OTTAKAR II., or PREMYSL OTTAKAR II. (C. 1230-1278), king of Bohemia, was son of King Wenceslaus I. ; his maternal grandfather was the German king, Philip, duke of Swabia. In his father's lifetime he ruled Moravia, and in 1251 secured his election as duke of Austria, where he strengthened his position by marrying (Feb. II, 1252) Margaret (d. 1267), sister of Duke Frederick II., the last of the Babenbergs and widow of the German king, Henry VII. In Sept. 1253 he succeeded his father in Bohemia, and in 1254 concluded peace with Bela IV. of Hun gary, who had claimed Styria, advancing the Austrian frontier to the present line. In 1259 he expelled the Hungarians from the rest of Styria, then divorced his wife, married a granddaughter of Bela IV. and secured his investiture (by letter) with Austria and Styria from the German king, Richard Cornwallis.
In 1269 Ottakar II. inherited Carinthia and part of Carniola;
and having made good his claim, contested by the Hungarians, in battle, he was the most powerful prince in Germany when an election for the German throne took place in 1273. The electors, however, fearing his power, chose Rudolph of Habsburg, who in 1276 placed Ottakar under the ban, besieged Vienna, and com gelled Ottakar to renounce all his possessions except Bohemia and Moravia. (See AUSTRIA.) Ottakar was killed at Diirnkrut on the March, Aug. 26, 1278, in an attempt to recover his lands. Clever, strong and handsome, he is a famous figure both in history and in legend, and is the subject of a tragedy by F. Grillparzer, Konig Ottokars Gluck and Ende.
See 0. Lorenz, Geschtchte Konig Ottokars, ii. (Vienna, i866) ; and F. Palacky, Geschichte von &Amen, vol. i. (Prague, 1844).