In , Tyl became politically active and was briefly a member of the Austrian parliament in Vienna. Because he fought for the independence of the Czech nation from the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, he was later marked as politically unreliable by the authorities and expelled from the Estates Theatre. He wanted to found his own traveling theatre company but his request was rejected, so in 1851 he joined an existing one and left for a tour, together with his family. Yet the theatre company did not fare well, and the Tyl family ended up in poverty. In 1856, during his theatre's stay in Pilsen, the 48 years old Tyl died of an unknown illness and was buried at a local cemetery.