The university is the oldest in Moravia and the second oldest in the Czech Crown lands. Its foundation was an important element of the Counter-Reformation in Moravia, as the church of Rome began its fight back against Protestantism. Roughly 90% of the population of the Czech lands was already Protestant by the time the took over the throne in 1526. The Protestant Hussites were working for the provision of universal education, which was a particular challenge for the Catholics. By the middle of the century there was not a single town without a Protestant school in the Czech lands, and many had more than one, mostly with two to six teachers each. In Jihlava, a principal Protestant center in Moravia, there were six schools: two Czech, two German, one for girls and one teaching in Latin, which was at the level of a high / grammar school, lecturing on Latin, Greek and Hebrew, Rhetorics, Dialectics, fundamentals of Philosophy and fine arts, as well as religion according to the Lutheran Augustana. With the University of Prague also firmly in hands of Protestants, the local Catholic church was unable to compete in the field of education. Therefore, the Jesuits were invited, with the backing of the Catholic Habsburg rulers, to come to the Czech lands and establish a number of Catholic educational institutions, foremost the Academy in Prague and the one in Olomouc.