Czech nobility
Czech nobility consists of the
Noble titles were abolished by law (No. 61/1918 Sb. z. a n.)
History
The beginnings of the Czech nobility can be seen in the time of the first Přemyslid princes and kings, i.e. in the 9th century. As a legally defined state of nobility in the Czech lands, it arose in the course of the 13th century, when members of noble families began to own newly built stone castles. The influence of the nobility rose rapidly, which became the cause of a strained relationship between the king and the nobility during the last Přemyslid kings and especially during the reign of John of Bohemia and his grandson, Wenceslaus IV at the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries.[2] After the burning of Jan Hus in 1415, Czech society and therefore the Czech nobility was divided into two groups - Catholic and Hussite (later Protestant). Both groups were at war with each other both during the Hussite Wars and long after them. After the end of the Hussite Wars and the rule of the Luxembourgers in the 1530s, the country was controlled by various noble associations. In 1452, they agreed on a land administrator, who became the noble George of Poděbrady. Five years later he was elected King of Bohemia, but disputes between the Catholic and Protestant nobility continued until the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War in 1618. [3]
The status of the nobility further increased in 1500, when the Vladislav land constitution was issued. In 1526, Ferdinand I of Habsburg was elected King of Bohemia. He, along with his successors, tried to reduce the influence of the nobility. This process was interrupted during the reign of Rudolf II in the years 1576-1611. In 1618, the Protestant part of the Czech estates started the Bohemian Revolt by throwing imperial officials out of the windows of Prague Castle. Czech Protestants were defeated in the Battle of White Mountain in 1620, and the following year 27 leaders of this rebellion were executed. Thus, the Catholic aristocracy definitively won over the Protestant aristocracy in Bohemia, but at the same time the absolutist monarchy won over the estate monarchy.
During the
From the 17th century, only the Catholic Czech nobility significantly participated in the functioning of the Habsburg Monarchy. Newly arrived families gradually identified with the Czech lands and often also with the Czech language. At the end of the 18th century, a period called Josephinism began. His representative, the Emperor and King Joseph II (1780-1790), initiated extensive reforms that significantly changed the position of the nobility and reduced the number of aristocratic privileges. Part of the modernization of the country was also the prioritization of German at the expense of Czech (the purpose was more efficient state administration).
During the 19th century, the Czech nobility was significantly involved in the process of
After the First World War, the monarchy disappeared in the Czech lands and a republic was established. Most of the Czech nobility held monarchist positions, but remained loyal to the newly established Czechoslovak Republic. Some nobles even entered the service of the Czechoslovak Republic and worked in diplomacy (for example, representatives of the Lobkowitz, Schwarzenberg and others). The Czechoslovak Republic confiscated the property of the Habsburgs and Hohenbergs, and the Clam-Martinic family also lost their property. During the following years, the property was sold off and the Fürstenbergs, for example, left the country. [6]
The turning point occurred in 1938. In response to the direct threat to the democratic state by
In 1945, the properties of most Czech noble families were returned. However, there was a deportation of the majority of the population of German nationality, in which both the nobles who collaborated with the Nazis and the nobles who did not collaborate with the Nazis, but only claimed German nationality before the war, lost their property. For example, Trauttmansdorff,
In 1948, there was a
After the Velvet Revolution in 1989, properties seized by the communist regime were returned to their original owners. Members of the Czech nobility who emigrated abroad returned to their estates. Some subsequently returned to public life (for example, Karel Schwarzenberg as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Member of Parliament and Senator, Michal Lobkowitz as Minister of Defense and Member of Parliament, Tomáš Czernin as Senator). Other Czech nobles devote themselves, for example, to business, culture, science, the church, or knightly orders.[10]
Oldest noble families
The oldest founding families (numbering around twenty) of the Czech and Moravian nobility include:
- Buzici
- Benešovici
- Drslavici
- Hrabišici
- Hroznatovci
- Janovici
- Markvartici
- Ronovci
- Vítkovci
- Zierotins and others.[11]
List of important noble families
- Bavor of Strakonice
- Belcredi
- Bibra
- Boskowicz
- Bořek-Dohalský
- Bruntálský of Vrbno
- Bubna of Litice
- Chorinský of Ledská
- Clary-Aldringen
- Colloredo-Mannsfeld
- Czernin
- Chotek
- Deym of Střítež
- Dobřenský of Dobřenice
- Dubá
- Berka of Dubá
- Jelení
- Hildprandt
- Harrach
- Hradec
- Hohenberg
- Kamenický of Kamenice
- Kinsky
- Colditz
- Kolowrat
- Kaunitz
- Krajíř of Krajek
- Kravaře
- Kunštát
- Lichtenburg
- Liechtenstein
- Lanna
- Larisch
- Lichnowsky
- Lipá
- Lobkowicz
- Martinic
- Nostitz
- Paar
- Parish
- Pernštejn
- Piccolomini
- Poděbrady
- Přemyslid
- Rohan
- Ronovci
- Rosenberg
- Švihovský of Rýzmberk
- Slavata of Chlum
- Slavník
- Smiřický of Smiřice
- Schlick
- Schwarzenberg
- Sporck
- Sternberg
- Schwamberg
- Thun-Hohenstein
- Trčka of Lípa
- Tunkl of Brníčko
- Vítkovci
- Vlašim
- Vršovci
- Waldstein
- Wratislaw of Mitrovice
- Zajíc of Hazmburk
- Zedtwitz
- Zierotin
Gallery
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bishop of Prague and later a missionary among the Prussiansis for his life and deeds honoured as a patron saint of three countries
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Peter I of Rosenberg (?–1347), important politician and philanthropist, associated with the Book of Rosenberg, the oldest legal publication written in Czech
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innovative tactics, although blind, didn't lose a single battle
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George of Kunštát and Poděbrady (1420–1471), the only Bohemian lord who managed to gain the royal rank (via election), remembered especially for his proposal to create peaceful all-European union of Christian states
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Vojtěch I of Pernštejn (1490–1534), aristocratic magnate and supreme court master
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William of Rosenberg (1535–1592), an important statesman and philanthropist, a moderate representative of the Catholic nobility in the period before the Thirty Years' War
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Hagecius (1525–1600), astronomer, naturalist and personal physician of Emperor Rudolph II, who invited Brahe and Kepler at Prague to scientific collaboration
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Petr Vok of Rosenberg (1539–1611), the last descendant of powerful and wealth "viceroyal" Rosenberg family, benefactor of the oldest Protestant church Unity of the Brethren
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Kryštof Harant of Polžice and Bezdružice (1564–1621), writer, military leader, diplomat, traveler and composer, one of the leaders of the Estates Protestant uprising of 1618, executed after the Catholic victory in the Battle of White Mountain
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Albrecht Jan Smiřický of Smiřice (1594–1618), the wealthiest lord of its era, possible candidate to the Bohemian throne and one of main heads of the anti-Habsburg Bohemian Revolt
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Heřman Czernin of Chudenice (1576–1651), traveler, diplomat and politician, highest provincial court master and chamberlain
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Thirty Years War, the first holder of title generalissimoin history
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Czech history, her political engagement and intrigues have greatly helped forcible re-Catholization of Bohemia after 1620
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František Antonín Sporck (1662–1738), important benefactor and visionary, founder of the hospital in Kuks
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Habsburg Monarchy, initiator of the Diplomatic Revolution
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Josef I. Schwarzenberg (1722–1782), politician and philanthropist, founder of the Schwarzenberg Pension Institute for Employees
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Jan Rudolf Czernin of Chudenice (1757–1845), patron and art collector, president of the Academy of Sciences, supreme chamber and hofmeister
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Kašpar Maria of Sternberg (1761–1838), botanist, geologist, paleobotanist and founder of the Bohemian National Museum in Prague (1818)
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Josef Václav Radetzky von Radetz (1766–1858), Austrian field marshal and viceroy of Lombardy–Venetia, called the "Saviour of the House of Habsburg" during the revolution year of 1848 in Italy
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Karl Filip Schwarzenberg (1771–1820), diplomat and military leader, victor over Napoleon in the Battle of Leipzig
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Jiří Buquoy de Longueval (1781–1851), economist, writer, politician, businessman, inventor, founder of the first nature reserve in Bohemia
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František Antonín Kolovrat (1778–1861), politician, prime minister
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Vilemína Zaháňská von Sagan(1781–1839), salon owner, writer, supporter of the writer Božena Němcová
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Cardinal Bedřich Schwarzenberg (1809–1885), Archbishop of Salzburg and Prague, theologian, mountaineer, public figure, initiator of the completion of the St. Vitus Cathedral at Prague Castle
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František Ladislav Rieger (1818–1903), politician, co-founder of the National Party, knighted for his merits
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Emil Škoda (1839–1900), entrepreneur and engineer, founder of Škoda Works– one of the largest European industrial conglomerates of the 20th c., knighted for his merits
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Antonín Dvořák (1841–1904), one of the most important Czech and European music composers, knighted for his merits
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Bertha von Suttner (1843–1914), née Kinsky, peace activist and writer, the first woman awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (1905) and probably the most known noblewoman of Bohemian origin
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Žofie Chotková (Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg) (1868–1914), wife of the heir to the Austrian throne Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, assassinated in Sarajevo in 1914
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Alexander Kolowrat - Krakowský (1886–1927), car racer, aviator, owner of film studios and co-owner of the Laurin & Klement car company
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Adolf Schwarzenberg (1890–1950), businessman, anti-Nazi
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Jindřich Kolowrat-Krakowský (1897–1996), diplomat, politician, philanthropist, anti-Nazi
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Zdeněk Bořek Dohalský (1900–1945), journalist and anti-Nazi resistance fighter, executed by the Nazis in 1945
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Jiří Stránský (1931–2019), writer, screenwriter, translator
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Karel Schwarzenberg (1937–2023), politician, businessman, philanthropist and fighter for human rights
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František Kinský (born 1947), producer, moderator and regional politician
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František Václav Lobkowicz (1948–2022), Roman Catholic priest, bishop of Ostrava-Opava
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Tomáš Czernin (born 1962), businessman and politician, senator
Notes
- ^ Exact wording of this "Law of 10 December 1918, which abolished the nobility, medals and titles" is available on the Czech Wikisource
- ^ Loužecký, Jan Drocár a Pavel. "Historická šlechta – život po meči a po přeslici". historickaslechta.cz (in Czech). Retrieved 23 July 2022.
- ^ Mezník, Jaroslav (1990). Česká a moravská šlechta ve 14. a 15. století (in Czech). Prague: Historický ústav ČSAV.
- ISBN 978-80-200-2364-3.
- ISBN 80-86781-08-9.
- ^ "Pár slov o české šlechtě v éře První republiky - Blog iDNES.cz". iDNES.cz (in Czech). Retrieved 23 July 2022.
- ISBN 978-80-7422-520-8.
- ISBN 978-80-88433-02-6.
- ^ "Dědic Lichtenštejnska: Morava je náš druhý domov, majetkové spory překonáme - Seznam Zprávy". seznamzpravy.cz. Retrieved 23 July 2022.
- ^ "Modrá krev" (in Czech). Czech Television. Retrieved 23 July 2022.
- ^ "Historicka Slechta" (in Czech). n.d. Archived from the original on 4 May 2010.
Further reading
- von Dobrá Voda, Adalbert Král (1904). Der Adel von Böhmen, Mähren und Schlesien [Aristocracy of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia] (PDF) (in German). Prag: I. Taussig. Retrieved 14 February 2016.
- von Meraviglia-Crivelli, Rudolf Johann (1886). Der böhmische Adel [Bohemian Aristocracy] (PDF) (in German). Nürnberg: Bauer und Raspe. Retrieved 14 February 2016.
- von Kadich, Heinrich Edlen; Blažek, Conrad (1899). Der mährische Adel [Moravian Aristocracy] (PDF) (in German). Nürnberg: Bauer und Raspe. Retrieved 14 February 2016.
- Blažek, Conrad (1887–1894). Der abgestorbene Adel der Provinz Schlesien und der O. Lausitz [Extinct Aristocracy of the Province of Silesia and Upper Lusatia] (in German). Vol. I–III. Nürnberg: Bauer und Raspe.
- Pilnáček, Josef (2010). Rody starého Slezska [Families of Ancient Silesia] (in Czech) (3rd ed.). Brno: Ivo Sperát. ISBN 978-80-904312-3-2.