Czech national rebirth

The Czech national Renaissance ( České národní obrození in Czech) is a cultural movement born in the Czech countries with. The goal of the movement is to make reappear the Czech language, culture and the national identity. The most prominent personalities of the movement are Josef Dobrovský and Josef Jungmann.

Context

Following the Battle of the White Mountain in 1620, the Czech countries undergo the policy of Germanisation Habsbourg. The Czech is more or less eliminated from the administration, the literature, the schools, the Université of Prague and within the higher classes. The books written in Czech are burned and any publication in Czech is regarded as heretic by the Jésuites. The Czech language is reduced to means of communication between the peasants, generally illiterate. This is why the movement of Rebirth draws its inspiration among the ordinary Czechs of the countryside.

Big events

Josef Dobrovský publishes its Czech Grammaire in 1809. Josef Jungmann publishes its Dictionnaire tchèco-German in five volumes between 1834 and 1839.

These lexicographical works exert an important influence on the evolution of the Czech language. Jungmann combines the vocabulary of the period of the Bible of Kralice (1579-1613) with the language used by its contemporaries. It borrows from other Slavic languages of the words which do not exist (or more) in Czech and creates a certain number of neologisms. Jungman also inspires the development of a Czech language scientific, which makes possible the development of a research Czech original.

Less glorious, but revealing episode from this return to the sources of the language, the fortuitous discovery of the Handwritten of Dvůr Kralové and Zelená Hora, in 1817, feeds a intellectual debate during all the 19th century. Are they the oldest manuscripts known in Czech language? Or of false brilliances? Emblématiques of the movement of the Czech national Rebirth, it is not fortuitous that the polemic dies out with this one, the end of the century and the advent of the Czech middle-class at the stations - keys of the administration of the country.

1862 sees, under the impulse of Miroslav Tyrš, the birth of nationalist gymnic association Sokol.

With the rebirth of the language, the Czech culture refleurit. Czech institutions are established to celebrate the Czech history and the culture. The National theater opens its doors in 1883, and the National museum in 1890.

The cultural fight could not avoid the educational ground. A Czech professorship is gradually set up within the Université Charles of Prague: in 1863, on 187 cours given, 22 are it in Czech, the remainder being it in German. Into 1882, according to the pressure of the rising Czech middle-class and the reinforcement of the national feeling, the university (then called Carolo-Ferdinandea) is divided into two entities, one Czech, other allemande, completely independent one of the other. In 1909, the number of the students of the Karlo-Ferdinandova univerzita reached 4 300 whereas those of the Karl-Ferdinand Universität is of 1 800.

Consequences

Consequently of these patriotic efforts, the Czech found an official use in the Czech countries, and is now used by the majority of Czech. She is today official language in Czech Republic and in the European Union. Before the Czech national Rebirth, this language was likely to disappear because of German.

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