PALACKÝ’S HISTORY OF THE CZECH NATION
inseparable constituent of every work about František Palacký or his History: “The German world built its sceptre on the ruins of world-ruling Rome . . . . As the German was aggressively attaching himself to the heritage of old Rome, the temperate Slav was silently following him and sat next to him. Therefore the contents and the basic trait of the history of Bohemia and Moravia is the incessant intercourse and the ceaseless conflicts between Slavic principles on the one hand and the German and Roman ones on the other hand.”8
This basic idea of the purpose of Czech history reappears in the rewritten sixth section of the second book, titled “A Picture of Common Czech life under Heathenism.” In this section, Palacký inserted all of his ideas on the basic differences between the Czech and German nations. These are based on great discrepancies in national character and primary culture. Palacký also inserted his romantic notions about the way of life, religion, and character of the ancient Slavs. Beginning on page 198 (page 166 in the German text), we can observe the two texts merging to some extent, even though later the Czech narrative is clearly much richer in detail and in many places strongly anti-German.9
Also part two, which describes the reign of Přemysl Otakar II, acquired numerous new passages. In these added segments, Palacký gives an extensive characterization of Přemysl’s personality and evaluates his attempt at colonization. In addition, Palacký ponders the subject of Otakar’s relationship with the Czech nobility. On the basis of new sources, he also explains the correct choice of Rudolf Habsburg as the German king and the reasons for Přemysl’s collapse. The national coloration of these passages is underlined by a detailed interpretation of a document sent by Přemysl to the Polish nobility, asking for help and calling for Slavic unity against the “influx of Germanism.”10
In addition to these greater compositional changes, the text is also enriched by a number of smaller additions: new sentences, aphorisms, and minute characterizations which not only betray the author’s attitude toward the historical matter, but also play an educational and informative function.”11
The change in the title of the work is an example of the historico-philosophical type of change. While the German version gives an account of the history of Bohemia—Geschichte von Böhmen—the Czech version is dedicated to the history of the Czech nation. Therefore, in the former case the country (Böhmen), and in the latter the nation of Czechs (Čechen) is the subject of the scholarly work. In the first two books of part one of the German edition, we can detect the precise differentiation between
