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Bohemia (green) within the Czech Republic today.

Bohemia ( ; ; ; ; ) is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands, currently the Czech Republicmarker. In a broader meaning, it often refers to the entire Czech territory, including Moravia and Czech Silesia, especially in historical contexts, such as the Kingdom of Bohemia.

Bohemia has an area of 52,750 km² and today is home to 6.25 million of the Czech Republic's 10.3 million inhabitants. It is bordered by Germanymarker to the southwest, west, and northwest, Polandmarker to the north-east, the Czech historical region of Moravia to the east, and Austriamarker to the south. Bohemia's borders are marked with mountain ranges such as the Bohemian Forestmarker, the Ore Mountainsmarker, and the Krkonoše within the Sudeten mountains.


Coat of Arms of Bohemia

Ancient Bohemia

Roman authors provide the first clear reference to this area as Boiohaemum, from Germanic Boi-Heim, "home of the Boii", a Celtic people. As part of the territory often crossed during the Migration Period by major Germanic and Slavic tribes, the western half was conquered and settled from the 1st century BC by Germanic (probably Suebic) peoples including the Marcomanni; the elite of some Boii then migrated west to modern Switzerland and southeastern Gaul. Those Boii that remained in the eastern part were eventually absorbed by the Marcomanni. Part of the Marcomanni, renamed the Bavarians (Baiuvarum), later migrated to the southwest. It should be noted that, although the leading tribes changed, there was a large degree of continuity in the actual population, and at no time was there a wholesale depopulation or change in ethnic stock.

After the Bavarian emigration, Bohemia was partially repopulated around the sixth century by the Slavic precursors of today's Czechs, though the exact amount of Slavic immigration is a subject of debate. The Slavic influx was divided into two or three waves. The first wave came from the southeast and east, when the Germanic Langobards left Bohemia (circa 568 AD). Later immigrants came from the Black Sea region, as shown by Iranian place names as "Dudleb" (today in Prachens region, South Bohemia) and "Charvat" (Choroathos). Soon after, from the 630s to 660s, the territory was taken by Samo's tribal confederation. His death marked the end of the old "Slavonic" confederation, the second attempt to establish such a Slavonic union after Carantania in Carinthia.

Other sources (Descriptio civitatum et regionum ad septentrionalem plagam Danubii, Bavaria, 800-850) divide the population of Bohemia at this time into the Merehani, Marharaii, Beheimare (Bohemani) and Fraganeo. (The suffix -ani or -ni means "people of-"). The great tribes of Dudleb, Lemuz and Charvat are missing from this list, which shows a linguistic and cultural shift from Sarmatian in favor of Slavonic dialects, a common occurrence in nomadic immigrations. The first religions of these "Bohemians" are unclear, although some Iranian religion-inspired cults (for example, the god Mihr) have been discovered in extant graves (from Pohořelice, Kal, Mikulčicemarker in the 8th century), and a temple of the Fire called Žīži in the center of Fragamarker. Christianity first appeared in the early 9th century, but became dominant much later, in the 10th or 11th century.


Přemysl dynasty

The Coat of arms of the Bohemian King and Kingdom.





Luxembourg dynasty

The House of Luxembourg accepted the invitation to the Bohemian throne with the crowning of John I of Bohemia in 1310. His son, Charles IV became King of Bohemia in 1346. He founded Charles University in Prague, central Europe's first university, two years later. His reign brought Bohemia to its peak both politically and in total area, resulting in his being the first King of Bohemia to also be elected as Holy Roman Emperor. Under his rule the Bohemian crown controlled such diverse lands as Moravia, Silesia, Upper Lusatiamarker and Lower Lusatiamarker, Brandenburgmarker, an area around Nurembergmarker called New Bohemia, Luxembourgmarker, and several small towns scattered around Germany.

Hussite Bohemia






Habsburg Monarchy

After the death of King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in the Battle of Mohácsmarker in 1526, Archduke Ferdinand of Austriamarker became King of Bohemia and the country became a constituent state of the Habsburg Monarchy.

Bohemia enjoyed religious freedom between 1436 and 1620, and became one of the most liberal countries of the Christian world during that period of time. In 1609, Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II who made Praguemarker again the capital of the Empire at the time, himself a Roman Catholic, was moved by the Bohemian nobility to publish Maiestas Rudolphina, which confirmed the older Confessio Bohemica of 1575.






Twentieth century

Bohemia within Czechoslovakia in 1928.
After World War I, Bohemia (as the biggest and most populated land) became the core of the newly-formed country of Czechoslovakiamarker, which combined Bohemia, Moravia, Austrian Silesiamarker, Upper Hungary (present-day Slovakiamarker) and Carpathian Rutheniamarker into one state. Under its first president, Tomáš Masaryk, Czechoslovakia became a rich and liberal democratic republic.

Following the Munich Agreement in 1938, the border regions of Bohemia inhabited predominantly by ethnic Germans (Sudetenland) were annexed to Nazi Germany; this was the only time in Bohemian history that its territory was divided. The remnants of Bohemia and Moravia were then annexed by Germany in 1939, while the Slovak lands became the Slovak Republic, a client state of Nazi Germany. From 1939 to 1945 Bohemia (without the Sudetenland) formed with Moravia the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia (Reichsprotektorat Böhmen und Mähren). After World War II ended in 1945, the vast majority of remaining Germans were expelled. After World War II Czechoslovakia was re-established. In 1946, the Communist Party strongly subsidized by the Soviet Union (due to an agreement amongst the Allies, Patton's armies did not enter Prague and the city had to liberate itself before being officially liberated by the Soviet Red Army) won elections. In February 1948 the Communists ousted the remaining democratic ministers from the government in a coup d'état.
Beginning in 1949, Bohemia ceased to be an administrative unit of Czechoslovakia, as the country was divided into administrative regions. Between 1949 and 1989 Czechoslovakia (from 1960 officially called Czechoslovak Socialistic Republic) became a Soviet satellite even though there wasn't a Soviet army present (interestingly enough, surrounding countries including Eastern Austria were occupied by the Red Army) until Czechoslovak Communist Party started to reform and democratize itself in 1968. This "Prague Spring" process was stopped abruptly by an invasion of 'brotherly' armies of Warsaw Pact in August 1968. In 1989, Agnes of Bohemia became the first saint from a Central European country to be canonized by Pope John Paul II before the "Velvet Revolution" later that year. After the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1993 (the "Velvet Divorce"), the territory of Bohemia became part of the new Czech Republicmarker.

The Czech constitution from 1992 refers to the "citizens of the Czech Republic in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia" and proclaims continuity with the statehood of the Bohemian Crown. Bohemia is not currently an administrative unit of the Czech Republic. Instead, it is divided into the Praguemarker, Central Bohemianmarker, Plzeň, Karlovy Vary, Ústí nad Labem, Liberecmarker, and Hradec Králové Regions, as well as parts of the Pardubice, Vysočinamarker, South Bohemianmarker and South Moravianmarker Regions.

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