The Czech Manuscripts is dedicated to one of the most important literary forgeries on the model of Macpherson's Ossianic poetry. The Queen's Court and Green Mountain Manuscripts, discovered in 1817 and 1818, went on to play an outsized role in the Czech National Revival, functioning as founding texts of the national mythology and serving as sacred works in the long period when they were considered genuine. A successful literary forgery tells a lot about what a culture wants and needs at a particular moment. One fascinating aspect of this story is how a successful fake was able to function in an integral way as part of the Czech cultural revival of the nineteenth century, both because it played to expectations and nationalist values and because it met real cultural needs in many ways better than genuine historical literary works and artefacts. Also fascinating is the vainglorious Václav Hanka, a prolific and dedicated forger who was likely the center of the conspiratorial ring that created the manuscripts and who went on as the librarian of the Czech National Museum to alter a number of others. David Cooper analyzes what made the Manuscripts a convincing imitation of their Serbian and Russian models. He looks at how translation shaped their composition and at the benefit ofexamining them as pseudotranslations, and investigates the quasi-religious rituals and commemorative practices that developed around them. The Czech Manuscripts brings the Czech experience into the broader developments of European history.

"The present volume of MSP's Czech Translations Series brings the first scholarly edition in English of the so-called Manuscripts, Czech literary forgeries of the early nineteenth century whose creation and reception represent one of the more remarkable episodes of Romantic forgery. The rich documentation here includes a selection of reviews and polemical articles that the Manuscripts provoked, showing their long term cultural significance and impact, including the central role they played in the development of Czech national consciousness. The annotated translation enables contemporary readers to experience their aesthetic force and perceive the qualities that linked Czech culture to the broad stream of European cultural developments"--

Was Israel founded by Czechoslovakia? A History of Czechs and Jews examines this question and the resulting findings are complex. Czechoslovakia did provide critical, secret military sponsorship to Israel around 1948, but this alliance was short-lived and terminated with the Prague Trial of 1952. Israel’s "Czech guns" were German as much as Czech, and the Soviet Union strongly encouraged Czechoslovakia’s help for Israel. Most importantly however, the Czechoslovak-Israeli military cooperation was only part of a much larger picture. Since the mid-1800s, Czechs and Jews have been systematically comparing themselves to each other in literature, music, politics, diplomacy, media, and historiography. A shared perception of similar fates of two small nations trapped between East and West, in constant existential danger, helped forge a Czech-Jewish "national friendship" amid periods of estrangement. Yet, this Czech-Jewish national friendship, an idea that can be traced from Masaryk and Kafka via Weizman and Ben Gurion to Havel and Netanyahu, was more myth than reality. Relations were often mixed and highly dependent on larger historical developments affecting Central Europe and the Middle East. As the Czech Republic emerges as Israel’s main EU ally, this book provides a timely analysis of this old-new alliance and is essential reading for students and scholars with an interest in History and Jewish Studies.

With the fall of socialism in Europe, the former East bloc nations experienced a rebirth of nationalism as they struggled to make the difficult transition to a market-based economy and self-governance. The dissolution of Czechoslovakia, in particular, underscored the power of ethnic identity and ancestral loyalties.Hugh Agnew develops the argument that Czechoslovakia's celebrated national revival of the mid-eighteenth century has its intellectual roots in the Enlightenment and defined the nation's character and future development. He describes how intellectuals in eighteenth-century Bohemia and Moravia-the "patriotic intelligentsia"-used their discovery of pre-seventeenth-century history and literature to revive the antiquated Czech vernacular and cultivate a popular ethnic consciousness. Agnew also traces the significance of the intellectual influences of the wider Slavic world whereby Czech intellectuals redefined their ethnic and cultural heritage.Origins of the Czech National Renascence contributes to a renewed interpretation of a crucial period in Czech history.

The Latin-English bilingual volume presents the text of The Chronicle of the Czechs by Cosmas of Prague. Cosmas was born around 1045, educated in Liège, upon his return to Bohemia, he got married as well as became a priest. In 1086 he was appointed prebendary, a senior member of clergy in Prague. He completed the first book of the Chronicle in 1119, starting with the creation of the world and the earliest deeds of the Czechs up to Saint Adalbert. In the second and third books Cosmas presents the preceding century in the history of Bohemia, and succeeds in reporting about events up to 1125, the year when he died. The English translation was done by Petra Mutlova and Martyn Rady with the cooperation of Libor Švanda. The introduction and the explanatory notes were written by Jan Hasil with the cooperation of Irene van Rensvoude.T

Frances Starn is a writer living in Berkeley, California. --Book Jacket.

The author examines the Jewish experience of the past two hundred years in Bohemia and Moravia (the present day Czech Republic), including history, myth, demograohics, biography, culture and politics.