Bohemia

a province of the Austrian Empire. It lies between Bavaria and Saxony. It takes its name from the Boii, a German tribe known in the time of Caesar, and heim the German word for home; but the Bohemians are a Slavonic people who crowded in later. They are related to the Moravians, the Poles, and the Hungarians. They have a language no German can understand, and a literature no German can read: In 1348 they founded the University of Prague. Huss and Jerome, the great heretics and reformers, labored for the Bohemians in their own language, as Luther did in German and Wyclif in English. The native language of Comenius was Bohemian. In 1620 there were eighteen printing presses in Prague alone.

Although the boundaries of Bohemia are marked by mountain ranges of greater or less height the country has always been subject to invasion. Independence was never maintained continuously. The House of Austria, in particular, claimed a sort of overlordship. Ferdinand I acquired a legal right to the Bohemian crown by marriage with Anne of Bohemia. In 1627 Ferdinand II declared Bohemia a purely catholic and hereditary kingdom of the empire. Bohemia suffered terribly during the Thirty Years' War. By political and religious persecution, 30,000 families were driven away. Some authorities claim that as high as 70,000 men, including the Hussite clergy and the nobility of Bohemia, were driven westward to Amsterdam and other cities, much as the Huguenots were expelled from France.

Although the people became essentially Catholic, the Bohemians have always been restless under Austrian domination. In 1848, the year of revolutions, the Bohemians rose, but did not succeed at this time in accomplishing much. Bohemian discontent manifested itself again in 1859, following on the expulsion of Austria from Lombardy. In the reorganization that followed the close of the Six Weeks' War, by which Austria was driven out of the German Confederation, the present arrangement was perfected.

Bohemia is now a province of the Austrian Empire. The Bohemians elect 130 members of the Austrian lower house. The management of local affairs is intrusted to a local or provincial diet of 242 members. The members are elected for six years. The election is far from democratic. The clergy, the universities, the great land owners, and the cities are given representation. The diet regulates local taxes, agriculture, education, church, and charitable institutions, and public works. The Bohemians are far from satisfied. The present contention is that Bohemia, like Hungary, shall be recognized as an independent kingdom of Austria-Hungary.

Geographically, Bohemia belongs with Saxony to the north. Its waters flow chiefly to the Baltic. It has about 20,051 square miles of territory, equivalent to that of New Hampshire and Vermont. The population in 1900 was 6,318,697, of whom 2,000,000 were Germans, 90,000 Jews, and the rest Bohemians. It is one of the most fertile regions in Europe. The plains produce the usual small grains, flax, hops, fruits, and vegetables in abundance. The mountains yield graphite, coal, copper, lead, tin, zinc, iron, silver, and building stone. Bohemian lace and ribbons are celebrated. During the winter, when there is no field work, the peasant women earn eighteen or twenty cents a day making lace. There are pottery and porcelain works. Bohemian cut glass is the finest in the world. The best test tubes, graduates, and other laboratory glassware are obtained from Bohemia. It rivals Bavaria in the production of beer. See Prague; Austria; Huss