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A HISTORY OF BOHEMIAN LITERATURE

Croatian languages, and some minor dialects. The second part contains the history of the Polish and Bohemian literatures, and notes on the now nearly extinct dialects of the Slavs of Northern Germany. The book became antiquated even during Šafařik's lifetime, and he planned a new revised and enlarged edition, which was to have been published in Bohemian. Failing health and other occupations prevented Šafařik from carrying out this work. Even in its first state the book, which was only reprinted after Šafařik's death, long remained the standard authority on the little-known subject of which it treats. It is only since Mr. Pypin and Mr. Spasovič published in 1865 their (Russian) History of the Slav Literatures that Safařik's work can be considered as superseded. Another fruit of Šafařik's residence in the South Slav countries was his Serbische Lesekörner, an historical and critical analysis of the then little-known Servian language. This book also was written in German.

During his stay at Prague, Šafařik produced his most important work, which rendered him famous in all Slav countries. I refer to the Starožitnosti Slovanské ("Slavic Antiquity"), which was published in 1837. The book—written in Bohemian—is an attempt to record the history and culture of the Slavs in the earliest times. The subject, still very obscure, was then entirely unexplored. Šafařik intended the work to consist of two parts, but only the first, which is purely historical, was completed. Of the second part, only some essays on the ancient ethnography and archæology of the Slavs were published. The historical work, which Šafařik again divided into two parts, deals, in the first, with the history of the Slav race from the time of Herodotus to the fall of the West Roman empire. The second part continues