Page:A history of Bohemian literature.pdf/417

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
400
A HISTORY OF BOHEMIAN LITERATURE

Prague, met Palacký in the street. Innumerable photographs of the great historian had rendered Breynek familiar with his features. He walked up to him, stating that he was a Moravian and a countryman. Palacký conversed affably with him for several minutes and then gave him his hand. This meeting became the principal event of Breynek's life. Every date was designated as having happened "before I met Palacký" or "after I met Palacký." He only regretted that he had been too shy "to kiss the hand that had written the history of his country." Palacký's History, as already noted, was published simultaneously in German and in Bohemian; the earliest volumes indeed at first appeared in the former language only. The book is therefore not so inaccessible as the works of the earlier Bohemian historians, from which I have given copious quotations. An English translation of Palacký's history of Bohemia is, however, still a desideratum.

With the exception of a short German biography of Dobrovský, most of Palacký's minor works are connected with his great History; some are the results of studies preparatory to the great work; others contain documentary evidence in support of statements made in the book; in others again, Palacký enters into controversies with some of the critics of his work. I shall mention some of the most important of these works. In the year 1829 the Bohemian Society of Sciences offered a prize for the best essay on the early historians of Bohemia. Palacký won this prize with his first historical work, entitled Würdigung der alten Böhmischen Geschichtschreiber. The book was written in German, and was first published in the Journal of the Bohemian Museum, that then appeared in German as well as in Bohemian. In 1830 it was re-