5. PEOPLE WHO INFULNCED THE CZECH HISTORY

5. The Czech Republic – people who influenced the Czech history

• Who do you think the most influential personalities in your country were/are?

• Why do you think they are still remembered?

• Choose one or two and talk about them.

I hope that it isn’t possible to mention all influential personalities in Czech Republic, because each ruler, each known person brought to our country something. I have chosen mostly the politicians, because I hope that from the politician position is best to influence the histoy. I would like to mention the most famous and for me important persons:

Firstly, it is Frankish merchant Samo. It was ruler of the first known Slavic state in Central Europe, nowadays in Moravia.

After him, I hope the most famous ruler is Charles4th. He was one of the most important monarchs of the middle age. This Czech King of the Luxembourg dynasty even became the Holy Roman Emperor in the half of 14. Century. He is known for found Charles University, build the Charles bridge, which is the oldest bridge at Vltava and the castle Karlštejn.

Speaking about Charles University, another important man, professor and rector of the University is Jan Hus. He is mostly known as a critic of indulgences (odpustky). He tried to reform the Catholic Church and in 6.7.1415 he was burnt as a heretic. This day is the Czech state day.

Let’s move a bit further from middle age. I believe that for Czech state is important the first president of Czechoslovakia. It is Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk. He was a professor and member of Austrian imperial council. He supported democratic politics. We call The first republic a period of time from the formation of Czechoslovakia state (1918) to 1938.

In 1938 the Czechoslovakia was occupied by Nazi. Obviously, it wasn’t very welcome between Czech people, but there were few of them, who tried to fight. One of the symbol of ant-communist resistance is Milada Horáková. She joined the underground after the occupation. Because of her loud protests, she was arrested by the Gestapo. In 1950 there was a communist trial, where she was sentenced to death.

The reign of communism was stopped by the Velvet revolution in 1989: The leading figure of this was Vaclav Havel. He was on the first spokesmen of Charter 77 and after the revolution he became a president. He died in 2011.

Finally I would like to mention two men, who were awarded the Nobel Prize. It is Jaroslav Heyrovský the professor of chemistry for the new branch of electro-chemistry and a poet Jaroslav Seifret for his literature.

I hope that these people are still remembered, because they did something important for our country. Even it is to show, that it is important to fight or to build a centre of education. I hope that there will be more people like this in my generation.