What's in a Prague street name

Originally published on Twitter on 13 September 2022.

Fibichova was built in 1904.

From 1940 to 1945, this was Ševčíkova. Fibichova is to the right of Ševčíkova (https://whatsinapraguestreetname.com/2023/01/14/prague-3-day-142-sevcikova/). Except Current Ševčíkova wasn’t called Ševčíkova until 1947.

Blimey.

Zdeněk Fibich was born in Všebořice near Benešov in 1850. Encouraged by his music-loving (and Austrian) mother, he attended school in Vienna and in Malá Strana.

By the age of 15, he had composed over 64 pieces. At that same age, he contacted Karel Sabina (https://whatsinapraguestreetname.com/2022/11/24/prague-3-day-79-sabinova/), later putting his libretto Bukovina to music.

He became choirmaster and second conductor at the Provisional Theatre in 1876, and operatic dramaturg at the National Theatre in 1899.

Fibich had three wives. The first, Růžena Hanušová, died after two and a half years of marriage, and Fibich married her sister Betty, an opera singer.

He dedicated three of his operatic characters to her, but also left her in 1895 for his third wife.

Said third wife was Anežka Schulzová, who wrote the libretto for his opera Šárka.

However, Fibich died in 1900, and it’s Betty with whom he’s buried in Vyšehrad Cemetery.