What's in a Prague street name

Originally published on X on 26 January 2023.

Sekaninova was built in 1892.

Until 1947, this was Přemyslovo nábřeží (Přemysl Embankment), after Přemysl Oráč, or Přemysl the Ploughman, husband of Libuše and ancestor of the Přemyslid dynasty.

Ivan Sekanin was born in Nové Město na Moravě in 1900.

He studied law at Charles University and joined the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party (which was a democratic socialist party and not affiliated with the Nazi Party).

He moved left and joined the Communist Party in 1925. As a lawyer, he went about protecting Communists from justice.

He joined and/or several communist / anti-fascist organisations, including the Left Front / Levá fronta), the Communist Party’s grouping of intellectuals.

In 1938, he was one of the organisers of Věrni zůstaneme, an anti-Nazi petition committee.

As soon as the Nazis established the Protectorate in March 1939, Sekanin was arrested and sent to Pankrác, then to Berlin.

A political trial, due to be held there, was cancelled, and he was sent to Sachsenhausen, where he died in May 1940, aged 39.