What's in a Prague street name

Originally published on X on 22 January 2024.

You know where Kraków is. Like me, you may also be wondering when people stopped spelling it ‘Cracow’ in English (full disclosure: I was never a fan of that spelling).

Kraków is named after Krakus, the alleged founder of the city (and its castle, Wawel), who apparently defeated a dragon living at the foot of Wawel Hill by feeding it fake sheep filled with stones.

Krakus’ name is noticeably similar to that of Krok: https://whatsinapraguestreetname.com/2024/08/23/prague-2-day-93-libusina/

Back when the Prague’s New Town, where this street is located, was founded in 1348, Wawel was where Polish kings were crowned, and the king of Poland was Casimir III the Great / Kazimierz III Wielki, founder of what is now known as the Jagiellonian University – Poland’s oldest.

He also had a new district of Kraków named after him – Kazimierz. This was the centre of Jewish life in Kraków, and, if you’ve been to the city as a tourist, it’s likely that you spent a good portion of your time there.

Anyway, when Charles IV founded Prague’s New Town, he arranged for merchants to move over from Kraków, and they settled round here, hence the street name.

Kraków is somewhere I only ever seem to go when I have a lot of work to do, so my pics over the years are limited, but here are some, including a mildly amusing instruction on how to close the door in your hotel room from 2014.