What's in a Prague street name

Every street in Prague, one by one.

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I could talk about myself for ages, or I could point out that https://english.radio.cz/ed-ley-englishman-recording-stories-pragues-streets-one-one-8806941 is over two years old but still largely stands (other than the Twitter links).

Category: Prague 3

  • Prague 2, day 1: Italská

    Originally published on Twitter on 7 November 2022. Italská was created (though not built) in 1926. Italská was formed by joining parts of two other streets – Žižkova (built in 1889 – see multiple Prague 3 posts if you want to learn about Jan Žižka), and Divišova, built in 1884. Prokop Diviš (1698-1765) was a…

  • Prague 3, day 1, version 2.0: Hartigova

    Originally published on Twitter on 2 October 2023, one day after the street, formerly Koněvova (https://whatsinapraguestreetname.com/2022/11/18/prague-3-day-1-konevova/) , was officially renamed. Karel Hartig was born in Sedlčany, near Příbram, in 1833, and trained as a bricklayer, working, amongst other places, on the George of Poděbrady / Jiří z Poděbrad barracks, which we now know better as…

  • Prague 3, day 193: Dagmar Burešové

    Originally published on Twitter on 17 May 2023. Dagmar Burešové was definitely built in 2022 but only given a street sign in the last month in the spring of 2023. Dagmar Kubištová was born in Prague in 1929. Her father was a lawyer, and the entire family was strongly anti-communist. In 1950, she married a…

  • Prague 3, day 192: Orlická

    Originally published on Twitter on 1 November 2022. Orlická was built in 1911. The Orlické (‘Eagle’) Mountains are in north-east Bohemia; they’re named after the river Orlice, a tributary of the Elbe. Part of one of the Orlice’s own tributaries, Divoká Orlice (Wild Eagle), forms the Czech-Polish border. The three highest peaks in the range…

  • Prague 3, day 191: Velehradská

    Originally published on Twitter on 31 October 2022. Velehradská was built around 1860. Until 1896, the street was called U židovského hřbitova (At the Jewish Cemetery), as, until 1890, what is now Mahlerovy sady (which includes the Žižkov Television Tower) hosted the cemetery until it was moved (https://whatsinapraguestreetname.com/2022/11/28/prague-3-day-99-izraelska/) due to overcrowding. Velehrad, meanwhile, is a…

  • Prague 3, day 190: Milešovská

    Originally published on Twitter on 30 October 2022. Milešovská was built in 1896. Milešovka, 837 metres high, is the highest peak in the České Středohoří, the Central Bohemian Uplands, in northern Bohemia. Bronze objects and ceramics from the Bronze Age have been found near the mountain; they suggest there was a mountain cult of sorts.…

  • Prague 3, day 189: Náměstí Jiřího z Poděbrad

    Originally published on Twitter on 29 October 2022. Náměstí Jiřího z Poděbrad was built in 1896. It was called Krále Jiřího (King George) until 1948, and it’s fften known as Jiřák if you’re Czech, often known as J-zee-P if you’re a foreigner (guilty, and I’m from a country where we say ‘zed’). George of Poděbrady…

  • Prague 3, day 188: Laubova

    Originally published on Twitter on 28 October 2022. Laubova was built in 1896. Nikki Lauba (1949-2019) was a Formula One driver from the old Austro-Hungarian Empire. No, sorry, wait. Until 1952, the street was called Vilímovská, possibly after a vineyard. There’s a street with the same name in Dejvice. Ferdinand Laub was born in 1832…

  • Prague 3, day 187: Korunní

    Originally published on Twitter on 27 October 2022. Korunní was built in 1889. From 1956 to 1990, this was Wilhelma Piecka, after Wilhelm Pieck, first president of the GDR from 1949 until his death in 1960 (i.e. this is a rare case of somebody getting a street named after them during their lifetime). The rest…

  • Prague 3, day 186: U Vodárny

    Originally published on Twitter on 26 October 2022. U Vodárny was built in 1885. It was known as Gebauerova from 1940 to 1945, after Jan Gebauer (1838-1907), one of the most important Czech linguists. He famously exposed the Manuscripts of Dvůr Králové and Zelená Hora (which I really hope I get to write about one…

  • Prague 3, day 185: Nitranská

    Originally published on Twitter on 25 October 2022. Nitranská was built in 1889. Nitra, located 95 km east of Bratislava, is the fifth-largest city in Slovakia, with a population of 79,000. It’s also the oldest Slovak city, first mentioned in 828, but archeological items found there have been dated back more than 25,000 years. A…

  • Prague 3, day 184: Řipská

    Originally published on Twitter on 24 October 2022. Řipská was built in 1889. Říp is a hill, 461 metres high, located just south of Roudnice nad Labem, in the Ústí Region. According to legend, Forefather Čech (Praotec Čech) arrived here with his people and climbed the hill. He then told his brothers that this was…

  • Prague 3, day 183: Perunova

    Originally published on Twitter on 23 October 2022. Perunova was built in 1889. Perun is a Slavic god and quite the multitasker, being the god of the sky, thunder, lightning, storms, rain, law, war, fertility and oak trees. He’s analogous to Thor and Mars. There are multiple potential origins for his name – for example,…

  • Prague 3, day 182: Kolínská

    Originally published on Twitter on 22 October 2022. Kolínská was built in 1911. It was founded as a royal city, probably in the mid-1200s, by Přemysl Otakar II, because what wasn’t. There’s even a fresco in the Town Hall there, showing him supervising the construction (picture taken from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kolin_town_hall_fresco_1.png). In 1421, the city was captured…

  • Prague 3, day 181: Libická

    Originally published on Twitter on 21 October 2022. Libická was built in 1911. Libice nad Cidlinou, population 1,200, is a village in Nymburk district. It was first mentioned in 981, although archeological finds indicate that the land the village lies on was already inhabited in the Bronze Age. In the 10th century, the Slavník family…

  • Prague 3, day 180: Boleslavská

    Originally published on Twitter on 20 October 2022. Boleslavská was built in 1910. Stará Boleslav came into existence in the early 10th century, when the Přemyšlids built a castle here to guard their Central Bohemian domain. A church was built too, dedicated to Arab physicians and two Christian martyrs, Saints Cosmas and Damian. This church…

  • Prague 3, day 179: Květná

    Originally published on Twitter on 19 October 2022. Květná was built in 1930. ‘Květná’ is an adjective derived from the word ‘květ’, which means flower. This is also why ‘May’ in Czech is ‘květen’. However, it’s not an adjective I’ve ever seen elsewhere – ‘floral’ would typically be ‘květinový’ or, less typically, ‘květovaný’. The street…

  • Prague 3, day 178: Čáslavská

    Originally published on Twitter on 18 October 2022. Čáslavská was built in 1910. Čáslav, population 10,000, is a town in Central Bohemia, in the Kutná Hora district. It was founded in 1264 by Přemysl Otakar II, who I am just going to start assume founded everything, including me. Initially on the side of the Catholics…

  • Prague 3, day 177: Chrudimská

    Originally published on Twitter on 17 October 2022. Chrudimská was built in 1908. Chrudim, population 23,000, is the second-largest city in the Pardubice region. It was first mentioned in writing in 1055, when Břetislav I died there during a military campaign. A proper city was then constructed here starting in 1263, at the initiative of…

  • Prague 3, day 176: Hradecká

    Originally published on Twitter on 16 October 2022. I’m really rubbish at transferring these to the website so far. Hradecká was built in 1908. Hradec Králové (German: Königgrätz), population 91,000, literally translates as ‘Queen’s Castle’. It’s the capital of the eponymous region (Královéhradecký kraj in Czech, so… eponymous-ish), in north-East Bohemia. Originally just called Hradec…