Bohemian angle

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The Bohemian Angle (Czech: Český koutek , also Český koutek v Kladsku ; Polish: Czeski Zakątek ) is a small historical area in the west of the former County of Glatz . Until 1477 the area belonged to the Nachod rule in the Königgrätzer Kreis . At that time it was incorporated as the “Bohemian side” into the already existing Hummel dominion and together with this in the same year into the also Bohemian County of Glatz. After the First Silesian War in 1742 and finally after the Peace of Hubertusburg in 1763, the area fell to Prussia together with the County of Glatz .

history

The name Bohemian Angle came into being after the formerly Bohemian area was transferred to Prussia in 1763. Originally the name was applied to the entire “Bohemian side” of the Hummel manor . However, since the parish of Lewin was Germanized much earlier due to its proximity to the former "German side" of the Hummel district, the name Bohemian Angle has been mainly used only for the villages along the Bohemian border since the end of the 19th century. It was important that the villages Schlaney and Brzesowie / Birkhagen belonged to the parish of the Bohemian Náchod until 1780 and the property of these villages partly belonged to the city of Náchod until 1945. In contrast, the parish Tschorbeney with the associated localities Kudowa , Strausseney with the colony Bukowine / Tannhübel ( Bukowina Kłodzka ) and Jakobowitz belonged to the Bohemian rule Neustadt an der Mettau from 1580 to 1785 . Folklorist Josef Štefan Kubín , who dealt with the history and population of the Bohemian Angle at the beginning of the 20th century, also includes Blasewey ( Błażejów ), Gellenau and Sackisch . In addition, in Heuscheuergebiet villages located Passendorf with the colony Brunn Kress and Nauseney that should be at that time was still largely tschechischsprachig and former Nachod had also belongs to the rule.

The geographical and hydrogeographic conditions probably also played a role in the naming. While the Kłodzko Basin is surrounded by mountains, its western area is geographically open to Bohemia and was therefore more easily accessible from there than from the district town of Kłodzko . In addition, the border between the “German” and “Bohemian” parts of the Hummel district ran along the mountain ridge, which also forms a watershed . The Reinerzer Weistritz drains east into the Oder and thus to the Baltic Sea . In contrast, the rivers on the “Bohemian side” ( Schnelle , Tscherbeeyer Bach , Sichler Bach and Stekelnice ) flow west into the Mettau , which flows into the Elbe and thus the North Sea .

The traditionally good relationship with the nearest Bohemian town of Náchod, which, in contrast to the district town of Glatz, is only a few kilometers away and was easily accessible, was also of importance for the naming “Bohemian Angle”.

In contrast to other localities in the Kłodzko Land, a large part of the population of the Bohemian Angle spoke not only German but also an ancient Czech, which is known as Kłodzko Czech . In addition, most of the residents lacked knowledge of the written Czech language. This peculiarity is explained by the fact that with the annexation of the Glatzer Land to Prussia in 1763, the inhabitants of the Bohemian Angle also became Prussian citizens and the border line to Bohemia was now a state border. As a result, the Czech idiom of the autochthonous population of the Bohemian Angle no longer took part in the development of the Czech language.

20th century

After the collapse of Austria-Hungary in 1918, the newly founded Czechoslovakia made claims to the entire Kłodzko area . Thereupon the Association for Glatzer Heimatkunde called for rallies to fend off the territorial claim of Czechoslovakia. Numerous protests were written in 1919 with the so-called Glatzer plebiscite , including to the American President Wilson . At its instigation, the Allies sent a commission to investigate popular opinion in the Kłodzko region. After the latter had convinced themselves of the resolute and unequivocal attitude of the people of Glatzer to remain with Germany, the claims of Czechoslovakia were rejected by the Paris Peace Conference in 1921. The majority of the inhabitants of the Bohemian Angle also professed their Germanship and in numerous political rallies spoke out clearly against joining Czechoslovakia. As early as 1864, residents of the Böhmischer Winkel had founded a Prussian military association, which was primarily dedicated to maintaining military tradition on a German-patriotic basis.

Even after the Kłodzko Land together with Silesia fell to Poland as a result of the Second World War in 1945 , Czechoslovakia repeated its claims to the entire Kłodzko Land . Since their implementation did not appear to be very successful, they primarily only demanded the area of ​​the Bohemian Angle. The claim was justified with the still recognizable ethnic affiliation of part of the population and their friendly and family relationships with the area on the other side of the border. In Nachod, the Kłodzko Committee ( Kladská komise ) was founded on May 9, 1945 and the Association of Kłodzko Friends ( Svaz přátel Kladska ) on October 18, 1945, and the National Committee for the Kłodzko Land in Prague . The Prague literary scholar Václav Černý led a delegation of some Czech citizens from the Bohemian Angle to President Edvard Beneš in Prague in the summer of 1945 , with the aim of annexing this border area with Czechoslovakia. In 1946, several Czech publications appeared, including Kladský sborník , edited by Václav Černý, which reported on the folklore and peculiarities of the Czech dialect in the Bohemian corner. In this context, the works of the writer Alois Jirásek , who came from the Bohemian Hronov near the border and who had strong patriotic and family ties to the area of ​​the Bohemian Angle, also acquired political significance . The villages of Schlaney ( Slaney ) and Strausseney ( Stroužné ) play an important role in his four-volume home novel “U nás” . A signature campaign initiated by the Kłodzko Committee in 1945 for the incorporation of the Bohemian Angle into Czechoslovakia met with determined and aggressive resistance from the Poles.

In 1946, the majority of the Germans in the Bohemian Angle were expelled by the Polish authorities to West Germany or what was then the Soviet occupation zone . Numerous residents had already fled across the nearby border to Czechoslovakia, where they were supported by the Czech Glatzer Committee and provided with housing and work, and some of their descendants still live there today. They describe their experiences at that time in a publication that appeared in 2017. On the initiative of the Glatzer Committee and with the support of the Czech authorities, a Czech-language school was set up in Kudowa-Zdrój from the school year 1947 onwards for the German residents of the Bohemian Angle who remained in their homeland , which was initially attended by 165 children from Kudowa and the surrounding villages. At the end of the 1951/52 school year, however, at the endeavors of the Germans who stayed behind, it was dissolved by the Polish authorities and continued as a school with German as the language of instruction in the Zakrze district . After most of the German residents who had not been displaced were resettled to the Federal Republic by way of family reunification in the 1950s , the school was closed in 1960.

literature

  • Wolfgang Mader: The western corner of the county of Glatz. In: Colorful pictures from the Silesian region. 1st volume. 2nd revised and increased edition. Woywod, Breslau 1898, p. 300.
  • Franz Albert: The County of Glatz is not a Czech country! A German wake-up call. 2nd Edition. Publishing house of the Verein für Glatzer Heimatkunde, Glatz 1921 ( Glatzer Heimatschriften 7, ZDB -ID 2520906-1 ).
  • Josef Št. Kubín: České Kladsko. Nástin lidopisný. Národopisné Společnosti ČSL, Prague 1926 ( Narodopis lidu českoslovanského 2, ZDB -ID 415322-4 ).
  • Franz Albert: The history of the Hummel rule and its neighboring areas. First part: The rule of Hummel up to the year 1477. Self-published by the author, Münster 1932.
  • Václav Černý : Kladský sborník . Druzstevní Práce, Prague 1946 ( Svět. Nova rada 45, ZDB -ID 2241964-0 ).
  • Milič Čapek: A key to Czechoslovakia. The territory of Kladsko (Glatz). A Study of a Frontier Problem in Middle Europe. Vogel, New York NY 1946.
  • Arno Lubos : The Czech people in the county of Glatz. In: Arno Lubos: Germans and Slavs. Examples from Silesia and other eastern regions. Europaverlag, Vienna 1974, ISBN 3-203-50510-X , pp. 29–53.
  • Albert Hantsch: From Hummel to Heuscheuer. Marx, Leimen / Heidelberg 1976.
  • Růžena Hlušičková: Kladsko a Československo v letech 1945–1947. (Study a document). = Ziemia Kłodzka a Czechoslowacja w latach 1945–1947. Ústav Historických věd Pedagogické Faculty Vysoké školy Pedagogické, Hradec Králové 1999, ISBN 80-238-5087-3 ( Kladský sborník. Supplement 1).
  • Ferdinand Graf von Magnis : The Glatzer country in its relation to Bohemia and Silesia. Self-published, Freudenberg-Rauenberg 1990, p. 155.
  • Zdenek Bil: The Bohemian Corner. In: Grafschafter Bote. 2, 1999, ZDB -ID 952258-x , pp. 14-16.
  • Lydia Baštecká, Ivana Ebelová: Náchod. ( Dějiny českých měst ), Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, Praha 2004, ISBN 80-7106-674-5 , pp. 249-250 ( Dejiny Ceských Mest ).
  • Český koutek v Kladsku. Study a statě . Kladský sborník, 5th supplementum, Hradec Králové 2008, ISBN 978-80-903509-8-4 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Czechoslovak memoranda for the peace conference of Paris 1919, Memorandum No. 9: The problem of the Glatzer region
  2. ↑ Aleš Fetters: Vaclav Cerny v rodném kraji. Sborník k nedožitým narozeninám univ. Prof. Václava Černého . Nakladatelství JUKO, Náchod 1994, p. 17f.
  3. ↑ Vaclav Cerny: Paměti [Autobiografie], Toronto, 68 Publishers , p 31f.
  4. ↑ Eva Koudelková: Byli jsme tam doma. Vzpomínky pamětniků na dětství v Českém koutku . Nakladatelství Bor, Liberec 2017
  5. ↑ Krysztof Koźbiał: Szkoła z czeskim językiem nauczania v Kudowie-Zdroju . In: Kladský Sborník 5-2003, pp. 177-185.

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