Litoměřice

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).

Litoměřice

Main Square with the Town Hall

Flag

Coat of arms

Coordinates: 50°32′3″, 14°7′58″

Founded around

10th century

Royal status

1219

Area

- city

17.99 km² (6.9 sq mi)

Elevation

136 m (446.2 ft)

Population

- city

25 517 (2.6.2005)

Postal code

412 01

Website: www.litomerice.cz

Litoměřice (IPA: [ˈlɪtomɲɛr̝ɪtsɛ]; German: Leitmeritz) is a town at the junction of the rivers Elbe (Czech: Labe) and Ohře (German: Eger) in the north part of the Czech Republic, approximately 72 km (45 mi) northwest of Prague.

The area within the Ústí nad Labem Region is called Garden of Bohemia thanks to mild weather conditions important for growing fruits and grapes. During the time of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, many pensionists chose it over more southern areas of the Empire.

1 History
2 People
3 Population
4 External links

[edit] History

Litoměřice as seen from the Radobýl Hill.

One of the oldest Czech towns established in the 10th century at the place of an early medieval Slavic fort. The Royal Town statute was granted in 1219. From the 12th to the 17th century it was a significant trade center in the Holy Roman Empire. The German population suffered during the 15th century Hussite Wars. After the Protestant insurrection that triggered the Thirty Years' War, and their defeat in the Battle of White Mountain, the population of the city had to accept Catholicism, or leave the town, which became a bishop residency in 1655. As a result, the Czech population shrunk and the town became largely Germanized.^{[citation needed]}

After the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved in late 1918, the areas along the border with Germany, where a majority of the former Austrian citizens were speaking German language, tried to join German Austria (which in turn aimed to join Germany), but Czechoslovak troops prevented this. In 1919, all of Bohemia and Moravia was put under the Czechoslovak rule by the Treaty of St. Germain, including the large area stretching around central Bohemia and Moravia, which became as Sudetenland a matter of political controversy in the following years. Slavs settled there again, but remained a minority. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, German troops occupied the Sudetenland. The Czech population that had grown to about 5,000 people had to leave again.

Main square

In the final stages of the World War II, German troops were retreating to escape the advancing Red Army. Czech resistance took control of the castle on 27 April 1945, and after a few days they started negotiation with the Nazi commander about the terms of his surrender. The Wehrmacht capitulated in the night after 8 May, but German troops fled on 9 May just before Soviet troops entered the town on 10 May 1945.

[edit] People

Most of the German population of the town was expelled by Beneš decrees in August of 1945 along with about 2.5 million other Czechoslovak citizens of German ethnicity.

The greatest representative of Czech romanticism Karel Hynek Mácha died in Litoměřice, shortly after he had moved to the town, and was buried there. Later his grave was moved to Prage where he is buried now at the Vyšehrad cemetery.

Štěpán Cardinal Trochta was a bishop of Litoměřice from 1947.