Throughout history, the lands of the Czechs and its people have been called many things, but the two most prominent names are Bohemia/Bohemian and Czechia/Czech. In a previous blog about the Legend of Lech and Cech, the origin of the name “Czech” was established; the name is derived from the legendary figure Cech, who settled the land and is the ancestor of all the Czechs. However, where does the name Bohemia originate from?
The name “Bohemia” traces its origins all the way back to the Roman Empire, long before the Slavic people had ever arrived in Europe. Around the mid-4th century BC, a group of Celtic people, known to the Romans as the “Boii”, lived in the region that would someday become the Czech lands.
By the 1st century BC, the Boii had disappeared, and the Germanic tribes such as the Macromanni had moved into the region, living there until 530 AD. The Germanics called the land “Böhmen”, and the Romans called it “Boiohaemum”, both of these names meaning “Home of the Boii”. When Germanic tribes moved further westward, the Slavs known as the Czechs arrived to settle the land in their place, eventually founding a duchy and then a kingdom. Despite the Boii having been long gone and the Czechs now living there, the land would continue to be called by its old historical name, which in English was translated as “Bohemia” and its people the “Bohemians”.
It would not be until the early 20th century that Bohemia and the Bohemians would finally be called their true name by the world at large. This coincided with the independence of the Czechs and Slovaks from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, who decided to call their new state Czecho-Slovakia, with the Czech part being called “Czechia”. With the dissolution of Czechoslovakia during the “Velvet Divorce”, the Czech lands became the Czech Republic or just Czechia.
Written by James Travis
Sources:
Agnew, Hugh. The Czechs and the Lands of the Bohemian Crown. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2004.
Thomson, S. Harrison. Czechoslovakia in European History. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1953.
Bazant, Jan, Nina Bazantova and Frances Starns, eds. The Czech Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Durham, NC: duke University Press, 2010.