Scholarly record

HUMANISTIC TRENDS OF THE BOHEMIAN BRETHREN AND THEIR PRINTING HOUSE IN KRALICE

A. Wlochova, K.Slamova

Abstract

The paper aims to map the roots of the Unity of the Brethren, a religious movement whose origins date back to reform religious thinking represented, e.g. by John Wycliffe in England. The text mentions the key moments in the history of the Unity of the Brethren, notices the influences and contacts with Martin Luther in Germany and later Jean Calvin in Geneva and focuses on the development trends within the church itself. It especially points out the trend towards humanistic traditions of education, scholarship, literature and linguistics, which took prevalence over more conservative ideas. This development was the results of efforts of one of the most prominent members of this religious movement, Jan Blahoslav, whose work culminated in printing the Kralice Bible translation - a treasure of Czech culture that influenced the next generations of scholars and artists and formed the basis for the development of the standard Czech language. The significance of this huge project accomplished by Jan Blahoslav’s successors consists in the fact that the readers had the Holy Scriptures available in a modern language, and above all, in a high quality translation following the Humanism approach “ad fontes”, which was based on original languages of the biblical text: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. The next part of the article presents the unique archaeological site in Kralice nad Oslavou in Moravia, the Czech Republic, where the Unity of the Brethren’s printing house was located. The visitors to Kralice can see many items connected with this part of history in the Memorial of the Kralice Bible founded in 1969. The text also describes the graphic art of the Kralice Bible within the European context using wood engravings with the Renaissance elements inspired by the Antique tradition, such as leaves and borders. Among other things, this shows that Kralice activities of the late 16th and early 17th centuries represent the top printing production of its time.

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