Humanismus v novém konceptu literatury českých zemí (1. polovina 16. století)
Humanism in the new approach to literature in the Czech lands (in the first half of the 16th century)

Summary/Abstract: Our ideas regarding the origins of humanism in the Czech lands are based onKristeller’s now classic “narrow” view of this school as a philological and philosophicaltrend. At the turn of the 16th century an active role in the literary scene was taken (withonly some exceptions) by Utraquist priests, who with the aid of translations interalia were endeavouring to reform the declining post-Hussite society. Emphasis wasplaced on religious education and the cultivation of morality in accordance with theearly Christian church. This trend, which we have described with the new term proto-Revival, has for the most part nothing to do with scholarly humanism either at thelevel of translation or in occasional original works – but this does not detract fromits exceptional importance. Religious rigorism and linguistic patriotism were notunique to conservative Utraquism, but can also be found in non-conformist religiouscommunities. These small churches, motivated by confessional priorities, also rejectednon-religious education and the tuition of foreign languages (Greek and Hebrew),while their leaders’ activities were incompatible with humanist interests. Only thereligiously syncretic centre in Náměšť aimed to keep pace with the rest of Europe. Itwas here for the first time, if only very briefly between 1533 and 1535, that the potentialfor undiluted humanism emerged, thanks to Erasmus’s critically reformed methodof translating, as well as to the domestic scholarly interest in the Czech language.At the level of Biblical translation the Unity of Brethren did not emerge from theirCzech isolation until relatively late in comparison with the German reformation inthe early 1560s. During the post-Hussite period, the substantial minority of Catholicscame closest to the antique tradition and humanist thinking thanks to their studies atuniversities abroad, while the needs and readership skills of the primarily Utraquistsociety were not suitable, so that those individuals capable of literary expressionhad to rely on publishing in Latin abroad. However, while they performed theirsacerdotal service in the Catholic church, the pluralist religious model in the Czechlands outwardly muted their humanist orientation and actually bolstered their activeanti-Reformation stance. Members of humanist circles in Olomouc and Plzeň onlypublished abroad to a very minimum extent, as the predominant form of creativeactivity had come to be unpublished correspondence with the character of privatebut not open literary letters; whence the modern-age aphoristic designation “writers without literature”. The post-1547 political changes did not just provide the literaryand book-printing sphere with a new censorship model, as is often pointed out, but italso accelerated and deepened positive-acting phenomena that occasionally appearedafter several decades. Religious-educational and moral cultivation of society started tobe more motivated by an interest in enlightenment, language education and economicgrowth. New knowledge, passed down from classical antiquity and the Middle Ages,was disseminated among the burghers and aristocrats in the form of translations,or more frequently by means of adaptations of German originals, or less frequentlyby means of original Czech or Latin texts. The intervention by the authorities inthe status of the towns, and so by extension in the mentality of their inhabitants,brought about one more change in the literary sphere after 1547, temporarily relievedof its religious controversies, creating a space for the promotion of Renaissance Latinpoetry. Here antiquity was truly of constitutive importance, although primarily asa source of imitations of classical pre-texts. In this regard an indisputably importantcatalyst was Collin’s reform of pedagogical procedures at Prague University. Ofcourse, the presentation of Latin poetry by Bohemian and Moravian printing houseswould not have been possible without antiqua. This previously unknown associationmight appear strange to paleo-Bohemists and neo-Latinists, but it also shows thatliterary and book culture cannot be separated in modern-era studies. The belatedarrival of antiqua, brought about by disapproving confessional standpoints, came toact as another yardstick for assessing relations between the Czech lands and Europeancultural trends until 1536.

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