About a century before Martin Luther challenged Catholic church doctrine and catalyzed the Protestant Reformation, Jan Hus was burned at the stake for heresy due to his beliefs that countered traditional church ideas. Hus, a Czech preacher, gained many supporters during and after his death, and his execution sparked a fifteen-year-long military conflict between his followers, the Hussites, and the Catholic Church and Holy Roman Emperor. This paper proposes a distinctive perspective by emphasizing how perceptions can motivate actions and shape impacts. Both sentiments, either as heretical from the Catholic Church and Emperor's perspective, or as "Warriors of God" from the Hussites' perspective, affected the actions of the Hussites, and ultimately the outcome of the wars.
History of Central Europe, History of scholarship and learning. The humanities
Representing the second largest Shīʿī Muslim community after the Ithnāʿasharīs, or Twelver Shīʿīs, the Ismāʿīlīs have had a complex history dating back to the formative period of Islam. In medieval times, the Ismāʿīlīs established states of their own, the Fāṭimid caliphate and the Nizārī Ismāʿīlī state of the Alamūt period. They also made important contributions to Islamic thought and culture. In particular, while developing their theological doctrines, the Ismāʿīlīs elaborated an esoteric system of religious thought, with distinctive cosmological, eschatological, and soteriological doctrines, as well as a cyclical view of the sacred history of humankind.
In the course of their long and eventful history, the Ismāʿīlīs became subdivided into a number of major branches and minor groups. Currently, the Ismāʿīlīs belong to the Nizārī and Ṭayyibī Mustaʿlian branches, and are scattered as religious minorities in more than thirty countries of Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and North America. Numbering several millions, they also represent a diversity of ethnicities and literary traditions, and speak a variety of languages. The majoritarian Ismāʿīlī community, the Nizārīs, have had a continuous line of imāms as their spiritual leaders, who in modern times have been internationally known as the Aga Khans. The imāms of the Ṭayyibī Ismāʿīlīs have remained in concealment since 524 AH/1130 CE; in their absence, their community has been led by spiritual leaders designated as dāʿī muṭlaq, who have enjoyed absolute authority.
Ismāʿīlī historiography, as well as the perceptions of outsiders of the Ismāʿīlīs, in both Muslim and Christian milieus, have had fascinating trajectories. By and large, the Ismāʿīlīs were persistently misrepresented until modern times, with a variety of myths and legends – including the Assassin legends of the Crusader circles – circulating about their teachings and practices. This state of affairs was mainly due to the fact that until the twentieth century the Ismāʿīlīs were almost exclusively studied and evaluated on the basis of evidence collected, or often fabricated, by their detractors. The breakthrough in Ismāʿīlī studies occurred with the recovery and study of genuine Ismāʿīlī theological and other texts on a large scale – manuscript sources which had been preserved secretly in private collections in many regions, especially in Yemen, Syria, Iran, Central Asia, and South Asia.
The Qajar era represents a critical period in the history of Iran–Europe relations. Encounters between Iranian travelers and Western social and cultural contexts significantly influenced their perceptions and inspired the production of the earliest Persian travelogues. Among these, Geramrudi’s account is particularly notable for its observations on English morals and customs, as well as its critical perspective on homosexual practices. His interpretations of these subjects have sparked considerable scholarly debate, with some viewing his account as historically reliable and others considering it fabricated or retaliatory. This study applies Max Weber’s theoretical framework alongside Alfred Schutz’s interpretive sociology to critically analyze Geramrudi’s narrative within its broader cultural and historical context. To further this analysis, representations and interpretations of same-sex relations in other contemporary Iranian travelogues are also examined, addressing the central question of how Persian travelers perceived sexuality in England, particularly regarding same-sex interactions. Methodological limitations in previous studies—including selective use of sources, neglect of the textual production context and lack of comparative analysis—underscore the necessity of the present research. A close textual and experiential reading of travel narratives concerning sexuality reveals the cultural tensions between Iran and England. The findings suggest that travelers’ accounts were shaped by lived experiences and implicit typologies embedded within the intersubjective structures of English culture. Some travel writers, preceding Geramrudi, had already addressed the topic of homosexuality in England, thereby corroborating the internal logic and coherence of his observations.
The study introduces a spearhead hoard from the Velem-Szent Vid hillfort (Vas County, Hungary), which was retrieved by the joint research project of the Eötvös Loránd University Institute of Archaeological Sciences and the Centre archéologique européen du Mont Beuvray in 1993. The two spearheads were found next to each other, inserted into the ground of a potential house floor, on a settled plateau of the Velem-Szent Vid hillfort. The spearheads’ parallels stretched beyond the borders of the Carpathian Basin. Based on the analysis of spearhead no. 1, we consider it most likely that this assemblage was deposited in the Ha B1 period. The spearheads were studied by a digital USB microscope-camera for documenting production, technological, and use-wear traces. The two studied objects were identified as finished, used products of actual combatants based on micro traces. They were probably mounted on shafts and could be put on display inside a house or in a settled area. The two weapons may constitute a reversible dual hoard that was eventually abandoned at a single point. Alternatively, they could be seen as a set of trophies looted from defeated enemies, serving as a reminder of a triumphant battle.
In the last week of August 2023 (27 Augustus – 2 September), the first V4 Summer School in Economic History was held in Prague. It was organized by the Institute of History of the Czech Academy of Sciences in cooperation with the Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, and the University of Warsaw. The event was financially supported by the Visegrad Fund. The long-term target of the Ph.D. Summer School in Economic History was to incorporate the V4 historiographies of economic history into international networks. It intended to encourage the young generation of economic historians to enter the international scene and participate in an open academic discussion.
Abstract Central Europe around 1900 was marred with anxiety around the choice of career. This article weaves histories of education, labor, bureaucracy, and the social sciences to show how families reacted to changes in the labor market, including the opening of careers to talent and the mechanization of handicrafts. Parents found themselves unable to guide their children to a safe profession. Whereas previously, career choices were limited, changes in education and the labor market offered adolescents more options. Simultaneously, however, some occupations became endangered and others overcrowded. The erosion of labor stratification gave families the hope of social mobility but also upended their ontological security, as traditional roads to adulthood became impossible to follow. This article uses the discourse on career choice to write a history of this crisis. The discourse was born in early modern Europe to stop parents from forcing their children into a profession against the children’s wishes. In nineteenth-century Europe, however, parents and schools weaponized this discourse against each other to widen or narrow access to advanced education. Social scientists concerned with the industrial labor force joined the conversation by turning career choice into a matter of scientific expertise. Finally, the article shows how voluntary associations pioneered the provision of vocational guidance before state intervention after World War I. Thus, the article traces a significant transformation in the transition to adulthood and offers a prehistory of vocational guidance.
The monitoring of the European bioeconomy is hampered by a lack of statistics on emergent and partially bio-based sectors. In this study, we complete the picture of the bioeconomy in the European Union (EU) by first estimating a set of socioeconomic indicators in missing sectors. Second, we identify four broad bioeconomy patterns within the EU that differ according to the specialisation of Member States’ labour markets in the bioeconomy (location quotient) and according to the apparent labour productivity of their bioeconomies. The patterns are geographically distributed in (i) Eastern Member States and Greece and Portugal; (ii) Central and Baltic Member States; (iii) Western Member States; and (iv) Northern Member States. They are strongly related to the level of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in Member States, and to their political histories (e.g., their year of accession to the EU, and the existence and maturity of their bioeconomy strategies). Within each group, diversity exists in terms of sectoral bioeconomy development. Third, we examine temporal dynamics over the period 2008–2015, stressing with the cases of Slovenia, Portugal, Greece and Finland that a transition from one group to another is possible. Finally, we take a closer look at the East–West bioeconomy disparities within Europe and suggest measures to promote EU bioeconomies.
This study attempts to illustrate the document production of the Faculty of Arts of Comenius University in Bratislava in the significant first phase of its rich history in the years 1920 to 1950. In this period, Comenius University in Bratislava underwent a fundamental change - its de jure demise and the subsequent establishment of the Slovak University in Bratislava. Paradoxically, however, this only had a slight effect on the internal organization and it did not fundamentally change documentation practices at the faculty. The article focuses not only on the written production of the faculty, but, in relation to the legislation in force at the time, it clarifies the faculty's activities and the functioning of its governing bodies and their mutual relations and powers. The work is based on information that was drawn mainly from preserved archival materials, which are now stored in the permanent archival custody and administration of the Archives of Comenius University in Bratislava. We also drew on archive documents from the National Archive in Prague.
Auxiliary sciences of history, History of Central Europe
This paper focuses on selected historiography concepts of the soviet historian and ethnologist L. N. Gumilev (1912–1992). The main aim is to present Gumilev's revision of the Kulikovo battle (1380). Paper is based on his two articles published in 1980 on the occasion of the 600th anniversary of the event. Primary sources are supplemented by Gumilev's correspondence deposited in Prague and St. Petersburg. Paper clarifies alleged Eurasianist aspects of Gumilev's articles and consequences of their ambivalent reception in the intellectual milieu of Russian nationalists.
Auxiliary sciences of history, History of Central Europe
The study deals with the development and instrumentalization of the Handlová strike (1940) in the historiography before 1989. In the paper, I will provide the situation that preceded the strike and then the analysis of its process. It will also be necessary to determine who initiated the strike and what role the illegal communist movement played in it. I am going to compare the forms of instrumentalization with some of the claims made by historiography after 1989. In the context of instrumentalization of a strike, several questions arise. Was this a significant historiographic milestone? For what purpose was it used? Who and why was he the maintainer of his instrumentalization? How much influence had the communists during the strike?
Auxiliary sciences of history, History of Central Europe
The study presents a concrete proposal for the modification of the school educational program for history at primary schools. This proposal is based on the cyclical concept of teaching, i.e. that in each school year of the second level (6th to 9th grades) history as a whole be taught thematically from antiquity to the present, but always from a different perspective. The design of the program is an attempt at a specific implementation of modern didactic models (historical literacy, historical thinking) in teaching.
The Italian unification period of the nineteenth century finally saw the fragmented states of Italy become one nation as it stands today. This article explores how Italian nationalist Giuseppe Mazzini influenced Italy's unification. By using a combination of Mazzini's essays and autobiographical notes along with secondary sources on Mazzini and nineteenth century Italy, this article demonstrates that his writings allowed for the dissemination of nationalist thought throughout Italy and Europe more broadly. Mazzini was often discredited by his contemporaries and early historians as a failure due to his unsuccessful military revolutions, but only looking at his revolutionary actions fails to take into account the fact that Mazzini's life's work was educating the Italian people on the importance of national unity.
History of Central Europe, History of scholarship and learning. The humanities
Current notions of “hearing impairment,” as reflected in clinical audiological practice, do not acknowledge the needs of individuals who have normal hearing pure tone sensitivity but who experience auditory processing difficulties in everyday life that are indexed by reduced performance in other more sophisticated audiometric tests such as speech audiometry in noise or complex non-speech sound perception. This disorder, defined as “Auditory Processing Disorder” (APD) or “Central Auditory Processing Disorder” is classified in the current tenth version of the International Classification of diseases as H93.25 and in the forthcoming beta eleventh version. APDs may have detrimental effects on the affected individual, with low esteem, anxiety, and depression, and symptoms may remain into adulthood. These disorders may interfere with learning per se and with communication, social, emotional, and academic-work aspects of life. The objective of the present paper is to define a baseline European APD consensus formulated by experienced clinicians and researchers in this specific field of human auditory science. A secondary aim is to identify issues that future research needs to address in order to further clarify the nature of APD and thus assist in optimum diagnosis and evidence-based management. This European consensus presents the main symptoms, conditions, and specific medical history elements that should lead to auditory processing evaluation. Consensus on definition of the disorder, optimum diagnostic pathway, and appropriate management are highlighted alongside a perspective on future research focus.
The birth of Cyprus republic in 1960 was significant milestone in Cyprus history. In august 1960 independent republic of Cyprus was established and it was also the end of long-running struggle of Cyprus's inhabitants (especially Greek Cypriots) for freedom. The creation of new state accepted and supported by the UN and a lot of world states. As time goes by, the new Republic established serious diplomatic contacts with many countries in the world. The contribution will be dedicated to the breakdown of the Republic of Cyprus in 60 years of 20th century, with accent on 1963-1964 years, together with a point of view from domestic and foreign politics.
Auxiliary sciences of history, History of Central Europe
After World War II, the declaration of the independent Jewish state started to be discussed again by the international community. In these days, Czechoslovakia supported the Zionist movement/Israel in new-born organization of United Nations, and also provided an unofficial assistance to the Zionist movement through the arm supplies as well as military training to chosen Jewish volunteers. This cooperation was not immediately cancelled after the February coup in 1948 when the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia got a total dominance over politics of the country. In the long run, however, the communist rule in Czechoslovakia led to the growing tension in relations with Israel. Within next few year the mutual cooperation of both states was over and the mutual relations were close to the open hostility. One of the aims of this paper is to introduce the reasons that led to a shift of Czechoslovak attitude towards Israel, as well as the impact of these changes in the international context.
Auxiliary sciences of history, History of Central Europe
The study tries to describe the transformations of a village called Zborowskie in the Liswarta
river basin in the south-east frontier part of Upper Silesia. This village was probably founded in
the late Middle Ages as a dependant village (though it was transformed relatively soon into a demesne).
A pivotal moment in its history that rapidly changed its appearance, both in terms of spatial
arrangement and social structure, was the establishment of a manufactory producing stoneware
smoking pipes in 1753, in parallel with the intensive German colonisation of Upper Silesia.
A new site was reserved for the purposes of the manufactory and Western experts were called in.
Archaeological research conducted in 2013 and 2014 revealed the size of the former manufactory
and corrected the original supposition about the origin of the wooden structure that had been
regarded as a factory building from the 18th century: After the explorations it was described as
a residential building designed for more families (known as czworak, square-shaped) from the
19th century.