Kamil Krofta

Kamil Krofta ( born July 17, 1876 in Pilsen, † August 16, 1945 in Prague) was a Czech historian of the Goll school and diplomat.

Youth

In 1894 he finished his studies at the Real Gymnasium in Pilsen and began the study of philosophy in Prague and later from 1896 to 1899 in Vienna. From 1899 to 1901 he held on to study in the Archives of the Vatican.

Scientific career

In 1901 Krofta worked in the Bohemian State Archives in Prague. In 1905 he was a lecturer in Austrian history at the Charles University in Prague. From 1911 he was an associate professor and in 1919 full professor of Czech history with special reference to Slovakia.

Political career

From 1919 he was ambassador to the Vatican and was instrumental in the recognition of Czechoslovakia by the small state. From 1921 to 1925 he resided as ambassador to Vienna, where he also lectured at the Comenius University in Bratislava here. 1925 to 1927 he was ambassador in Berlin. From 1927 he took over the technical management of the Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under the government of President Edvard Beneš. In 1936, he went into retirement. From February 29, 1936 to October 4, 1938 he was working as a successor of Milan Hodža as Foreign Minister of the Czechoslovak Republic.

After the establishment of the Protectorate, he published a defense of the Czechoslovak foreign policy. He joined the Czech resistance group Parsifal, and was one of the leaders of the Preparatory National Revolutionary Assembly ( Přípravný národní Revoluční výbor ). In 1944 he was arrested and initially held later in prison Pankrác in the Theresienstadt concentration camp prisoner.

He died of his arrest shortly after the liberation of Czechoslovakia.

Memberships

From 1916 he was an associate member of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences.

Works

Most of his books dealt with the Czech history. From 1903 to 1909 he co-authored with Jan Bedřich Novák a book on Czech parliaments and assemblies prior to the Battle of White Mountain. Another historically valuable work was his treatment of the Hussite period in which he dealt mainly with the study of the history of religion and the church since the 15th century until the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War. Addition, however, he was interested in the economic and social history of Bohemia. In this field, he wrote several books and articles about the life of the rural population, customs law in Moravia in the 16th century, the beginning of the Czech tax law and more.

Published in German language

  • The roots of the Czechoslovak foreign policy
  • Czechoslovakia and the international situation at the beginning of 1937
  • Czechoslovakia and the little Entente in contemporary European politics
  • The Germans in the Czechoslovak State
  • Europe at the Crossroads
  • The Podkarpatská Rus and Czechoslovakia
  • The Germans in the Czechoslovak history
  • History of Czechoslovakia
  • The Germans in Czechoslovakia
  • The Germans in Bohemia
  • The Bohemian diet negotiations and parliamentary decisions from 1526 to the modern era
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