The library of the Czech historian Tomaš Pešina of Čechorod who lived in the time after the White Mountain is nowadays part of the family library of the Wallensteins which is housed at the castle in Mnichovo Hradiště. This article focuses on the series of chronicles coming from the estate of Pešina and created around the mid 14th century. The codex contains both copies of national chronicles (Chronicle by Bartošek of Drahonice, Chronicle by Přibik Pulkava of Radonin and Old Czech Annals) and chronicles of the Mladá Boleslav Town and Žatec Town.
This article focuses on narrative sources for the town histories which are part of the Manuscript collection of the National Museum in Prague. It refers to Early Modern Times historiographic works coming from the following towns: České Budějovice, Horní Blatná, Cheb, Jáchymov, Klatovy, Plzeň, Prachatice, Sedlčany, Vysoké Mýto, and Trutnov.
This article evaluates once more the historiographic and literary images of John of Bohemia and his son Charles IV in Italian texts from the 14th and early 15th centuries. What we find is a peculiar mixture of criticism and apotheosis, sometimes stated by the same authors, depending on the point in time they were writing, and of course the expectations of their potential readers. While John of Bohemia faced overwhelming expectations from Dante after the death of his father, he was branded a naïve yet greedy papal mercenary from the beginning of his Italian Expedition in the early 1330s. His son was more successful in avoiding negative stereotypes and harsh criticisms during his Italian expeditions in his youth, as well as in 1354/55 and 1368/69. In the end, however, even chroniclers that are traditionally considered to have had a positive view of the Luxemburg king and emperor harshly rejected his political actions in Italy. Most of the time, this is connected with the financial interests all foreign monarchs had when establishing temporary rulerships in Italian cities, and the monetary pressures this bore on their citizens; the worn-out cliché, both of contemporaries and historical researchers, that labelled foreign, Central European monarchs as barbaric intruders, could hardly be confirmed. Charles and his father are blamed for being unable to solve the structural problems of Italian and Imperial politics.
The Zittau library of Christian Weise has an extensive collection of manuscripts, among which we find a number of early modern-era chronicles relating particularly to the six towns of the Lusatian League. One of these is the Zittau Chronicle by Tobiáš Schnürer from the 16th century, preserved in a later transcription, in which he chronologically recorded the most important events of his era, including the names of members of the Town Council. Memorial and chronicle records are also included in a collection of manuscripts by Abraham Frenzel (1656-1740). This includes a preserved transcription of an early modern-era chronicle of Sorau (Żary), which details the problems of life in the town and the local authority at the time. Another of Frenzel's preserved manuscripts describes the journey through Europe made by Michael Frank at the end of the sixteenth century, including his visit to Bohemia.