Czech Stamps

W. A. Mozart - booklet

2011-09-07T21:38:00.000+02:00

Catalogue number	0695
Date of issue	31.8.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	á 6 die-cut self-adhesive stamps
Size of picture	52 x 30 mm
Graphic designer	Marina Richterová
Engraver	Martin Srb
Printing method	multicoloured offset

Expressively conducting Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an original copy of the Don Giovanni score and the Prague's Estates Theatre in the background.
A stamp identified with the letter E corresponding to the price of Ordinary Item up to 20 g - European countries in international priority service (current price according to the Price List of Basic Postal Services: CZK 20).
Price of the booklet as of the date of issue: 6times CZK 20, i.e. CZK 120.
Stamps identified with a letter can be used alone or in combination to mail any sort of domestic or international products.

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Men's European Volleyball Championships

2011-09-07T21:32:00.000+02:00

Catalogue number	0690
Date of issue	31.8.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	á 50 pcs of stamps, sheets are marked with bar code
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Pavel Švejda
Printing method	multicoloured offset

Following the 2010 FIBA Basketball Championship for Women in Brno, Ostrava and Karlovy Vary, a most successfull event for the Czech players who won the unexpected silver medals, the Czech audience will get a chance to see players of another ball game, even more popular than basketball, viz. volleyball.
The Czech men's representation team won the surprising 10th place at the 2010 World Cup in Italy after they had beaten the previous world champions, the US team, 3:0, but had unluckily lost 2:3 to the new world champions from Brazil.
The championships will be hosted in Austria and the Czech Republic. The anticipated tough events will take place in two Austrian and two Czech cities. The Austrian cities are Vienna and Innsbruck. The two host cities initially chosen by the Czech organizing committee, i.e. Prague and Liberec, were recently changed to Prague and Karlovy Vary, maybe because the latter was a successful host of the basketball championship finals.
Jan Svoboda, coach of the Czech representation team, used the following words to assess the position of the Czech players in Pool B: "We did not want to get Russia or Serbia before the drawing took place. Now we are in one group with Russia, Portugal and Estonia. Portugal has also been one of the top European teams, and we were very glad we had managed to win the World Cup qualification event after the 3:2 heartbreaking finish. And Estonia would not have been our choice from the fourth, easiest group, either. It is a tough pool, and it will not be an easy task to go through. But it is our aim."
The top European tournament comes back to the Czech Republic exactly after ten years. The Czech team won the fourth place in Ostrava in 2001. Four pools, each of four teams, means sixteen teams. The winners (first position) of each pool will go directly through to the final eight matches, the runners-up (second and third positions) will fight for the next four places out of the final eight, and those finishing on the fourth position will quit the tournament. So the task for the Czech team is to end up as second or third in the pool, with the possibility to face further competitors from Pool D, i.e. Poland, Germany, Bulgaria and Slovakia.

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Nature Protection: Šumava - UNESCO Biosphere Reserve

2011-09-07T21:26:00.000+02:00

Catalogue number	A0691
Date of issue	31.8.2011
Face value	62 CZK
Print sheets	4 stamps + 4 coupons (se-tenant)
Size of picture	118 x 170 mm
Graphic designer	Libuše and Jaromír Knotek
Engraver	Martin Srb
Printing method	recess print from flat plate in black combined with multicoloured offset

The importance of the Šumava National Park and Protected Landscape Area grew in 1990 with the declaration of a biosphere reserve (part of the UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere (MAB) programme) covering almost the entire Šumava region and the neighbouring Bavarian Forest National Park in Germany. The Šumava Biosphere Reserve is to preserve the typical Šumava landscape and all of its traditional elements including the way of its cultivation. The biosphere reserve is located in the mountain area along the Austrian and Bavarian borders with the Czech Republic. The entire region was affected by human activities (such as gold mining, glass industry) and frequently used from as early as the 10th century. Šumava is also the last big central European area with an extensive way of using. The area abounds in ancient mountain forests, lakes of glacial origin, peat bogs, rivers and their canyons and similar values that have been preserved until the present day. Unlike the Šumava National Park with a higher percentage of forest (83.8%), forests (flower and acidophilic beech woods, mountain spruce woods, wetland pine woods) are present in more than 65% of the Šumava Biosphere Reserve. Local peat bogs are clearly the highlight of the area. The plains that cover the central part of Šumava at more than 1,000 meters above the sea level are also extensively used. The vast area is used as meadows or pasture land. A large number of rare animals, such as Northern birch mouse (Sicista betulina) or the imported Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx), live in the area. Prominent wild birds include wood grouse (Tetrao urogallus) and black grouse (Tetrao tetrix). The Blanice river headwater area has the highest presence of freshwater pearl mussel (Margaritifera margaritifera) in the Czech Republic. The Šumava-UNESCO Biosphere Reserve miniature sheet is the final one of the present series of six sheets featuring Czech biosphere reserves.
Cat. number - 0691: Face value 10 CZK - Tetrao urogallus, Turdus torquatus and Erebia euryale. Picture size: 50 x 40 mm
Cat. number - 0692: Face value 14 CZK - Colias palaeno Dactylorhiza traunsteineri. Picture size: 23 x 40 mm
Cat. number - 0693: Face value 18 CZK - Tetrao tetrix, Aeshna juncea and Alces alces. Picture size: 50 x 40 mm
Cat. number - 0694:Face value 20 CZK - Lynx lynx and Picoides tridactylus. Picture size: 50 x 40 mm

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European Florists Championship Europa Cup 2011

2011-07-01T22:21:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0689
Date of issue	15.6.2011
Face value	25 CZK
Print sheets	á 50 pcs of stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Vlasta Matoušová
Engraver Printing method	Miloš Ondráček multicoloured offset

Like the Olympic games, the top prestigious EUROPA CUP competition in floral design takes place once every four years in one of the member countries of FLORINT, the European Federation of Professional Florist Associations. The federation was formed in Strasbourg in 1956 under the name Fédération Européenne des Unions Professioneless des Fleuristes (FEUPF) and changed its name to Florint in January 2009.
The first of these professional florist competitions was held in 1967. The EUROPA CUP 2011 will be held on August 31st - September 5th, 2011 and it will be the first time the competition will be held in the Czech Republic. The City of Havířov and the Czech Union of Flower Growers and Florists will be the organizers.
The competitors will come from 24 European countries. The six disciplines will take them through the history of the organizing city and the history of Czech music. A couple of the competition themes will reflect Havířov's early history and its relationship with coal and flowers. The next theme will be the 170th anniversary of Antonín Dvořák's birth. The final theme will focus on fashion and surprise.
Jaromír Kokeš, 2010 Czech Master Florist, will represent the Czech Republic.

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Young Animals - Cricetus Cricetus

2011-07-01T22:15:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0688
Date of issue	15.6.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	á 50 pcs of stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Libuše a Jaromír Knotkovi
Engraver Printing method	Martin Srb multicoloured offset

The European hamster (Cricetus Cricetus) is a species of hamsters relative to voles. Some authors classify hamsters, voles and mice as a single family.
The European hamster is a medium-sized, stout-bodied animal with short legs. The tail is short and furred. It is often taken for a marmot, but unlike a marmot, the European hamster is more colourful, with yellow to orange brown dorsal fur with black ends, and a dark brown to black chest and belly. The top head fur is reddish, with white or yellow patches behind the ears and on the nose (and on the front legs). The animal changes its rather thick coat colour once a year. Other prominent features include very large cheek poaches, and flank glands of males that are much larger during the breeding season.
The European hamster is a nocturnal species. It is an excellent runner and jumper. It lives in separate burrows, consisting of tunnels 6-8 cm in diameter, nesting chamber, hibernating chamber, food and storage chambers and droppings chamber. It can burrow as deep as 2 meters in winter months when it hibernates. Females usually have 2-5 litters each year. The gestation period is 20 days, and the size of the litter ranges from 3 to 12 young.
The European hamster's diet consists of grains, seeds, plants, insects and baby young nesting birds.
It is native to a large area extending from south-west Siberia (the Yenisey river) to Belgium and north-east France. It started spreading from its original habitat on steppes into central Europe during the extensive deforestation period, significantly earlier than marmots; its remains were found on neolithic archaeological sites dating back some 6-7 thousand years. In the Czech Republic it lives in an open landscape. Since the 1970-80s, when it has become almost extinct, especially in hills and mountains, its presence has been steadily increasing, reaching very high levels in some regions (around the Labe River, in south Moravia, etc.), although its occurrence in areas more than 500-600 meters above the sea level is rather rare.

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100 Years since Jan Kašpar's First Public Flight

2011-07-01T22:11:00.001+02:00

Catalogue number	0687
Date of issue	1.6.2011
Face value	21 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Pavel Sivko
Engraver Printing method	Jaroslav Tvrdoň, Bedřich Housa rotary recess print in black combined with photogravure in yellow, red, violet and greybrown

Jan Kašpar (May 20th, 1883, Pardubice - March 2nd, 1927, Pardubice) was a Czech engineer, Czech aviation pioneer, most renowned member of the first group of Czech aviation builders and pilots. His pioneering long-distance flights made him particularly famous.
A mechanical engineering graduate from the Imperial and Royal Czech Technical University in Prague, Kašpar successfully completed a one-term programme at a higher car school in Germany and took up a job with Basse&Selve in Altena, Westfalia in 1908 where his interest in aviation began. After a short employment with Laurin&Klement in Mladá Boleslav he returned back to his native Pardubice and set up an aviation building business with his cousin Evžen Čihák. Both cousins went their own separate way after some time, however, with Evžen Čihák starting an independent business together with his brother Hugo.
Kašpar first construction was a monoplane after the Antoinette monoplane manufactured by French designer Latham. While he was still building the monoplane, he heard the news of Louis Blériot's first flight across the English Channel on July 25th, 1909. The news made him buy a Blériot XI (serial number 76) for 18 000 francs after he had found himself unable to take off his own model. The first engine he used in the Blériot was his own model, later replaced with an Anzani. Kašpar's first successful flight, covering 2 kilometres at a height of 20-25 meters, came on April 16th, 1910. He gained his first experience as a pilot during the next few months, and passed a pilot examination on June 16th, 1910.
In 1911 Kašpar performed the first flight in his own model fitted with a 70 HP Daimler engine and intended for a first long-distance flight in the Czech territory. The first test flight at a 400-meter height lasted 24 minutes and 23 seconds. Kašpar made another flight on the same day, April 30th, 1911, this time accompanied by his cousin Evžen Čihák as passenger.
Kašpar's highlight event, the famous Pardubice-Velká Chuchle flight (May 13th, 1911), covered 121 kilometres at about 800 meters above the ground in 92 minutes. The aircraft, donated by Kašpar to the Technical Museum of the Czech Kingdom (today's National Technical Museum in Prague) in 1913, is still on display.
Kašpar's next famous event was the first long-distance passenger flight. The Mělník-Chuchle flight lasted 41 minutes and 55 seconds; the passenger was Jaroslav Kalva, editor of theNárodní politika daily.
Impoverished and suffering from mental disease, Kašpar committed suicide in 1927.

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Execution of 27 Protestant Leaders (21.6.1621) on the Old Town Square

2011-07-01T21:26:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0686
Date of issue	1.6.2011
Face value	26 CZK
Print sheets	4 stamps
Size of picture	50 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Zdeněk Ziegler
Engraver Printing method	Václav Fajt recess print from flat plate in black combined with offset in red

The stamp commemorates the 390th anniversary of the execution of 27 Czech Protestant leaders on the Prague's Old Town Square. The mass execution of June 21st, 1621 became a symbolic end of the series of events that begun with the second defenestration of Prague on May 23rd, 1618, central to the start of the Thirty Years' War in 1618, and ended with the Protestant armies' defeat at the Battle on White Mountain near Prague, November 8th, 1620.
The execution was to become a shocking and frightening performance intended to prove to the contemporary Europe that the Habsburgs were not impressed by the leading Protestant aristocracy's revolt and that no rebellion, staged by Protestants, was able to jeopardize their authority. It led to a stronger position of the Habsburg dynasty on the Czech throne and suppression of any form of resistance on the side of a potential opposition.
A set of cobblestones, installed at the place where the scaffold (dismantled after the execution and given to the Prague's Monastery of Merciful Brothers) stood, commemorates the execution site and the sad end to the Czech Protestants' uprising.

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For Children: Zdeněk Smetana - The Little Witch

2011-07-01T21:21:00.001+02:00

Catalogue number	0685
Date of issue	1.6.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	30 stamps
Size of picture	30 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Otakar Karlas, Zdeněk Smetana
Engraver Printing method	Bohumil Šneider rotary recess print in black combined with photogravure in brown, blue, red and yellow

This year's stamp of the series For Children commemorates Zdeněk Smetana, Czech animator, screenwriter and graphic designer.
Smetana was born on July 26th, 1925 in Prague. He worked in the Bratři v triku film studio and as a director in the Krátký film Praha film studio, received more than fifty awards at both national and international film shows and festivals, including a Golden Lion, Golden Bear, British Academy Film Award, created a large number of characters and helped animate popular Czech TV bedtime stories, such as Pohádky z mechu a kapradí (featuring Křemílek and Vochomůrka),Rákosníček, Štaflík a Špagetka, Radovanovy radovánky and Malá čarodějnice (The Little Witch). He also illustrated several children's books.
Aged no more than a couple of centuries, the Little Witch is still too young for a fully qualified professional witch. Despite her poor command of magic, she's dying to see the fabulous annual witches' Sabbat soon to be held on an isolated mountain. Abraxas, her old raven, tries to dissuade her, but she won't listen! Hidden in bushes on the mountain, she finds it impossible to stand back and joins the dancing witches. The witch in chief commands the culprit to become a "good" witch in no longer than a year's time! The Little Witch understands it to mean that she is supposed to conjure the good, and not to be good in conjuring the bad, and immediately starts increasing her proficiency as a "good" witch. She conjures bundles of wood to help poor old women, helps an ill-treated horse, adds a charming smell causing euphoria to a poor flower girl's paper roses. But her good doings do not fail to leave heartburnings in a Little Witch's colleague, and when the Little Witch breaches the strict ban on Friday conjuring and helps two small children one Friday, she is punished with a heavy frost and snowstorm. She is able to turn the bad into a good magic, however, and the calamity ends in a merry carnival and snowmen building fun. By then it is time for the next annual Sabbat where the Little Witch is about to pass the qualification examination consisting of three tasks.

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Beauty of flowers - Chrysantemum

2011-07-01T21:18:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0684
Date of issue	27.5.2011
Face value	2 CZK
Print sheets	100 stamps
Size of picture	19 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Anna Khunová
Engraver Printing method	Bohumil Šneider rotary recess print in greenblack combined with photogravure in yellow, red and dark green

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Folk architecture - Z

2011-07-01T21:15:00.001+02:00

Catalogue number	0683
Date of issue	27.5.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	á 100 stamps
Size of picture	19 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kavan
Engraver Printing method	Bohumil Šneider rotary recess print in black combined with photogravure in grey-green

Timber-frame houses: A couple of timbered houses from North Bohemia (front); a timber-frame house from the West Bohemian border area (back); and a small-sized Wallachian cottage.

A stamp identified with the letter Z corresponding to the price of Ordinary Item up to 20 g - non-European countries in international priority service (current price according to the Price List of Basic Postal Services: CZK 20).

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Johann Gerstner (1851-1939) - Common Czech-Slovenian Issue

2011-07-01T21:11:00.001+02:00

Catalogue number	A0682
Date of issue	27.5.2011
Face value	34 CZK
Print sheets	A + 1
Size of picture	80 x 120 mm
Graphic designer	Karel Zeman
Engraver Printing method	Jaroslav Tvrdoň recess print from flat plate in black combined with offset in blue, red, yellow and black

This common Czech-Slovenian issue featuring violinist Johann Gerstner commemorates the 160th anniversary of his birth.
Johann (Hans) Gerstner (August 17th, 1851, Žlutice - January 9th, 1939, Ljubljana) spent most of his life in Ljubljana where he left a deep mark in the local community, although the memory of him and of his special merits is rather marginalized and suppressed.
Emanuel Wirth, who later became a renowned and successful violinist and teacher, brought Gerstner to music. Both boys were taught how to play violin and music theory by Karl Rohm in Žlutice. Gerstner took also flute and singing lessons. Thirteen-year-old Gerstner (1864) was admitted to the Prague Conservatory, at that time one of the best music schools, to study violin. Josef Krejčí, the school's director, taught him harmony and general bass, the other theoretical subjects were taught by Josef Foerster whose brother Anton Foerster recommended Gernster to take up a job in Ljubljana.
His post as a second violinist in Benewitz Quartet gave Gerstner (still as a student in Prague) an opportunity to play top contemporary Czech compositions, often directly from the original music sheets. He also played violin in the local German Opera Orchestra conducted by Bedřich Smetana.
As a fresh graduate Gerstner took up the job of director of the Slovenian Theatre and violin teacher at the Filharmonic Society's Music School in Ljubljana. Teaching was at the core of his activities in Ljubljana. He taught at up to ten schools. During his 48-year career at the Filharmonic Society's Music School he formed more than a thousand violinists; Leo Funtek from Slovenia, who became a renowned violinist, conductor and composer based in Helsinki, Finland, was the most successful of Gerstner's students.
Gerstner gave more than 700 concerts as an active performing violinist. He also played first violin at 154 concerts of chamber music. At his last orchestra performance (1911) he played both Beethoven's Romances. He gave his last public performance in 1929 at a concert commemorating 100 years from Franz Schubert's death. He also played violin in the main church choir in Ljubljana every Sunday for a long 40-year period, regularly attended workshops in Graz, Vienna, Salzburg, Mannheim and Cologne as a violinist and teacher, and worked as regional representative of Richard Wagner Company in Ljubljana.
Gerstner married Josefina Gnezda (Gnesda), daughter of the Slon Hotel in Ljubljana, who gave him three children: Edith, Maria and Hans Gerstner Jr. All three were talented musicians. Hans, who took violin lessons from Gerstner's fellow student and famous violin teacher Otakar Ševčík, followed in his father's footsteps for some time.
Despite his merits and medal received from Emperor Franz Joseph in 1902, Gerstner spent his old age in destitution and poverty. He was unable to earn some extra money because of his impaired vision. He died in 1939, his wife and a daughter met tragic death in a bomb attack on Ljubljana in 1945. His son Hans moved to Vienna where he wrote several books.
As a skilled violinist and teacher Gerstner paved the way for the development of the art of violin play in Slovenia. All further generations of violin teachers were able to build on the first and most essential foundations laid by him. But his contribution and unselfish dedication were not sufficiently appreciated, possibly due to his German origin because at the time of his life in Ljubljana the Slovenian population greatly disliked Germans. Yet he was a Ljubljaner who together with his family spent most of their life in Ljubljana. During his life he did not gain a position he was entitled to, despite his great contribution to the development of Slovenian culture.

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The Čtyřlístek Comics - Bobík

2011-07-01T21:07:00.001+02:00

Catalogue number	0681
Date of issue	4.5.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	á 10 die-cut self-adhesive stamps
Size of picture	23 x 30 mm
Graphic designer Printing method	Jaroslav Němeček multicoloured offset

Bobík the Pig, sitting on the grass, playing guitar and singing a love song. The Bobík the Pigstamp is the final one of the series of stamps featuring the Čtyřlístek comics characters.

A stamp identified with the letter A corresponding to the price of Ordinary Letter - Standard up to 50 g in domestic service (current price according to the Price List of Basic Postal Services: CZK 10).
Price of the booklet as of the date of issue: 10times CZK 10, i.e. CZK 100.

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Europa - Forest: Alluvial Forests

2011-07-01T21:02:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0680
Date of issue	4.5.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	6 stamps
Size of picture	33 x 33 mm
Graphic designer Line detailing Printing method	Adolf Absolon Martin Srb multicoloured offset

This year's central theme for the annual EUROPA issue, announced by the Association of European Public Postal Operators PostEurop, is "Forests".

An alluvial forest is a hardwood forest found on low levees, ridges and terraces with a high level of underground water within the floodplains of streams and rivers. This type of forest grows in areas that are slightly elevated above floodplain swamp and are usually flooded for a portion of the growing season. Formerly a normal biotope, it has been disappearing with the growing number of river realignment projects.
The largest alluvial forest in the Czech Republic grows at the confluence of the Morava and Dyje rivers. Residual alluvial forests can be found in the area of the confluence of the Labe and Cidlina rivers (Libický Alluvial Forest Natural Reserve), and on the banks or in the headwater area of the Morava and Dyje rivers.
The presence of a stream or river, or a high level of underground water leads to a lower amount of oxygen in the soil and subsequent reduction processes. The products of the processes contribute to the typical bluish colour and special smell of the so-called gley soil.
Primary trees found include poplar (Populus L.), oak (Quercus L.) , ash (Fraxinus L.) , elm(Ulmus L.) , alder (Alnus L.) , willow (Salix L.) , lime tree (Tilia L.) . Shrubs and small trees, such as cherry (Prunus serotina) , honeysuckle (Lonicera) , cornel (Cornel) , viburnum (Viburnum) , elder (Sambucus) , are present at places with more light.
The mix of plants found in alluvial forests depends on the shadow prevailing in the lower layers of the forest. Creepers, such as hop vine (Humulus lupulus) , try to penetrate into the upper layers. Other plants, such as ground ivy (Glechoma hederacea) , bramble (Rubus) , catchweed bedstraw (Galium aparine) , spread by vining stems.
Light-demanding herbs flowering before leaves bud on the surrounding trees give the forest so-called spring aspect. Spring snowflake (Leucojum vernum) , snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis) , lesser celandine (Ficaria verna) , yellow star-of-Bethlehem (Gagea lutea) , starwort (Stellaria holostea) , lungwort (Pulmonaria officinalis) , early-dog violet (Viola reichenbachiana) , hollowroot (Corydalis cava) , are among the herbs most commonly encountered in spring. A mix of grass species and other shadow-demanding herbs such as wild angelica (Angelica sylvestris), true forget-me-not (Myosotis palustris) , yellow flag iris (Iris pseudacorus) , enchanter's-nightshade (Circaea lutetiana) , European birthwort (Aristolochia clematitis) , moneywort(Lysimachia nummularia) , creeping buttercup (Ranunculus repens) , common comfrey(Symphytum officinale) , common figwort (Scrophularia nodosa) , touch-me-not balsam(Impatiens noli-tangere) , cover the ground in summer.
The patchy mossy underground tends to cover maximum 10% of the forest floor.
Soil fauna in alluvial forests is relatively rare due to the high amount of water in the soil. Earthworms and harvestmen are among the most common species. Amphibians are frequent in wet areas. Birds typical of alluvial forest include yellow throat, different species of warbler, chaffinch, whitwing, robin, starling, stork, silver and night herons, bee eater, buzzard, kite, hawk, falcon, sea eagle.

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200 Years of Teaching at the Prague Conservatory

2011-07-01T20:35:00.002+02:00

Catalogue number	0679
Date of issue	6.4.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Marina Richterová
Engraver Printing method	Martin Srb rotary recess print in black combined with photogravure in rosy, ochre, olive green and black

The Prague Conservatory, established in 1808 as a school for professional training of orchestral musicians, ranks among the oldest European schools of its kind. A proclamation, issued by music-loving Prague aristocrats on April 25th, 1808, became the primary stimulus for its foundation; it is now considered the founding charter of the Prague Conservatory. The first contributions started arriving soon after its publication, with the number of contributors steadily growing. The forthcoming Napoleonic wars delayed the plans, so that the organization "Society for Improving Music in the Czech Lands" set up by the aristocrats in March 1810 as a body intended to fund and manage the school over the following (more than 100) years, had to wait until April 24th, 1811 for the opening of first classes. Until the autumn of 1811 when the school managed to secure its own premises and "get under the roof" at the Dominican monastery of St Giles, the students were taught at their teacher's private rooms according to the first director Bedřich Dionýs Weber's syllabus. Singing lessons were added in 1817 to the already existing courses in orchestral instruments. The school significantly contributed to the development of Prague's musical life in the following period, with concerts provided by the school orchestra and the students' involvement in local professional orchestras being of vital importance and attracting praise of most renowned composers, such as C.M. Weber, R. Wagner, H. Berlioz, F. Liszt.
Bedřich Smetana applied for the post of the school's director in 1866, but he lost to organ school director Josef Krejčí, the candidate chosen by the selection board.
The golden age of the school came in 1884; it moved to the newly completed Rudolfinum building and employed famous violin teacher Antonín Bennewith as director. New programmes, including piano, organ, composition and conducting courses, became available in 1890, after the school merged with the organ school, and in 1891 the school managed to secure Antonín Dvořák, first as a composition teacher and later as the school director (1901-1904). Dvořák formed a large number of leading composers, such as Josef Suk, Vítězslav Novák, operetta composers Oskar Nedbal and Franz Lehár, although the school boasts also other famous alumni, such as Otakar Ševčík, Jan Kubelík, Jaroslav Kocian, Václav Talich, Karel Ančerl, Rafael Kubelík, Bohuslav Martinů, Alois Hába, to name just a few.
After 1918, the conservatory was nationalized and lost its premises at the Rudolfinum. It moved to a Benedictine monastary, and later to the building of a former chemical institute at Trojanova street, before it ended in its present premises on Prague's Old Town Na Rejdišti street. A drama school, providing courses in drama, was added to the school's departments in 1919. The key figure contributing to its formation was legendary actress Otýlie Sklenářová-Malá. The school's directors in the period between the two world wars included famous figures such as Josef Suk, Vítězslav Novák, J.B. Foerster, Vilém Kurz, Jaroslav Kocian, and others. After World War II, a dancing department (an independent Dancing Conservatory after 1980) was formed, and the Prague Conservatory's "Master School" (providing follow-up courses after completion of standard programmes) was transformed into an independent academy of music. Václav Holznknecht (the school's director from 1942 to 1970), a lawyer, pianist and popularizer of music, led the school during the difficult time of the Nazi occupation and most of the communist regime. In 1986, a popular music department was established to provide courses in two major subjects, singing and composition.
After the change in the society in November 1989, both teachers and students worked hard to meet the constantly increasing demands laid upon music and theatre professionals. The school's major commitment is to sustain the high reputation of the school and to further expand the famous, two-century-old tradition of the school, which during its existence formed a myriad of musicians, composers, singers, dancers, and actors and played a significant role in the development of music education of the Czech population.

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Personalities - Famous Czechs: Vlasta Burian (1891-1962)

2011-07-01T20:26:00.003+02:00

Catalogue number	0678
Date of issue	6.4.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Pavel Sivko
Engraver Printing method	Jaroslav Tvrdoň rotary recess print in blackblue combined with photogravure in greyblue, red and blue

Josef Vlastimil Burian, better known as Vlasta Burian (April 9th, 1891, Liberec - January 31st, 1962, Prague) was a Czech stage and film actor and director, singer, sportsman, businessman, author and imitator. His boundless spontaneity and urge to win turned him into a real star on the Czech film and theatre scene. One of the most popular Czechoslovak stars between the two world wars, he was unjustly sentenced for Nazi collaboration. Vlasta Burian, winner of the King of Comedians award, as well as movies starring him are still widely popular among Czech audiences.
Born the son of Antonín Burian, a tailor, Czech patriot and amateur actor in Liberec, and his five-year-older wife Marie (who had a daughter, Žofie Picková, by previous marriage), Vlasta Burian spent the first ten years of his life in Liberec, before the family decided to move from the mainly German populated town with little sympathy for his father's patriotic activities to Prague's Žižkov (1901). Vlastimil learned the profession of a shop assistant at a local business school.
As the son of a devoted actor, he grew up within a circle of people interested in theatre and heard many related stories since his childhood. Although he was a keen sportsman, excellent football player, AC Sparta Prague Football Club goalkeeper, cyclist, professional tennis player who regularly competed - and often won - in a number of championships and tournaments, most of his sporting activities gave way to theatre. Burian's career as a comedian first started at private parties, but by talent, he gradually gained access to public performances.
Following a relationship with his partner, dancer Anna Emilie Pírková, and mother of Burian's illegitimate daughter Emilka, Burian married Nina Červenková (1919) who loved him, was his greatest fan and supporter in the hardest times of his life. He became a grandfather in 1944 when Emilka gave birth to a son, Vlastimil Kristl.
An amusing entertainer in public, he privately suffered from melancholy, changes in mood and manic depression. This was the main reason for his frequent seclusion at his villa in Prague's Dejvice.
In his prime, Burian was a great patron of sportsmen, both at professional and amateur levels, sponsoring e.g. the national cyclists team.
Burian's career and popularity came to an abrupt turn in 1944 with the closure of his private theatre by the Nazi authorities, followed by its nationalization and Burian's arrest by the Czech authorities after the war, for allegations of collaboration with the Nazis. He was placed into a cell with SS men and criminal offenders who heavily humiliated him. After an intervention by Foreign Minister Jan Masaryk he was released and further investigated at large, and eventually found innocent by the court. The ruling drew a negative attention from the press and some politicians calling for his exemplary punishment. Burian was re-arrested and in a show trial sentenced for several months of heavy imprisonment and payment of half a million crowns due to alleged collaboration with Nazi occupants. Virtually all his property was confiscated, and when he came from prison, he was prohibited to re-open his theatre or perform in public in the following five years. He had to start doing hard manual labour, working as checkweigher at a mining firm in North Bohemia, messenger boy, kitchen help and car driver at chalets. He started performing again, although without any official approval. It came no sooner than in 1950. His last role was the character of accountant Dušek in the satirical movie "Zaostřit, prosím!"
The five years of prohibition to perform changed Burian into a more modest man. The term in jail and persecution broke his health; formerly an active sportsman in outstanding physical condition, he became an old man. Despite his poor health he had to perform at shows to earn some money. Tended by his faithful wife Nina, he died at home, suffering of pulmonary embolism, after he had to give his last performance with severe pneumonia.

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Easter

2011-03-11T14:27:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0677
Date of issue	23.3.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	á 50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 30 mm
Graphic designer	Libuše and Jaromír Knotek

one of the Easter symbols - newly hatched chicks
Easter is a spring time festival in its origin. The originally Canaanite spring time festival obtained a completely new meaning some 3500 years ago when the Jews adopted and transformed it into their Pascha, commemorating the passover and exodus, or liberation of the Jewish people from their slavery in Egypt. Easter is also the central Christian religious feast, commemorating the resurrection of Jesus Christ, an event believed by Christians to take place the third day after his crucifixion. Easter is a moveable feast. The First Council of Nicaea (325) established the date of Easter as the first Sunday after the first spring full moon. As such, the feast can be celebrated in March or April. The days preceding the Easter Monday have also their own names: Maundy (or Green in the Czech tradition) Thursday; Good (or Great in the Czech tradition) Friday; Holy (or White in the Czech tradition) Saturday, ended with the Easter Vigil starting after sundown on Holy Saturday and celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter still enjoys much popularity in the Czech Republic. Ordinary people normally associate it with children who go carolling on Easter Monday and get decorated eggs, sweets and other treats.

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Year of the Rožmberks (Vilém and Petr Vok of Rožmberk)

2011-03-08T23:47:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	A0676
Date of issue	9.3.2011
Face value	49 CZK
Print sheets	-
Size of picture	120 x 110 mm
Graphic designer	Oldřich Kulhánek
Engraver	Miloš Ondráček

Petr Vok of Rožmberk (October 1st, 1539, Český Krumlov - November 6th, 1611, Třeboň) was the last member of the aristocratic family of Rožmberk (also known as Rosenberg). Living in the shadow of his older brother Vilém for more than fifty years, he publicly admitted that he suffered from the "younger, unwanted, and less able sibling syndrome". From his early life, Petr Vok loved learning, knowing and inventing things, as evidenced by his keen interest in science, literature, arts and culture in general. He sponsored local literature, theatre, education (Rožmberk School in Soběslav) and arts. The library he created belonged to the largest in Central Europe. His collection of artefacts, physical instruments and works of nature was comparable to those gathered by Rudolf II at Prague Castle. He transformed the castles in Bechyně and Třeboň into Renaissance mansions, and founded - and became the grand master of - the Order of Skull.
Although he ruled in a way similar to his brother Vilém's, both brothers had a different personality. Petr was a sensitive, open person, standing behind his decisions (this was clearly shown by his negative attitude toward the Habsburg dynasty, or his relationship with the Moravian Church). He also had a good sense of fairness. His marriage to the very young Kateřina of Ludanice (1580) remained childless, and Kateřina began suffering from an unknown mental illness, but she was well-looked after by her husband until her death. Nor did he impose excessive or new taxes on his subjects, despite his considerable debts. He looked after poor and sick people at both Bechyně and Třeboň estates. The poor from the town of Třeboň and the surrounding area were invited to Třeboň Castle for a free meal every day at 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. He became a proficient manager of the Rožmberk estate in just a few years after his succession to power, twice preventing an imminent bankruptcy and division of the estate. The last of the Rožmberks was one of the leading figures in the 16th and 17th century Czech history.
Vilém of Rožmberk
In the 1580s, Vilém commissioned the construction of a Jesuit College in Český Krumlov and received the Order of Golden Fleece, the highest imperial order granted to Catholic aristocrats.
Although he married four times, he remained childless, and after his death the Rožmberk estate passed to Petr Vok of Rožmberk. Vilém of Rožmberk, helped by his chief manager Jakub Krčín of Jelčany, boosted the economic development of the estate. Krčín continued the pond building and fishing business set up in the Třeboň area by famous pond builder Štěpán Netolický, built crop and sheep farms, breweries, mills, silver mines, glass works. Vilém designed a project of transformation of the castle in Český Krumlov into a Renaissance chateau, worth of his position and power, and had the summer mansion Kratochvíle (Pastime in English) near Netolice built. The first project of reconstruction of Třeboň Castle into a Renaissance mansion after the devastating fire in 1562 was also completed during Vilém's rule.
Vilém hosted a large number of musicians, composers, painters, alchemists, such as Antonín Michael of Ebbersbach, Edward Kelly, Johny Dee, at Třeboň Castle.

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Folk architecture - E

2011-03-04T13:30:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0675
Date of issue	23.2.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	á 100 stamps
Size of picture	19 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kavan
Engraver	Bohumil Sneider

As part of the national cultural heritage, folk architecture has always been, and hopefully still remains an inspiration for the contemporary people. It can teach the contemporary architects a lesson in the sensitive urbanisation approach to the surrounding landscape; reasonable proportions; frugal use of materials; suitable design for all required functions of a countryside building; high aesthetic level. A few simplified examples can include the characteristic frame structures common in the West Bohemian border region; the two-storey half-timbered buildings with richly decorated gables typical of North Bohemia; the mostly single-storey Central Bohemian chamber structures built of wood, stone or bricks; the wide-front mountain house of East Bohemia and West Moravia; the white farm buildings in the South Bohemian Blatensko region famous for their gables with a multitude of shapes; the longitudinal grid of buildings in South Moravia, distantly echoing the Roman portico, with hand painted porches and separate wine cellars; the half-timbered cottages in the North Moravian Wallachian region, etc. Each of the basic types always comes with several different examples, not to speak about different combined influences and other interesting aspects.
The E-stamp features a North Bohemian gable and a Central Bohemian gate (front), combined with a Wallachian cottage and a South Bohemian gable from the Tábor region (back).

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Folk architecture - A

2011-03-04T13:25:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0674
Date of issue	23.2.2011
Face value	A
Print sheets	á 100 stamps
Size of picture	19 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kavan
Engraver	Bohumil Sneider

A simplified general kind of summary of nationwide folk architecture, featuring characteristic gables and gates across all regions of the Czech Republic: a South Bohemian gable from the Blatensko region (front); a North Bohemian gable (left); a gable shutter common in North Bohemia as well as North Moravia (right); a West Bohemian half-timbered gable (back).
Both architectural landmarks built in major styles and exceptionally rich countryside architecture abound in the Czech Republic. Throughout the history, the regional and natural diversity contributed to the creation of numerous specific areas, both in terms of the technology and aesthetics used in the structure of folk dwellings. Its morphology lets us feel the remarkable afterglow of famous epochs of art combined with an ancient tradition, the latter endowing the ordinary outbuildings with as much practicality as possible.
Thanks to the historical circumstances, the countryside can offer a large number of superb examples of folk architecture preserved on their original site. Such buildings make a significant part of our everyday cultural life; as such, they should rightly get more attention from the general public. The fact that they are mostly located outside any protected or museum area means that they frequently face the risks associated with lack of knowledge or sensitivity. The lack of an official protection - with the exception of several protected areas declared by the government - has fortunately been compensated for by numerous examples of an excellent care provided by their owners holding them as a summer house for hobby. This natural spontaneous protection would, like the institutional one, deserve certain support, at least of a moral kind.
The natural, material and cultural conditions in the small territory of the Czech Republic created locations with typically autonomous features of folk architecture. The intimate space of a stamp face might be sufficient to feature, e.g. a comprehensive series of the different forms of gables.

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20 Years of the Visegrad Group

2011-03-04T13:22:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0673
Date of issue	11.2.2011
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	8 pcs
Size of picture	44.4 x 26.5 mm
Graphic designer	Barnabás Baticz

This year's issue is a stamp designed by the four member countries of the Visegrad Group (also known as the Visegrad Four, or V4) on the Slovak Ambassador to V4's initiative, backed by the Slovak Post, to commemorate the 20th anniversary of establishment of this alliance of four Central European countries, i.e. Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.
The idea of the V4 alliance derives from a meeting of the Czech, Polish and Hungarian rulers in Visegrad, Hungary in 1335. Charles I of Hungary, Czech king John of Luxembourg, and Casimir III of Poland entered into an agreement of a close cooperation in political and commercial affairs, and of eternal friendship. This agreement inspired the next successful Central European initiative established 656 years later.
The present group was formed on February 15th, 1991 (ten days before the end of the Warsaw Pact) at a meeting of Hungarian Prime Minister József Antall, Czechoslovak President Václav Havel, and Polish President Lech Wałęsa in Visegrad, as the so-called Visegrad Three group. The politicians signed a declaration of a close cooperation of the three Central European countries on their way to the European integration. The countries saw their cooperation in the era after the collapse of the Communist regime as vital for transition from the totalitarian system to a free, plural and democratic society. The group became known as the Visegrad Four (V4) after the split of Czechoslovakia into the successor states Czech Republic and Slovakia; both states became members of the alliance.
Three of the V4 member countries, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland, joined the NATO in 1999. Slovakia followed in 2004. The foreign policy activities of the four countries further merged after their accession to the European Union on May 1st, 2004. The group's core activities, including programmes under the Regional Partnership with Austria and Slovenia or the V4+ concept with other Central and Eastern European countries, focus on cooperation and stability in a broader Central European region.

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The Ctyrlistek Comics - Pinda

2011-03-04T13:15:00.002+01:00

Catalogue number	0672 or VZS05 (booklet)
Date of issue	9.2.2011
Face value	A
Print sheets	á 10 die-cut self-adhesive stamps
Size of picture	23 x 31 mm
Graphic designer	Jaroslav Nemecek

The "Ctyrlistek - Pinda" stamp features Pinda the Rabbit as a painter with brushes in his hand and a box of water paints. Piňda is the next character of the comic book Ctyrlistek appearing on a stamp. The last of the Ctyrlistek boys, Bobik the Pig, is to follow soon.

A stamp identified with the letter A corresponding to the price of Ordinary Letter - Standard up to 50 g in domestic service.

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Cubist Architecture - Black Madonna House Prague

2011-03-04T13:03:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0671
Date of issue	9.2.2011
Face value	14 CZK
Print sheets	8 pcs
Size of picture	40 x 26 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kavan
Engraver	Vaclav Fajt

The Black Madonna House is a masterpiece of Czech Cubist architecture. The house, located at Prague's Old Town between Celetna street and Ovocny trh square, was designed by Czech architect Josef Gocar and built in 1911-12. The house, named after the Baroque statue of Black Madonna in an alcove on the facade, hosts the Prague's National Gallery Museum of Czech Cubism.
The Black Madonna House was built on the site of the former Baroque Granovsky house, whose name it adopted, for merchant František Herbst who wanted to use it as a department store. The interesting thing is that Gocar's first design was refused by the Prague City Hall due to a lack of harmony with the historical neighbourhood. Gočár responded to the allegations by adding further Cubist features, such as more pronounced Cubist entrance or balcony railing.
Gocar originally planned a wine shop in the basement, café on the ground floor, textile store on the first floor, office space on the third and residential space on the fourth floors. All interior decorations, including furniture and other details, had also a Cubist design.
Allegations of unfashionableness hunted the building since its creation, leading to the closure of the café as early as the 1920s. The ongoing trend of transformation of the house culminated in the 1950s when the entire house became an office building used by exhibition firm Výstavnictví.
During an early 1990s reconstruction project, led by Karel Prager, the house was returned to its original shape, old paintings were removed and a missing glass roof section completed to match Gocar's initial design. The house was reopened to the public at a ceremony, attended by former President Vaclav Havel, October 18th, 1994, and became the venue of the Czech Museum of Fine Arts, with a permanent exhibition of Czech Cubism in a part of the house. A replica statue, carved of wood with multicolour finish, of the original Black Madonna was mounted in an alcove on the facade in 2000. The house was added to the National Heritage List as a cultural site in 2010.
The museum removed its collections in 2002, but the Czech Cubism exhibition was reopened in 2003 as part of the National Gallery's activities. The Grand Café Orient on the first floor was reopened in 2005.
The Czech Ministry of Culture used the house in the early 1990s to secure a credit, worth some CZK 300 million, for launching a lottery (so-called "Ceska lotynka"). The project failed, and the house faced a threat of becoming a bank property. The government overcame the situation by borrowing a loan through its agency, the State Culture Fund, from another bank (Komercni banka) to repay the original credit.

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Beauties of Our Country: Cheb 950 Years

2011-03-04T12:58:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0670
Date of issue	9.2.2011
Face value	12 CZK
Print sheets	8 pcs
Size of picture	26 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kavan
Engraver	Vaclav Fajt

Cheb is the ancient capital of the westernmost region of the Czech Republic. The first known settlement in the vast area on the banks of the upper Ohře river was a Slavic stronghold, built as early as the 9th to 11th centuries on a hill overlooking the river. The first mention of Cheb dates back to 1061; it is the oldest evidence of the ongoing medieval colonization of the area surrounding Cheb during which the German colonists pushed the original Slavic settlers back to the hinterland.
The first castle made of stone was built around 1125 by the Vohburg family, and rebuilt after 1167 by Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa in the typical Paletinate style. A settlement, first mentioned in 1203 as Cheb, grew at the foothill outside the castle walls. The century-long disputes between Czech and German rulers about the ownership of the Cheb region ended in 1314 with the victory of Czech king John of Luxembourg. In the 14th century Cheb, with an exclusive location on a major Czech-German trade route, developed into a strong town state with an army of its own, gradually gaining control over the surrounding region.
During the Thirty Years' War, Albrecht von Wallenstein, chief commander of the Imperial Army, and his chief officers and secretary, were killed in Cheb. The town suffered severely during the era.
In the period after the war, Cheb was to become a vast Baroque stronghold, but the project failed and was cancelled in 1809. After the construction of a railway station, the town was transformed into a major railway hub. The 20th century Cheb was strongly affected by the events of both world wars and their consequences. The historical centre underwent a large reconstruction (1956-69), and Cheb became a town conservation area in 1981.
The town highlights include the Castle and the Black Tower, built in the Romanesque style. The 18.5 meters high tower was built of bossed blocks of black ash rock. The most valuable and best preserved building in the castle area is the Chapel of SS Erhard and St Ursula in the Romanesque and Gothic styles, with a unique interior architecture. Each of the two floors of the chapel boasts a different building style.
The main square ("namesti Jiriho z Podebrad") of the town, dedicated to Czech king George of Poděbrady, has a selection of architectural treats. A bunch of originally 11 medieval houses called the Block ("Spalicek"), was gradually erected in its lower part, starting from the 13th century. The magnificent St Nicholas Church, built in 1220-30, is close to the square. The star attractions of Cheb monasteries are St Francis monastery and St Clare monastery. The Monastery of St Francis, originally Friars Minor, was built in the early 13th century and rebuilt in 1275-85, as a complex of double-floor buildings, with a tall square tower from the time of Charles IV. The cloisters (1310-30) with window tracery are the town's Gothic highlight. Just across a small square called Frantiskanske namesti stands St Clare monastery (1264, rebuilt in the early 18th century into a Baroque shape) and church. The church (1708-11), a fine high-Baroque piece by Christoph Dientzenhofer, has been used by the town gallery as a concert and exhibition hall since 1975. St Wenceslas Church, on the site of the oldest local Slavic settlement close to the Janske namesti square, once operated as a Dominican monastery. St Bartholomew Church (1414) near a bridge across the Ohře is an atrial Gothic building with a ceiling resting on a single pillar.

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Jiří Melantrich of Aventinum (1511-1580)

2011-03-04T12:48:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0669
Date of issue	9.2.2011
Face value	30 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Pavel Hrach
Engraver	Bohumil Sneider

Jiří Melantrich (Rožďalovský) of Aventinum (or Aventýn; born Jiří Černý Rožďalovický; c. 1511, Rožďalovice -November 19th, 1580, Prague) was an important Czech Renaissance printer and publisher.
It is not clear when Jiřík Černý, later known as Jiří Melantrich of Aventinum, was born. The alleged year of 1511 is based on the information from a calendar published by Daniel Adam of Veleslavín according to which Melantrich died at 69. He came from a non-wealthy Ultraquist family. Hardly anything is known of his early life. The first mention of him is from 1534, the year he became a bachelor at the Faculty of Arts at Charles University in Prague.
He set up a printing shop, and gradually started to flourish and gain European significance. The Melantrich's Bible (so-called "Melantriška"), issued by him in four or five editions, was at the core of his activities as publisher, although he published also three editions of the New Testament as well as a large number of other religious and moral books (e.g. works by Desiderius Erasmus) for both Catholic and Lutheran or Ultraquist readers, Czech Renaissance Humanist literature or collections of Latin poems. The publication of a Czech and later also German edition of Mattioli's Herbarium, resulting from Melantrich cooperation with famous Italian physician and botanist Pietro Andrea Mattioli, gained European importance. Other of his publications included all kinds of handbooks and dictionaries, acts of Parliament and other legal literature, as well as inexpensive amusing books for ordinary people.
Melantrich also served as the Prague's Old Town councillor. He was raised to the rank of nobleman and granted a single coat of arms in 1557. Throughout his life Melantrich was known as a person educated in the spirit of Renaissance Humanism, an Ultraquist influenced by Lutheranism, who tolerated Catholicism. After he died in 1580, his son-in-law Daniel Adam of Veleslavín took over the Melantrich publishing house and continued its operations.

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Personalities - Famous Czechs: St Agnes of Bohemia (1211-1282)

2011-03-04T12:44:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0668
Date of issue	20.1.2011
Face value	12 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Renata Fucikova
Engraver	Jaroslav Tvrdon

St Agnes of Bohemia (c. 1211 - March 6th, 1282), Czech princess and abbess of the Convent of St Francis in Prague, was the youngest daughter of Czech king Premysl Ottokar I and Constance of Hungary. When she was three years old, she and her sister Anna were entrusted to the Cistercian order in Trzebnica and Doksany to be educated. At that time she was probably engaged to Konrad, son of duke Henry I the Bearded of Silesia and his wife Hedwig. Konrad later died and both sisters returned back to Prague. At the age of eight, Agnes was engaged by her father Premysl Ottokar I, who wished to establish a relationship with the Hohenstaufen family, to Henry, son of Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (later Henry VII of Germany). For the next six years Agnes was sent to the court of Leopold VI of Babenberg to continue her education. But Leopold managed to secure Henry for his own daughter Margaret, and the fourteen-year-old Agnes returned back to Prague again. Her father then planned for her to marry Henry III of England. Henry's delegation was welcomed at Prague Castle a year after her return from Babenberg and Agnes was engaged to Henry, but Henry broke the engagement in 1229. Henry VII of Germany, at the time already married to Margaret of Babenberg, then showed interest in Agnes again. The last suitor was Henry's father Frederick II, but Agnes, who was then free to decide as her father already died and her brother Wenceslaus I loved her, rejected him.
With the help of her brother Wenceslaus I, Agnes founded the Hospital of St Francis in Prague (1232) and two convents where the Franciscan friars and Clare nuns who worked at the hospital resided. She joined the Prague Clares in 1234 as their abbess. She also contributed to the promotion of the Franciscan brotherhood working at the hospital as an individual order, the Knights of the Cross with the Red Star, based on a strict compliance with the Franciscan rules, although her first attempt in 1237 failed. In 1238 she gave up the office of abbess of the Prague Clares, the office remaining vacant until her death.
Agnes played an active role in the social life of her time. Her contribution to the conciliation between Wenceslaus I and his son Premysl was vital. During a controversy between her nephew Premysl Ottokar II and the papal protégé Rudolf I of Habsburg, Agnes clearly took the side of her family when she accepted Premysl's daughter Kunhuta under the roof of the convent in 1277 and denounced the pope's anathema placed on Premysl by asking the nuns to pray for Přemysl during his war campaign against Rudolf before the battle on the Moravia Field.
Agnes remained highly active even prior to her death, which occurred at the then venerable age of 71 years. Her famous charitable works and involvement in the country's affairs gave rise to numerous legends emerging immediately after her death. Although the early attempts at canonization of this pioneer of care for the poor and hospital care in the Czech lands made by Elisabeth of Bohemia and her son Charles IV failed, Agnes was beatified in 1874 and later, on November 12th, 1989, formally canonized.

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The Tradition of Czech Stamp Production

2011-03-04T12:38:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0667
Date of issue	20.1.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	30 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Bedrich Housa

The 2011 issue in the series Tradition of Czech Stamp Design is a single-colour stamp, printed by the rotary recess method, which first appeared on the "Mail Coach on Charles Bridge" envelope commemorating the exhibition of specialised branches of the Union of Czechoslovak Philatelists Prague 1966. The stamp was originally designed and engraved by Josef Hercik. Bedrich Housa is the author of the current engraved version.
Josef Hercik (March 22nd, 1922, Uhersky Brod - July 9th, 1999, Prague) was one of the leading Czech engravers in the post-World War II era, mainly due to the large number of national and international awards he received for his contribution to the art of engraving in stamp design. As the author of more than 400 stamp engravings, Josef Hercik managed to overcome even Jindra Schmidt and became the most prolific Czechoslovak engraver.
Josef Herčík's started his art career in the almost forgotten craft of gunstock engraving in the arm producing firm Zbrojovka Uherský Brod. He moved to Prague in 1940 where he also married. After the end of the war he was admitted to the College of Arts in Prague. The education opened him a broader way to graphic design. Although mainly recognized as a stamp engraver, he also authored a large spectrum of other graphic works, such as drawings, book covers and illustrations, bibliophilic works. His engravings for the 1958 edition of Arthur Rimbaud's "Le bateau ivre", designed by painter František Tichý, was the first work that made him publicly visible. His cooperation with graphic designer Václav Sivko, which started at the same time, introduced him to stamp engraving; Herčík's first stamp engravings followed Sivka's designs used for the PRAGA 1962 exhibition, although his first "real" stamp engravings featuring two insect motifs appeared later.
Herčík worked mainly for the Czechoslovak stamp design, but several of his works became also internationally renowned. He engraved an extensive series of facsimiles of famous stamps, e.g. the Blue Mauritius, for the German philatelic firm Hermann Sieger, as well as a few stamps for other postal administrations, such as Monaco or the United Nations.
Herčík covered also other areas of graphic design, such as free or heraldic graphics. As a heraldic designer he was even commissioned to design and engrave almost all Czechoslovak issues including heraldry of Czech or Slovak towns.
Josef Herčík and his wife Helena remained very active and enterprising in the graphic arts industry even in old age. The printing firm "1. ceska graficka spolecnost", set up by them and their son Josef Hercik Jr.'s family in the 1990s, soon attracted major printing and graphic contracts from around the world.

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Census

2011-03-04T12:31:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0666
Date of issue	5.1.2011
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	á 50 pcs of stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Kolar

The Czech government has been preparing a national census of population and dwellings in the Czech Republic that is to be conducted officially at midnight March 25th-26th. Parallel 2011 national censuses are to be taken in all EU countries. The 2011 census is expected to include a number of new features, based on the previous experience and developments in information technology, according to the Czech Statistical Office.
Registered partnership is one of the new questions in the census questionnaire, while questions about household amenities, income and expenditure will be missing - the only details important for the Czech Statistical Office are the availability of a personal computer and access to the Internet.
For the first time ever, those respondents who have set up an official data mail box will be able to complete the census questionnaire online.
95 per cent of the census collectors will be employees of the Czech Post. Legal entities will receive the questionnaire through data mail boxes, although a call centre will be set up to answer queries and solve potential problems during the real collection time.
A trial census with 0.5% of the national population was conducted between April 5th and May 7th, 2010, testing all necessary processes before the real 2011 census. The organizers found that 6.4% of the respondents used the chance to complete the questionnaire online. A minicensus, run in the autumn 2010, offered pupils and students a possibility to process the collected statistical data.
Regular censuses in the territory of the Czech Republic have been organized since 1869.

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Kaspar Maria von Sternberg (1761 - 1838)

2011-03-04T12:25:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	A0665
Date of issue	5.1.2011
Face value	43 CZK
Print sheets	A 1
Size of picture	26 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Oldrich Kulhanek
Engraver	Wolfgang Mauer

Kaspar Maria von Sternberg (born on January 6th, 1761 at Brezina Castle) was one of the leading scientists of the first half of the 19th century, with a special interest in botany, geology and paleontology, and is considered as one of the founders of paleobotany. He is the author of an extensive and precious collection of minerals, fossils and herbs that became the core collection of the National Museum in Prague, founded by Kaspar Maria von Sternberg.
Kaspar Maria was born the eighth and last child (third son) of Johann von Sternberg and Anna Josefa Krakovská of Kolovraty, into a not wealthy Czech aristocratic family of Sternbergs. A philosophy graduate from the Prague University, he studied theology in Rome and received lower ordination. Inspired by the newly founded Regensburg Botanical Society (1790), he became a keen naturalist, contributor to the Society's Botanisches Taschenbuch and one of its ordinary members (1800). His first private botany teacher was Charles Jeunet Duval. After his failure as a church diplomat to Paris (1804-05), he gave up his career in the church and moved to Regensburg to work as director of local scientific institutes. The Regensburg Botanical Garden, set up by Sternberg, was destroyed during a 1809 war campaign.
During his French stay, Sternberg was introduced to Alexander von Humboldt and a group of elite French paleontologists and botanists. His book, A Survey of Saxifrages in Pictures (published in Latin) was based on materials collected during his scientific trips, especially to the Bavarian Alps. Shortly after the publication, he inherited the West Bohemian Radnice estate from his older brother and devoted scientist Joachim. He set up a botanical garden in Radnice and was a frequent visitor to the newly opened coal mines in the neighboorhood where he searched for primordial plant fossils. After his A Treatise on Botany in Bohemia (originally published in German and soon after also in Czech), he (together with Karel Bořivoj Presl and Augustin Corda) co-authored the 1820-38 An Attempt at Geographical and Botanical Description of Primordial Plants. He also became one of the key shareholders in Prague Railway Company (1825) authorised to build the Prague-Lány Horse-Drawn Railway (1827).
Kaspar Maria von Sternberg was elected President of the Society for the Establishment of the Czech National Museum in 1818, and bequeathed his library and paleontological collection to the museum. He died at Breznice Castle on December 20th, 1838 as the last male heir of the Leopoldine branch of the Sternberg family.

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Works of Art on Stamps: Karel Spillar (1871 - 1939)

2010-11-10T12:42:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0663
Date of issue	10.11.2010
Face value	30 CZK
Print sheets	4 stamps
Size of picture	50 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Karel Spillar
Engraver	Martin Srb

Karel Spillar (1871 - 1939): Spring, 1912, National Gallery in Prague.
The Czech painter and graphic designer Karel Spillar studied with Frantisek Zenisek at the Prague's Academy of Arts (1885-1893). He was one of the members of the Manes Union of Fine Arts and a teacher (after 1913) at the Academy of Arts. His early works were influenced by his stay at Paris and expressionism (1902-1908), other styles that found a way into his works included neo romanticism and the symbolism of Art Nouveau. His decorative works followed the paintings by Puvis de Chavannes (Portrait of a Lady in Black, 1899; Shepherds, 1914). Spilar's best known masterpiece is his decoration of the Municipal House in Prague, including the mosaic Homage to Prague (1909) above the entrance and the paintings in Smetana's Hall representing an allegory of Music, Dance, Poetry and Drama (1910) in the Art Nouveau symbolic style. He was the author of a number of other decorations, such as those in the lounge of the Central Hotel in Prague. Spillar was also the author of lithographic works, posters, small graphic designs.

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Works of Art on Stamps: MilosJiranek (1875 - 1911)

2010-11-10T12:35:00.000+01:00

Catalogue number	0662
Date of issue	10.11.2010
Face value	26 CZK
Print sheets	4 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 50 mm
Graphic designer	Miloš Jiránek
Engraver	Václav Fajt

Milos Jiranek (1875-1911): Piskari (Sand Bargemen), 1910, Moravian Gallery in Brno.
Milos Jiranek, also known as Vaclav Zednik, was a Czech painter, art reviewer, writer and translator. His paintings were mostly influenced by impressionism. He studied at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague. His teachers at the Prague's Academy of Arts were M. Pirner and V. Hynais. Jiranek was one of the leaders of the generation of founders of Czech modern art emerging in the course of 1890s. The main features of the new generation were their critical approach to the servitude of art with respect to ideology; calling for the creative freedom of individuals and for autonomous art thinking. The struggle for emancipation of Czech art life found its expression in the establishment of the Mánes Union of Fine Arts (1887) and the art magazine Volne smery (1896).
Milos Jiranek's work as a painter remained for a long time in the shadow of his activities as an art reviewer and organizer. The quality of his graphic art, tragically ended by his premature death at the age of 36 years, has not yet been fully appreciated. The series of his masterpiece White Studies is an original synthesis of the impressionist method with an intimist atmosphere, with a well-balanced composition of colours and shapes.

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Works of Art on Stamps: Karel Skreta (1610 - 1674)

2010-11-10T12:26:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0661
Date of issue	10.11.2010
Face value	24 CZK
Print sheets	4 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 50 mm
Graphic designer	Karel Skreta
Engraver	Milos Ondracek

Karel Skreta (1610-1674): Paris and Helen, around 1672 National Gallery in Prague
Karel Skreta, one of the major 17th century Czech baroque painters, was born to a well-to-do Protestant family, with the noble predicate 'ze' (his full name being Skreta Sotonovsky ze Zavoric). Members of the family, originally from Olejnice in South Bohemia, lived in Prague and Kutna Hora. Karel's father Konrad died when Karel was only three years old. The little boy was placed into the care of his uncle, Pavel Skreta, who, following his brother's will, enabled his young nephew to obtain a broad humanistic education in the Prague's Tyn school. Young Karel spoke Latin, German, Italian and French, and this knowledge proved very useful in the young man's adult life.Skreta's likely teachers of painting were artists at the royal court. After his return to Prague in 1638, he became one of the most popular local painters and gradually one of the major Czech early baroque painters. Skreta's painting shop, one of the largest in Prague, employed a number of apprentices and journeyman painters. His famous works include outstanding portraits, altar paintings, drawings and illustrations. Mythological themes rarely appeared in his works. His later works were based on the chiaroscuro technique. Skreta was the author of the Saint Wenceslas series of paintings for the Augustinian Monastery at Zderaz in Prague's New Town (1641), numerous altar paintings for major Prague churches (St. Thomas and St. Nicholas at the Lesser Town, St. Stephen, Virgin Mary before Tyn) and the Assumption of the Virgin Mary church of the Cistercian Monastery in Plasy.
In countless court proceedings, Skreta eventually won back almost all of his family's property that had been confiscated after they fled the country. He died in 1674 in Prague as a very rich man.

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Christmas - Zlutice Hymn Book

2010-11-09T14:28:00.001+01:00

Catalogue number	0664
Date of issue	10.11.2010
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Fabián Puléř, Zdeněk Ziegler

The 1558 Zlutice Hymn Book is a rare renaissance parchment folio (sized 63x40x16cm, weighing 28kg), containing 471 sheets of Czech utraquist liturgical texts for the divine services and hymns, decorated with remarkable paintings. The book was ordered by the Zlutice town councillors for the local literary brotherhood, for the considerable expense of 283 threescore of Meissen groschen, of which the sum of 23 threescore was contributed by the lord of the estate. Jan Táborský of Klokotská Hora, owner of a painting shop in Prague, used the following words to appreciate their generosity: "Eager to sing, the people of Zlutice ordered costly scripts to be made and written in a reasonable (i.e. Czech) language." The author of the letters (Czech bastarda) and notation was Vavrinec Bily. The book was illuminated by the famous painter Fabian Puler of Usti nad Labem. The 16 miniature paintings in the initial letters and arabesques are particularly well appreciated. They contain the coats of arms of Zlutice and each of the donators and guilds, scenes from the Old and the New Testaments as well as from the life of the townspeople (feasts, bull slaughtering, Sunday rest), paintings of famous Czech historic persons (Saint Wenceslas, John Hus, Jerome of Prague; the two latter ones being erased in the 17th century) as well as certain of the donators, both townspeople and lower noblemen from the neighbourhood.
The Hymn Book, until 1977 deposited in the Prague's City Museum, is now a part of the collections of the Museum of Czech Literature in Prague. The City Museum keeps a replica of the book.

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Historical stoves: Art Deco

2010-10-19T11:26:00.004+02:00

The Stamp will be issued on October 20 th

Catalogue number	0656
Date of issue	20.10.2010
Face value	20 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Michal Vitanovský
Engraver	Bohumil Šneider

Art Deco stoves - as indicated by the variety of its names, the Czech version of the Art Deco style had its special features. The names, such as rondocubism, curved or national style, show the embarrassment of theoreticians in naming this local style orientation. In any case, the common denominator was the bombastic decorativism, occasionally inspired with folklore. Stoves had a form similar to the contemporary architecture. The predominant material, used in the already large-scale production of Art Deco stoves, was enamelled sheet iron. The occasional burnt clay stoves, intended by the author as an original piece, represent the final stage of the unbroken historical line of glazed-tile stoves' development starting in the Middle Ages. The ceramic cover of the heating body in the chateau in Nove Mesto nad Metuji, created by Helena Johnova in 1939, is an example of the latter category.

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Historical stoves: Art Nouveau

2010-10-19T11:08:00.001+02:00

The Stamp will be issued on October 20 th

Catalogue number	0655
Date of issue	20.10.2010
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	23 x 40 mm
Graphic designer	Michal Vitanovsky
Engraver	Bohumil Sneider

Art Nouveau, considered as the last comprehensive style, tried to replace the existing academic historicism with new, original ornaments. Art Nouveau gradually expanded into all areas of decorative art, glazed-tile stoves including. The architecture of Art Nouveau stoves, with its rather cold structuring in comparison with certain other historical styles, is not revolutionary. What makes it rich, however, are the gentle and noble ornaments covering the glazed tiles. The rich vegetable decorations of typical Art Nouveau stoves, including this South Moravian one, are a unique feature distinguishing them from other styles. The cast iron door whose decor often becomes a part of the overall art design is another special feature of Art Nouveau stoves. At the same time metal doors signal an alternative material that began to gain ground in the contemporary production of stoves.

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Technical Monuments: Historic bridge

2010-10-19T10:54:00.001+02:00

The Stamp will be issued on October 20 th.

Catalogue number	0654
Date of issue	20.10.2010
Face value	12 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Ungrad
Engraver	Jaroslav Tvrdon

The Stone Bridge in Pisek (also known as the Stag Bridge) is the oldest still standing stone bridge in Bohemia. The bridge, spanning the Otava river, was the second stone bridge in Bohemia (after the already not existing Judith bridge in Prague). The exact date of its building is unknown, but the style is gothic. It was first mentioned in writing in 1348 when Charles IV ordered the town councillors to use fines collected in the town for maintenance of the bridge. A couple of gates with towers protected the bridge as well as the present historic town centre on either side. The left-hand tower was destroyed by the flood of 1768, the other one succumbed to wear and tear in 1825. The bridge is adorned by copies of the original, mostly 18th century baroque sculptures and the Cavalry. The 6.5m wide structure, slightly bulging up the river, consists of six arches spanning 111 metres, built on pillars with an upward save edge. The normal height above the water level is 5.5m. As one of the few medieval bridges, still standing and used in Central Europe, the stone bridge is a unique rarity.

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Technical Monuments - Cable-stayed bridge

2010-10-19T10:46:00.001+02:00

The Stamp will be issued on October 20 th.

Catalogue number	0653
Date of issue	20.10.2010
Face value	10 CZK
Print sheets	50 stamps
Size of picture	40 x 23 mm
Graphic designer	Jan Ungrad
Engraver	Jaroslav Tvrdon

Cable-stayed bridge - Mariansky Bridge in Ustí nad Labem, designed by the renowned architecture studio Roman Koucky, is one of the most distinctive and disputed projects built in the post-November 1989 Czech Republic. Following years of lengthy discussions about location of the bridge, the city councillors decided to place it under the Mariánska Rock, a site best suited for the bridge's main role, i.e. combining the city's three quarters - the city centre, Krasne Brezno on the left bank and Strekov on the right bank of the Labe river. The 70m high bridge was built in 1993 to 1998 and became the city's new dominant. The height is not the only feature attracting the attention of people: the impossible-to-overlook system of steel cables suspending the 170m long bridge is similarly provoking. The architect designed the number of cables, the height and shape of the pylon not only with respect to static but also to his artistic visions. For instance, the height of the pylon was to counterbalance the Mariánská Rock on the other side of the river. It also matches the height of the tower of the gothic church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary nearby. According to the Structural Engineering International (SEI), quarterly Journal of the International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE), it is one of the ten most beautiful 1990s world buildings. It has also become the most expensive local project in the area of transport infrastructure since 1948, financed by a city. The city had to postpone the project of reconstruction of the Mírove Square and other projects. Last year the bridge changed its owners: it has become the property of the Road and Motorway Directorate of the Czech Republic since June 26th, 2008.

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The CTYRLISTEK COMICS - STAMP BOOKLET

2010-10-18T19:52:00.001+02:00

The Booklet will be issued on October 20 th.

Catalogue number	VZS04
Date of issue	20.10.2010
Face value	100 CZK
Print sheets	á 10 die-cut self-adhesive stamps
Size of picture	23 x 31 mm
Graphic designer	Jaroslav Němeček

Myspulin a Cat Scientist
As a true scientist, Myspulin, the second of the four Ctyrlistek comics characters featured on a stamp, creates a chemical reaction setting off a firework of flowers coming out of the heated flask. Stamps with Bobik the Pig and Pinda the Rabbit, the other two 'boys' of the four Ctyrlistek characters, are to follow.

A stamp identified with the letter A corresponding to the price of Ordinary Letter - Standard up to 50 g in domestic service (current price according to the Price List of Basic Postal Services: CZK 10). Price of the booklet as of the date of issue: 10times CZK 10, i.e. CZK 100.

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