Prague history is one of the richest and the most eventful in the entire gamut of European cities. Founded formally as early as in the 9th century AD, Prague has been witness to a number of conflicts of religious and political natures, periods of glory and decline, and migration and infiltration of ethnic groups from all over Central Europe. The palaeolithic age was the first period in Prague history, of which signs of inhabitation are found in the city. Thereafter a number of Bohemian, Celtic and Germanic tribes made Prague their home. History in Prague takes a more recorded a formal turn with the coming of the Czechs in the 9th century. Princess Libuse founded the Prague castle following a dream or a divine revelation that she received. She also founded the Premyslid dynasty according to the name of her husband Premyslid, a humble Czech ploughman.
The middle ages saw the coming and dissemination of Christianity in Prague, under the rule of the Premyslid dynasty. King Wenceslas was the most illustrious king of this period. However, he was brutally murdered following his Saxon sympathies. He was buried in the rotunda of the St. Vitus Cathedral, the construction of which started in 929 AD. Prague was soon granted the status of a bishopric by the holy church in Rome in 973 AD, and Wenceslas was canonised. The rest of the middle ages saw the city being ruled by the Premyslid monarchs, which ultimately died out in 1306. the same year saw Prague wavering under the rule of Luxembourg, as Eliska, the last Premyslid princess married John of Luxembourg.
The Luxembourg rule ushered in the waves of the Renaissance movement in Prague, dawning a new
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age in the history of Prague. Prague became an archbishopric in 1344. Under the reign of Charles IV of the Luxembourg dynasty, Prague reached an importance unprecedented in its history. The Charles University, the first of its type in Central Europe was constructed, as was the Charles Bridge. Prague became an important center of the New Learning involving the scientists, alchemists and renaissance scholars, earning the nickname of “Magic Prague” for the city. It was the time that also saw the development of a fledgling Jewish community in the city. Prague became one of the greatest centers of Humanist studies. However, the death of Charles IV threw the city in a state of utter confusion. The Protestant reformist waves of early 17th century brought about by the Hussites further complicated the state of affairs, leading to the Battle of the White Mountains. The Catholics recorded victory, but Prague sank into obscurity. What followed thereafter were Czech wars of independence over the Austrio-Hungarian rule.
Prague shot back into political attention with the beginning of the World Wars. It stayed close to Paris in the First World War. The second World War saw the country taken by Germany's Nazi forces in 1939. it continued till the Soviet Red Army liberated the city in 1945. that began the communist regime in Czechoslovakia, with Prague as the center of governance. However, 1989 saw the beginning of the Velvet revolution leading to the first formal democratic presidential elections in January 1990, finally leading to the split in the country. Prague becomes the capital of the newly formed Czech Republic, now separate from Slovakia.
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