The Encyclopedia of Czech Towns by Karel Kuča is now freely accessible on the web

Lipnice nad Sázavou – From today, researchers can access a comprehensive encyclopedia of towns and municipalities in Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia, authored by architectural and urban history historian Karel Kuča. The website, which offers information about nearly 1400 existing and extinct settlements, was funded with the support of the Czech Chamber of Authorized Engineers and Technicians and the Association of Historical Settlements of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia. It cost about 300,000 crowns and makes the information available to interested parties for free. CTK was informed by the chairman of the association, Libor Honzárek, during the presentation of the website in Lipnice nad Sázavou in the Havlíčkobrod region.

"Anyone who loves monuments, who is interested in heritage urbanism, individual towns, their development, and history in those towns will find everything they need there. It is a universal tool prepared for everyone – for students, for designers when writing technical accompanying reports about a town. It can be for various programs. It's simply a source of information with a very broad foundation,” said Honzárek.

According to him, there is no equivalent of this encyclopedia in Europe. Its individual volumes were published gradually between 1996 and 2011. Kuča originally wanted to supplement the eight volumes with a ninth volume dedicated to literature, in which he would update the data found; ultimately, the additional information is part of the presentation on the website. Unlike the book, the website provides in full quality a large collection of photographs. There are about 13,000 published images, and the author intends to add more. The website also includes information about modern buildings and counts of homes and residents over a long historical sequence after 2021, unlike the book.

"I have to say it was a completely crazy idea. At first, it didn’t seem that crazy because it was supposed to be three volumes. However, after the first one, it became clear that it wouldn’t be that way,” Kuča said about the creation of his work. He ultimately gathered so much information that it filled 11,000 pages of text. More data will be gradually added to the website.

Due to the update, the encyclopedia now includes localities that became towns or municipalities after the book edition of the alphabetically arranged volumes. From the Vysočina region, for example, it includes Okříšky in the Třebíč district, which has been a municipality since 2007.