Marta Vaculínová is a research fellow at the RFB and will give a talk on her research project on 29 October 2026, during the book break at 12.45 pm:

The Goose and the Swan. The University of Wittenberg and Bohemia. The University of Wittenberg was a popular destination for Bohemian and Moravian students, particularly after Martin Luther had declared himself the heir to Jan Hus. During the first two-thirds of the 16th century, it was the most frequently attended foreign university by Bohemians. Traces of Bohemian students can be found in letters, autograph books and in the printed editions of the university’s disputations. Some later went on to work as professors at the university. At the beginning of the 17th century, the number of Bohemian students declined; during the Thirty Years’ War, exiles then came to Wittenberg, some of whom received a scholarship from the Elector. For the Wittenberg students of Bohemian and Moravian origin, there was no way back after 1620, as they would have had to convert to Catholicism in their homeland. Consequently, most of them remained in the German states or moved on to other parts of Europe. Their own writings, as well as other printed works – in particular funeral sermons, many of which are preserved in the Wittenberg Research Library for the History of the Reformation – bear witness to their complicated life journeys and fates.