Nationality: Czech(s). Ethnic groups: Czech (90.4% or 9.25 million); Moravian (more than 380,000 people); Slovak (193,000); Roma (171,000); Silesian ethnicity (11,000 people); Polish (52,000); German (39,000); Ukrainian (22,000) and Vietnamese (18,000). Religions: Roman Catholic, Protestant. Language: Czech, Slovak.
The two sides were debating the name until Czechoslovakia, after 74 years as a nation, broke apart in 1993—into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. That year, the Terminological Committee of the Czech Office for Surveying, Mapping, and Cadaster named it Czechia, an English version of the Czech word Česko.
"Cz" was a common Latin transcription of the Czech (Slavic) č-sound since Middle Ages. It was a common way to write Czech names in Latin texts long before Czechs started to write Czech texts in Latin script.
"Czechia" is pronounced CHEH-khiyah or CHEK-iyah — with a k, not a ch, in the middle.
Czech Republic, also called Czechia, country located in central Europe. It comprises the historical provinces of Bohemia and Moravia along with the southern tip of Silesia, collectively often called the Czech Lands. In 2016 the country adopted the name “Czechia” as a shortened, informal name for the Czech Republic.
From 1991, the Czech Republic, originally as part of Czechoslovakia and since 1993 in its own right, has been a member of the Visegrád Group and from 1995, the OECD. The Czech Republic joined NATO on 12 March 1999 and the European Union on 1 May 2004.
The Sudetenland was a province in northern Czechoslovakia, bordering Germany. Germany wanted to expand its territory to include the Sudetenland and gain control of key military defences in the area. Once it had control of these defences, invading the rest of Czechoslovakia would be considerably easier.
The Czech Republic is home to many famous international companies, including Deloitte Touche, Exxon Mobil and Zara. But the country also has its own homegrown large firms, such as Skoda, Budweiser Budvar, Pilsner Urquell and Bata. That's a car company, a shoe company and two beer companies.
Those who argue that events between 1989 and 1992 led to the dissolution point to international factors such as the breakaway of the Soviet satellite nations, the lack of unified media between the Czech and the Slovak Republics, and most importantly the actions of the political leaders of both nations like the
Tensions began to mount between Benes and Stalin over two issues. Stalin demanded that the province of Ruthenia be ceded to the USSR. Also, in the collapse of the quisling state body, the local “people's committees” that replaced them became dominated by Communists.
After World War II, when Communist Party of Czechoslovakia took over the control of the country through a Soviet-backed 1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état, Czechoslovakia became part of the Eastern Bloc through Warsaw Pact with Soviet Union and eastern and central European socialist countries.
From the Communist coup d'état in February 1948 to the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Czechoslovakia was ruled by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Czech: Komunistická strana Československa, KSČ). The country belonged to the Eastern Bloc and was a member of the Warsaw Pact and of Comecon.
Adolf Hitler justified the invasion by the purported suffering of the ethnic Germans living in these regions. The seizure of Sudetenland by Nazi Germany was detrimental to the future defense of Czechslovakia as the extensive Czechoslovak border fortifications were also located in the same area.
Around 500 BC: One of the Celtic tribes, the Boii, are the first Prague inhabitants known by name. The Boii called the region 'Bohemia' and the river 'Vltava'. 6th century: Arrival of the Slavs. Slavic settlements are established alongside the Germanic settlements around Prague.
Politicians in the Czech Republic are trying to put decades of debate to an end by announcing a new name for the country: Czechia.
When did Czech Republic became a country?
Around the 4th century B.C. the present-day Czech Republic was populated by Celts. They were the first ethnic group to arrive in the area, according to historical evidence. The Celtic Boii tribe gave the country its Latin name - Boiohaemum (Bohemia).
After World War I and the establishment of an independent Czechoslovak state, the whole of Bohemia became a part of Czechoslovakia, defying claims of the German speaking inhabitants that regions with German speaking majority should be included in the Republic of German-Austria.
Bohemia is a region of Czech Republic; the nomadic, often vilified, group called the Gypsies or Romany are called "bohemiens" in French. But in spite of this, the Bohemians and the Gypsies, in the most prevalent perceptions of both, shared some characteristics.
The Bohemians (Latin: Behemanni) or Bohemian Slavs (Bohemos Slavos, Boemanos Sclavos), were an early Slavic tribe in Bohemia (modern Czech Republic).
The term bohemianism emerged in France in the early 19th century, when artists and creators began to concentrate in the lower-rent, lower class, Romani neighborhoods.
