History of the printed Knihopis

The idea to create a complete list of Czech incunabula and old prints has appeared in 1923. That was the year of the 150th anniversary of the birth of Josef Jungmann. The decision was made to reproduce his Historie české literatury (1st edition in 1825) but on highly accurate and scientific basis. The Ministery of Education issued a decree (december 1923). Its purpose was to set up a committee with 8 members responsible for the work. Zdeněk Václav Tobolka was its first head and Cyril Straka, the prior of the Strahov Monastery was the first secretary of the committee.

The first results of the work appeared in 1925 when the list of all the 31 Czech Incunabula known at those times was published. The list of old prints (1501-1800) started to be published in 1939 (though some preliminary material appeared already in 1936). The work was completed in 9 volumes in 1967. After the death of Z.V. Tobolka  (+5.11.1951), doc. dr. František Horák became the new chief editor of the Knihopis. This man was also the first director of the Library of the newly founded Academy of Sciences of the Czech republic (today AV ČR) in 1953. When he has left the Academy for the State Library (National Library today) in 1967, he took with himself the collected material of the Czech Knihopis while the other non-Czech bohemian production of old prints remained in the Library of the Academy of Sciences. The Czech part of Knihopis has 17.631 titles.

While and after the Knihopis was published, many new additions and corrections appeared. Hence, doc. Fr. Horák started to publish the Supplementa to Knihopis. Until 1983 when he died not all of these were published and the work continues up to present days.

Meanwhile, the electronic database of the Knihopis and its Supplementa was made by ÚKS AV ČR in cooperation with the National Library. This database is now on-line.

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