Bohemian Glass, Crystal: History in Pictures

Green glass goblet from
the period of the
wandering of nations

Glassmaker on an
enamel-painted goblet,
1680


Glassworks, an anonymous painting from the beginning of the 20th century.		The Czech parchment of August 21, 1523, the oldest written document on glass-making in the area of Kasperske hory.

Glass can be found in Bohemia in solitary cases as early as primeval time. Glass beads imitating pearls were imported at the time of the Unetice Culture (about 1500 BC) probably from Egypt. However, the Celts living in Bohemia could produce glass themselves, which is testified to by the finds of melting pots and pans. Also the glass beads in the jewels of Great Moravia, dating from the 9th century, ate at least partly of domestic origin. In Nitra the foundations of a glass furnace from that time with fragments of black glass were discovered.

Glass could have been produced in Bohemia probably further centuries before, although the centers of advanced crafts were destroyed after the fall of the Great Moravia Realm. Many craftsmen left for Bohemia, although direct proof of the existence of glassworks is not available.

However, archaeological finds and solitary mentions in written documents show that local production did exist, though on a minor scale (stained glass).

The oldest glassworks in Bohemia and Moravia can be proved archaeologically only in the second half of the 13th century and by written documents only at the beginning of the 14th century. Initially the glassworks originated in forests, outside settlements; therefore, they escaped obviously the attention of those who could write. Before the origin of towns the early medieval writings did not deal with such trifles as handicraft production. However, even the period immediately following the origin of guilds does not furnish much information about glassworks, because glassmaking had never belonged to urban crafts. In the pre-Hussite times 20 glassmakers and glaziers are mentioned among the citizens of Prague and 14 in Brno, but in either case it was obviously merely an incorrect denomination of the character of their craft. There were no major forests in the environs of either Prague of Brno and it is improbable, therefore, that any major glassworks could operate in those regions for a longer period in the Middle Ages. The idea of regular import of wood, e.g. along the Vltava, was not feasible, either. The city records obviously meant the glaziers, i.e. the craftsmen glazing windows with circular glass plates which they bought elsewhere.

Glassworks were built in wooded regions, as the manufacture of glass necessitated a considerable quantity of wood, used not only for the firing of furnaces, but also for the production of an important raw material – potash, obtained from its ashes. Accordingly to old documents the manufacture of one kilogram of potash required many dozens of kilograms of sound beech or other wood. For this reason the woods in the environs of glassworks were soon felled. Before the wooded regions had been colonized, it was cheaper for the producer to abandon the old glassworks and to build a new one on the site provided with sufficient wood supplies than to transport wood over major distances. Some glassworks were like a vagrant camp: they moved from one site to another, always after wood on the way, to the depths of forests. This can also explain, why the operation of medieval glassworks did not last long.

Wood supplies played a role of importance even later. Even at the end of the 18th century some glassworks changed their sites because of wood shortage. Not all glassworks, however, were so vitally dependent on the proximity of forests which were indispensable chiefly for the works producing glass mass as raw material, but not for the works refining glass whose wood requirements were lower.

The differentiation among glassworks began at the end of the 16th century, when the glassworkers in some glassworks did not produce the whole product: a division of labor appeared - some of the glassmakers blew the glass product and others refined it. From this there was but a short step to the separation of both phases of production. An early as in the 17th century there was in Bohemia a number of independent household producers who bought their raw material in glassworks to refine it and sell their products.

Initially these producers lived in the immediate vicinity of the glassworks or in the nearest villages. In the course of time the glass refining concentrated in certain regions to which glass was imported even from considerable distance.

What we also offer