How old is Prague? A ninth-century hillfort and a city of 1922

Guidebooks say Prague is "over a thousand years old", which is true with room to spare. The real answer depends on what you count as its beginning: the first fortified hill, the first town, the first legal city and the present municipality are four different events, centuries apart.

The short answer

Prague is usually dated from around 870, when Bořivoj, the first Christian prince of the Přemyslid dynasty, is traditionally credited with founding a hillfort on the site of Prague Castle. On that reckoning the city is more than 1,150 years old in 2026. Settlement on the site goes back further, but the castle is the date most histories use.

The hill itself is covered in our guide to Prague Castle.

From hillfort to royal seat

The early Czech state grew around two hillforts above the Vltava, Prague Castle and Vyšehrad, and the dukes of the Přemyslid line moved between them. By the tenth century Prague was a trading place. The traveller Ibrahim ibn Yaqub, a Jewish merchant from Spain, described it around 965 as a city built of stone and lime and a centre of trade, one of the earliest outside accounts that survive. In 973 a bishopric was established in the city, tying it into the Church of Western Europe.

Below the castle, the Vltava crossing drew merchants, and by the twelfth century a market settlement had grown on the right bank, the origin of the Old Town. In the thirteenth century this settlement and the settlement on the left bank beneath the castle, the Lesser Town (Malá Strana), received town privileges. The structure of the medieval core is described in the pieces on the Old Town and Malá Strana. The Přemyslid state and its rulers are covered in the Přemyslids and the medieval Czech state.

The age of Charles IV

The city changed scale in the fourteenth century. Charles IV, king of Bohemia from 1346 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1355, made Prague his capital and rebuilt it. In 1348 he founded the New Town to the south-east of the Old Town, laid out on a planned grid with broad streets and large squares, and also founded Charles University, the first university in Central Europe. The stone bridge across the Vltava was begun in 1357, and the building of St Vitus Cathedral in the castle, begun in 1344, is also linked to his reign. The period and the emperor's wider legacy are in our pieces on Charles IV and the golden age and the New Town.

Much of the centre dates from this period or from the Renaissance and Baroque layers added later. Rudolf II made Prague his imperial seat from 1583 to 1612, drawing artists and astronomers to the city.

Turmoil and reunification

The Hussite movement, which began in the early fifteenth century, started with the burning of Jan Hus in 1415 and the first defenestration in 1419. The second defenestration, in 1618, when Protestant nobles threw two Habsburg officials from a window at Prague Castle, is usually named as the spark of the Thirty Years' War. After the Battle of White Mountain in 1620 the Habsburgs took firm control and the city entered a long Baroque age. The episodes are told in the Hussite movement and the Battle of White Mountain.

For centuries Prague was not one city. The Old Town, the New Town, the Lesser Town and Hradčany (the castle district) each had its own council and walls. Emperor Joseph II ordered them merged into a single administrative unit in 1784, and the new city took effect in the following years. The Jewish Town (Josefov) was added in 1850, and the story of that quarter is in the guide to the Jewish Quarter.

The nineteenth century and the national revival

The nineteenth century gave Prague much of the face visitors know today. Industry and railways arrived, and suburbs such as Karlín, Smíchov, Žižkov and Vinohrady grew as separate municipalities around the old core. At the same time, Czech national feeling revived after centuries of German-language dominance in public life. Czech became the language of the theatre, the press and the learned societies, and the National Theatre, opened in 1881 and rebuilt after a fire in 1883, was paid for by public subscription. The movement is described in our guide to the Czech national revival.

The suburbs were absorbed into the city only in 1922, which is why many Praguers still say they are from Žižkov or Vinohrady first and from Prague second. The shape of the modern city, with its numbered districts and its dozens of local councils, is explained in the piece on Prague's city districts.

The modern city

In 1918 Prague became the capital of the new state of Czechoslovakia, a change explained in our piece on the creation of Czechoslovakia. In 1922 Greater Prague was created, absorbing neighbouring towns and villages and giving the city something close to its present form. Its later years include the German occupation of 1939 to 1945, the Prague uprising of May 1945, the Soviet-led invasion of August 1968 and the Velvet Revolution of November 1989.

Since 1993 Prague has been the capital of the Czech Republic. The historic centre was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1992, and the legal and cultural framework for protecting it is described in the piece on the historic centre as a UNESCO site. On population, the censuses record the city's growth through the twentieth century, a story told in Prague's population.

Why the dates differ

All the ages are defensible. Archaeology finds older settlement, written sources date the first mention, and legal history records when privileges were granted. When you read that Prague was "founded" in a given year, ask what is being counted: a fort, a market, a town charter or a municipality.

Seeing the layers

A walk from the castle through the Lesser Town and across the Charles Bridge to the Old Town takes in the ninth-century hill, the Gothic and Baroque layers and the nineteenth-century riverfront in an hour or two. Our overview of the Prague river and bridges is a good companion, and the national story is in the short history of Czechia.

Frequently asked questions

How old is Prague?

Prague Castle is dated to around 870, so the city is more than 1,150 years old by that measure. As a single administrative city it dates from 1784, and in its present size from 1922.

Who founded Prague?

Tradition credits Prince Bořivoj of the Přemyslid dynasty with founding Prague Castle around 870. Earlier settlement existed on the site.

Is Prague more than a thousand years old?

Yes, by the date of the castle. A bishopric was founded there in 973, and a visitor wrote about the city as a trading centre around 965.

When did Prague become a capital?

Prague was the seat of the Přemyslid dukes and kings, the capital of the Kingdom of Bohemia, and became the capital of Czechoslovakia in 1918 and of the Czech Republic in 1993.

When did Prague become a UNESCO site?

The Historic Centre of Prague was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1992.

Start at the castle: it is where the count begins.