The project The Dowry Towns of Queens of Bohemia (A living part of the historic consciousness and its support by the instruments of historic geography, virtual reality and cyberspace) succeeded in the NAKI II competition.
The project of the Philosophical faculty of the University of Hradec Kralove presented in consortium with the Institute of History of the CAS and the Faculty of information technology of the Czech Technical University in Prague achieved the 15th position out of the total number of 173 projects.
It was decided by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic during the evaluation of the projects in the second public competition in research, experimental development and innovations for the year 2018 within the Programme for support of applied research, experimental development and innovations of the national and cultural identity for the years 2016 till 2022 (NAKI II).
The project was presented by the members of the Centre of urban history, principal investigator being doc. Mgr. Petr Grulich, Ph.D.
Project annotation
The towns that in the past belonged to the Bohemian queens, the so called the royal dowry (stably Hradec Králové, Chrudim, Vysoké Mýto, Polička, Jaroměř, Dvůr Králové, Trutnov, Nový Bydžov, Mělník) are a special category among the Czech historical towns in a number of perspectives. With exception of Mělník they create a specific geographic enclave in Eastern Bohemia. The institution began to form at the beginning of the 14th century and went through a complicated development. The dowry towns became a source of income for the queens and in case of medieval Hradec and Mělník also a seat of several of them for certain time. De iure, the institute of the dowry towns ended in the year 1918. The reflection of their historical charisma was revitalised again during the national revival in the 19th century and lives until today as one of the pieces of identity of these towns in relation to other towns in the Czech Republic.
The main goal of the presented project is in accordance with the specific goal 1,1 applied research and experimental development focused on presenting this uniquely Czech historical phenomena to the general public with help of tools of historical geography and advanced computer graphic. The main outputs of the project will be a dedicated mobile application and a web portal that will serve as a specialized historical guide through the dowry towns and their town landscape and specialized (reconstruction) maps of the whole regional enclave and the towns themselves. In case of Hradec Králové the guide will provide a possibility of a 3D journey in time on the basis of the so called extended virtual reality including the 3D reconstruction of the already disappeared urban areas and shows of the period life. For Dvůr Králové, Jaroměř, Polička and Vysoké Mýto the volumes of Historic Atlas of the towns of the Czech Republic will be created as further main outputs of the projects. Along with the secondary outputs of the project a compilation presenting the dowry towns to the lay and professional public will be also created. Simultaneously it will support the specific role of the dowry towns in the Czech national and regional identity.
For more details about the realization of the project that is being realized in the years 2018 -2022, see https://www.kralovskavennamesta.cz/
Municipal waterworks in Hradec Králové from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries (3D modeling of a defunct building - project NAKI II Dowry Towns of the Queens of Bohemia).
Long-term research goals:
- Deepening of the methodology of research of medieval and early modern towns
- Digital Humanities in research of town history
- Royal towns in the Middle Ages and Early Modern period
- Historical-geographical aspects of the development of our towns
- Complex research of town offices during the Middle Ages and Early Modern period
- Late – Medieval and Early Modern urban estates
- Written communication in the Medieval and Early Modern towns
- History of Hradec Králové