Teplice

Teplice , Teplice-Šanov until 1948 (Czech pronunciation: [ˈtɛplɪt͡sɛ ˈʃanof]; German: Teplitz-Schönau, archaically Töplitz) is a town in the Czech Republic, the capital of the Teplice District in the Ústí nad Labem Region. It is the state's second largest spa town (after Karlovy Vary). Teplitz was the primary seat of the Clary-und-Aldringen Austro-Hungarian princes.

Teplice is located in northwestern Bohemia near the border with the German state of Saxony. It is situated in the plain of the Bílina river, which separates the Ore Mountains (Czech: Krušné Hory) in the northwest from the Bohemian Central Mountains (Czech: České středohoří) in the southeast.

History

The thermal springs are fabled to have been discovered as early as 762, however the first authentic mention of the baths occurred in the 16th century. The settlement was first mentioned about 1158, when Judith of Thuringia, queen consort of King Vladislaus II of Bohemia, founded a convent for Benedictine nuns, which was destroyed in the course of the Hussite Wars. In the late 15th century, queen consort Johana of Rožmitál, wife of King George of Poděbrady, had a castle erected on the ruins.

Teplice figures in the history of the Thirty Years' War, when it was a possession of the Protestant Bohemian noble Wilhelm Kinsky, who was assassinated together with Generalissimo Albrecht von Wallenstein at Cheb in 1634. Emperor Ferdinand II thereafter enfeoffed his General Johann von Aldringen, who nevertheless was killed in the same year, and Teplice fell to his sister Anna Maria von Clary-Aldringen. Consequently, and until the expropriation of 1945, Teplitz was the primarily seat of the princely House von Clary und Aldringen.

After a blaze in 1793, large parts of the town were rebuilt in a Neoclassical style. The health resort was a popular venue for wealthy bourgeois like the poet Johann Gottfried Seume, who died on his stay in 1810, or Ludwig van Beethoven, who met here with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in 1812; as well as for European monarchs. During the Napoleonic War of the Sixth Coalition, Teplice in August 1813 was the site where Emperor Francis I of Austria, Emperor Alexander I of Russia and King Frederick William III of Prussia first signed the triple alliance against Napoleon I of France that led to the coalition victory at the nearby Battle of Kulm.

In 1895 Teplice merged with neighbouring Lázně Šanov (Schönau). With the dissolution of Austria-Hungary after World War I, the predominantly German-speaking population found itself in newly established Czechoslovakia. Right-wing political groups like the German National Socialist Worker's Party referred to themselves as Volksdeutsche and began to urge for a unification with Germany, their efforts laid the foundation for the rise of the Sudeten German Party under Konrad Henlein after 1933. With the Sudetenland, Teplice was annexed by Nazi Germany according to the 1938 Munich Agreement. At the same time the persecution and expulsion of the Jewish population began, culminating in the demolition of the Teplice Synagogue, once the largest in Bohemia. After World War II the Czechoslovak government enacted the Beneš decrees, whereafter the "Ethnic German" population was expelled from Teplice. In 1945, the princes von Clary und Aldringen, lords of Teplice since 1634, were expropriated.

In 1994 Jaroslav Kubera of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) became mayor of Teplice and holds the position to this day. Many would argue that he brought the town back into a respectable position among Czech cities. As the local spas attract tourists mainly from the middle east as well as from other parts of the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Teplice has in the past been called Czech Republic's "Little Paris", although rising crime and unemployment rates in the region have damaged that reputation.

FK Teplice

Teplice is home to the professional football club FK Teplice playing in the Gambrinus liga. Notable players of the club include Josef Masopust and Pavel Verbíř. The stadium, Na Stínadlech, is one of the largest in the country and has hosted international matches.