According to the chronicle, so early
as A.D. 722, Libussa kept a _pisak_ or clerk, literally, _a, writer;_
and her prophecies were written down in Slavic characters. The same
princess is said to have founded Prague. A considerable number of
Bohemian poems, some of which have been only recently discovered, are
evidently derived from the pagan period. Libussa's choice of the
country yeoman Perzmislas for her husband, in preference to her noble
suitors, indicates the early existence of a free and independent
peasantry. All these scattered features are however insufficient to
give us a distinct picture of this early period; and here, as among
all other Slavic nations, _history_ commences only with the
introduction of Christianity. The small states originally founded by
the Czekhes, were first united into one dukedom during the last years
of Perzmislas; while under his son Nezamysl, in the year 752, they
are said to have first distributed the lands in fee, and to have given
to the whole community a constitutional form.
The name of Boii, Bohemians, was transferred to the Czekhes by the
neighbouring nations. They continued to call themselves Czekhes, as
they do even now. The Moravians, a nearly related Slavic race, who
probably came to these regions at the same time with the Czekhes,
called themselves _Morawczik_,[5] from _Morawa,_ morass, a name
frequently repeated in Slavic countries.
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