The paper deals with the perception of European cities by travellers from the Bohemian Lands in the early Modern Era. Based on three examples from the noble environment (Bedřich of Donín, Jindřich Michal Hýzrle of Chody and Zdeněk Brtnický of Valdštejn), the paper monitors not only some locations visited by these gentlemen, but also what they found most interestig in these locations, where Theky gathered information about these places and whether they also ompared with what they knew from home, how they described their observations and similar other things.
The essay is dedicated to the educational foundation of Nicolaus Walter of Waltersperk († 1578), which was established at the Prague Utraquist university as a response to his testament from 1577. The first part of the study, which is based on an analysis of extant official sources, concerns on personal aspects of the founder and circumstances leading to establishment of the foundation. The second part concentrates on the scholarship holders (eighteen persons registered by their names for the period of 1600–1614). Their geographical, linguistic-ethnic and confessional composition as well as their subsequent careers were analysed.
Based on an analysis of sources of various kinds (e.g. contemporary pedagogical theory, school rules, various teaching texts, religious reference works and the like) this paper attempts to grasp the extent of knowledge of Scripture and biblical history among students and Latin school graduates from the 16th to the mid‑18th century. Partial knowledge of the Bible and biblical texts was all part of elementary education and children could acquire it before they studied at Latin schools (in the home environment, special catacheses and the like), where these foundations were then strengthened. Research into educational institutes of various denominations and types (particularist town schools, non‑Catholic private educational establishments, Jesuit schools, Piarist grammar schools and the like) indicates that although the reading of biblical texts as a rule was not included as a priority in Latin school curricula, pupils there did not only have a detailed knowledge of biblical history, but also managed to find their way round Scripture and to quote important passages from it, while dealing with Bible text and biblical realia both in religious tuition and in other subjects (particularly Latin). We do point out the differences that existed between individual schools, though these are in no way fundamental, rather depending on the definition of types of school. Scripture in the vernacular languages came to the fore in religious education particularly in the lower classes of non‑Catholic schools, whereas students at Jesuit grammar schools dealt almost exclusively with Latin (or exceptionally Greek) texts. Generally speaking, the pedagogical idea behind working with the Bible was similar in all schools, and in any case the plan was based on the same source even if the exposition, the argument and sometimes even the particular texts that were used might differ from one denomination to another.
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