ABSTRACT
Jan Patocka’s philosophy of history accords with Nietzsche’s interpretation of the prerequisites of history in different respects, even though Patocka himself did not thematize this antecedence. This chapter begins with a clarification of Patocka’s understanding of the relationship between ‘border’ and ‘history’. It seeks to distinguish Patocka’s thought concerning the border from those of his teachers, Husserl and Heidegger. On this basis, the chapter shows how his thought manages to avoid the tendency towards homogenization. It sketches a theory of (inter-)culturality that seeks in turn to delineate a border for the operative usage of the concept of culture. A significant consequence bears on Patocka’s conception of a philosophy of history itself. One may think that this late version of a philosophy of history follows on its precursors because it too focuses on Europe alone. That is certainly correct, and yet Patocka’s focus does not involve any Eurocentrism.
