ABSTRACT
The land of Czechoslovakia has a unique conformation. It stretches across Central Europe for about six hundred miles. It consists of three distinct sections, the easternmost and the westernmost parts joined by a slender neck. The Holy Roman Empire had reached and passed its period of greatest power. In the Middle Ages co-operation between the unrelated Czech and Hungarian kingdoms occurs more frequently than between the closely related Czech and Polish kingdoms. Before the Czechs were unified by the elimination of one rival house, the Premyslids had spread their power into Moravia and had come to represent both lands, Bohemia and Moravia, to the rest of Europe. The Czech state therefore constituted a political body distinct, not only from other similar bodies, but also from the Empire. The Czech kingnow held a position to which the other powerful princes of the Empire did not attain until many centuries later.
