Politik und Lebenswelt an der tschechisch-österreichischen Grenze

Rottenschachen/Rapšach im Vitorazsko/Weitraer Gebiet

Abstract

Rottenschachen/Rapšach is one of the largest communes in the ‘Weitraer Gebiet’/Vitorazsko in southern Bohemia. The border-region is divided between Austria and the Czech Repub- lic. From a Czech perspective, the Vitorazsko was a symbol for lost territory in the nine- teenth century. It was a rather poor region which shaped the mentality of the people. During the establishment of a firm border-zone against Austria in the 1950s, the Czech state-police undertook a thorough investigation on the loyalty of the population of Rapšach by taking into account the results of the censuses from 1857 onwards. Interestingly, many villagers changed the confession to the German or Czech nation from one census to the next. More important than nationalistic propaganda were groups of emigrants from Rapšach which formed influential Viennese and Prague pressure groups. The Viennese group was engaged in integrating the village into the National-Socialist German Reich. The Prague lobby helped to pardon a lot of villagers burdened with the cooperation with the National-Socialists. In the 1950s the villagers of Rapšach were relocated to the inland of the Czech Republic.