lit a candle 4h agoI was literally mid chapter of his Austerlitz book when I saw this. Been slowly working through it for my own napoleonic wars rabbit hole and his writing made Slavkov feel like I was standing there. Didn't expect to feel this sad over someone I never knew existed a year ago.
Their story
Dušan Uhlíř was a Czech historian, author and museum director, best known in his country as a leading authority on the Napoleonic Wars and as the director who opened the Brno City Museum at Špilberk Castle to Europe. He died in Brno on 1 October 2026, aged 88. He was…
Dušan Uhlíř was a Czech historian, author and museum director, best known in his country as a leading authority on the Napoleonic Wars and as the director who opened the Brno City Museum at Špilberk Castle to Europe. He died in Brno on 1 October 2026, aged 88.
He was born in Brno on 28 July 1938 and studied history and Czech language at the Faculty of Arts of what is now Masaryk University, graduating in 1961. From 1963 he worked at the Historical Institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in Prague, earning his doctorate in 1967 and the CSc. degree in 1968.
In 1973 he returned to Brno to work at the regional cultural centre, and from 1979 to 1984 he directed the museum at Slavkov u Brna, the town known internationally as Austerlitz. In 1984 he became director of the Brno City Museum at Špilberk Castle, a post he held until 1993. During those years the long reconstruction of the castle began. He completed its first stage, filled the new spaces with modern exhibitions, and used his contacts with museum organisations abroad to open the museum to Europe.
From 1993 to 2012 he taught at the Faculty of Philosophy and Science of the Silesian University in Opava, and for many years he also lectured on general history at Masaryk University, including to students of its University of the Third Age. He qualified as a docent in modern general history in 1993 and was appointed professor in 1998. His work centred on the 17th to 20th centuries.
Uhlíř was also a gifted popular writer. His books included Slunce nad Slavkovem, about the Battle of Austerlitz, Bitva tří císařů, Černý den na Bílé hoře, about the Battle of White Mountain in 1620, the crime histories Brněnský pitaval and Moravský pitaval, and Krvavý úterek, published in 2024. He also wrote film and television scripts and radio programmes. He twice won the Egon Erwin Kisch Prize for non-fiction, and received the Miroslav Ivanov Prize for lifetime work, the Slovak Vojtech Zamarovský Prize, the South Moravian Region Prize and, for 2024, the City of Brno Prize for historical sciences.
His death was announced by the Institute of Historical Sciences at the Silesian University in Opava on 2 October 2026, which remembered him as an outstanding historian, a world respected expert on the Napoleonic Wars and an unforgettable teacher. The City of Brno paid tribute to his contribution to the understanding and popularisation of the history of Brno, Moravia and the Czech lands.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), City of Brno, Silesian University in Opava. Wikipedia ↗
Photos
1Dušan Uhlíř in 2015
by People Forever
same, his White Mountain one got me into Czech history completely