The Eagle of Saint Wenceslas – Statue of St. Wenceslaus
Fact of the Czech figure „Patrons of the Czech Lands – Prague Castle – Cathedral”
Part of the „The patrons and guardians of the land” topic
In modern history, the Czechs most often turned to Saint Wenceslas as the patron and protector of the land and the nation during the years of the Nazi occupation of the Czech lands. The Nazis questioned Czech statehood and had plans to exterminate the Czech nation in the future. Public figures and members of the anti-Nazi resistance promoted the Saint Wenceslas tradition.
However, the tradition was also exploited by the occupiers. Some Czech Protectorate politicians used Saint Wenceslas’s alleged policy of cooperation with German rulers to justify collaboration with Nazi Germany. Even Acting Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich presented Prince Wenceslas as a pro-German monarch. This version of the Saint Wenceslas tradition continued to be propagated by the regime’s propaganda even after Heydrich’s death, most notably with the so-called “Oath of Allegiance to the Reich” held under the statue of Saint Wenceslas in Prague.
In 1942, the official symbol of the protectorate’s youth organisation became the Saint Wenceslas Eagle with Bohemian and Moravian emblem. The following year, the high Protectorate honour, the „Shield of Honour of the Protectorate with the St. Wenceslas Eagle”, was established. Afterwards, it was mostly referred to as the „St. Wenceslas Eagle”. It was awarded not only to pro-Nazi figures but also to various representatives of Czech culture, many of whom were unjustly discredited as Nazi collaborators. The reputation of the national saint was tarnished for multiple decades, a reality later exploited by the communist regime in its anti-Church propaganda.
