History of Department

The history of activities related to archaeology on the university grounds in Hradec Králové is inherently connected with the personality of Radomír Tichý. He joined the Department of History of PdF, University of Education of Hradec Králové (later the Institute of Historical Sciences of the University of Hradec Králové) as an assistant for the history of prehistory and antiquity in 1993. Here he founded the First University Centre of Experimental Archaeology and the Society of Experimental Archaeology for teaching and research purposes in 1994.

In 1995, the international student expedition Monoxylon'95 prepared for long time was carried out (Baltic Sea 1992, reservoir Rozkoš 1993-94). In 1996, R. Tichý and history students began to build the Centre of Experimental Archaeology of Všestary, which is still used to teach and popularize archaeology in the form of the Archaeological Park of Prehistory of Všestary (2013). The Institute of Historical Sciences led by prof. Vladimír Wolf has started to carry out its archaeological summer faculty researches since 1996 (1996 prince's court of Vysoké Chvojno, 1999 castle Stárkov, 2000 tar production facilities of Mostek, 2001 fortress of Mladé Buky).

In 1998 the international expedition Monoxylon II was realized – navigation on a reconstruction of a carved boat from the Bracciano lake - along the western Mediterranean coast. In 2000, R. Tichý founded the magazine Reconstruction and Experiment in Archaeology. The results of experimental archaeology were published on its pages (Living Archaeology since 2005).

In 2003 R. Tichý founded the Archaeological Centre of the Faculty of Education, University of Hradec Králové and he has headed it since then. This new form of the workplace carried out archaeological rescue research of the locality Obědovice near Hradec Králové in 2004. Rescue archaeological research in Tuněchody near Chrudim in the years 2005-2007 and 2008-2009 and rescue archaeological research in Obědovice near Hradec Králové in 2007-2009. This stage was connected with the first personnel reinforcements. Richard Thér has started to be involved in the processing of the archaeological research from Mohelnice since 2003, while Hana Dohnálková and Iva Dohnálková later joined the Prehistory Archaeological Park of Všestary. Thanks to the above mentioned persons, the workplace began to profile as a place of study of old technologies with the support of information systems (R. Thér).

1. Tichý founded the Department of Practical and Experimental Archaeology at the FHS of the University of Hradec Králové in 2005 (nowadays the Department of Archaeology of the Philosophical Faculty of the UHK). He accredited here a number of new fields of study (2006 Bachelor in the Computer Aid in Archaeology, 2007 Bachelor in Archaeology, 2008 Mgr. in Archaeology, 2009 Doctoral Studies in Archaeology). This enabled further personnel reinforcements of archaeological staff members, many of whom create the present form of the department.