Dolní Vltavice is a submerged village in the Český Krumlov area whose remains lie in the Lipno Reservoir. It had a church, a school, an inn and a cemetery, and a square at its centre.[1][2] A medieval village, it was founded in 1263 according to Novinky.cz, and in 1959, when the Lipno reservoir was filled, it was flooded by water together with the Church of Saint Linhart. [2]
In the 20th century the village was depopulated twice. After the war the German population left and Czechs settled the village, among them Slovaks from Romania. The inhabitants had to leave a second time in connection with the construction of the Lipno dam.[1]
The cemetery, which had Gothic features, disappeared under the water, and its bodies were exhumed in the 1950s and moved to Černá v Pošumaví. As the reservoir level dropped, the remains of the village were uncovered, and the Regional Museum in Český Krumlov moved more than 90 gravestones, which had been under water since about 1958, to Černá v Pošumaví. According to its director Martin Nechvíle, the museum intends to document the circumstances of the cemetery's disappearance and the transfer of the bodies better through archival research and to place an information board on the history of Dolní Vltavice at the cemetery in Černá v Pošumaví. [3] According to the museum director, their arrangement at the cemetery is to be discussed with the municipality and possibly with organisations of the expelled original inhabitants and their descendants.[1]
On Saturday 24 October 2026 at 3 p.m., the writer Jan Štifter dived into the Lipno Reservoir, accompanied by divers, to the site of the village's former square. He dedicated to the village his novel Vltavice, published by the publishing house Vyšehrad in August 2026. [4]
Chronology
- — The writer Jan Štifter dived to the submerged remains of Dolní Vltavice in the Lipno Reservoir, while the Regional Museum in Český Krumlov completed the transfer of more than 90 gravestones from the village cemetery.
- Zatopená Dolní Vltavice stále láká, dnes se k ní ponořil i spisovatel Štifter
- Na dno Lipna, do Dolní Vltavice. Spisovatel Štifter se potopí do míst příběhu své knihy
- O Vltavici napsal román. Teď coby potápěč prozkoumal torzo tamního kostela
- O Vltavici se mi zdá každou noc, říká spisovatel, který se ponořil na dno Lipna
Chronology
- — Writer Jan Štifter dived to the submerged remains of Dolní Vltavice in the Lipno Reservoir, while the Regional Museum in Český Krumlov completed the relocation of more than 90 gravestones from the village cemetery. → ČTK / České noviny Novinky.cz