The city district of Prague 1 comprises the core of the capital. It covers 550 ha, roughly 1% of the area of Prague, which makes it one of the smaller city districts.[1]
Territory and administration
The boundaries are set by the Statute of the Capital City of Prague, that is, Decree No. 55/2000 Coll. of the Capital City of Prague. The area has not changed since 1960. The administrative district became a separate city district in 1990.[1] The whole cadastral territory of Josefov, the smallest cadastral area in Prague by size, and of the Old Town lies here. Parts of Hradčany, Malá Strana and the Nové Město also belong to it, and, very marginally, so do Holešovice and Vinohrady.[1]
The largest share belongs to the Nové Město with 174 ha, followed by Malá Strana with 130 ha, the Old Town with 129 ha, Hradčany with 105 ha and Josefov with 9 ha. Vinohrady account for 2 ha and Holešovice for 1 ha. The left-bank part, on the Malá Strana side, measures 225 ha, the right-bank part on the Old Town side 270 ha, and the Vltava including its islands 55 ha. The higher points of Malá Strana and Hradčany reach 330 m above sea level, while the riverbed of the Vltava lies at 185 m.[1]
Population
As of 1 January 2009, 30,343 inhabitants were registered in the district, about 2.5% of the population of Prague. The share of permanent residents in the whole of Prague fell from roughly one third at the end of the 19th century, through more than 7% in 1961, to 3.5% in 1991. The decline is connected with the commercialization of the city centre since the Industrial Revolution.[1] The population density is around 5,500–5,600 inhabitants per km², about twice the Prague average.[1]
The average age rose from 42.2 years in 1991 to 43.3 years in 2008, while in Prague as a whole it was 41.7 years. In 2008 children under 15 made up 11% of the population, people over 64 made up 16% and those aged 15–64 made up 73%. According to the 2001 census, 24.2% of residents had a university education, compared with 18.8% in Prague as a whole.[1]
Beginnings of settlement
According to legend, Prague was founded by Princess Libuše. Wenceslas III, the last Přemyslid in the male line, was murdered in Olomouc on 4 August 1306. One of the most respected accounts of the city dates from 965–966, when the merchant Ibrahim ibn Yaqub al-Tartushi visited Prague. He described it as a stone city with extensive trade, where Slavs, Jews, Muslims and others were active.[2] The calendar of Daniel Adam of Veleslavín gives 2 November 723 as the date of the founding of Prague.[2]
Old Town
In some sources the territory of the Old Town is called Mezigrady, and it lay on the Vltava between Prague Castle and Vyšehrad. At first there was scattered, mostly timber building, small stone churches, farmsteads and hamlets. The settlement took firm shape only with the town walls.[2] Foreign settlements also belonged to the Slavic settlement: a German one around the Church of St Peter, a Romance one between the churches of St Michael and St Linhart, and Jewish ones, first near U staré školy street and later by the Old New Synagogue.[2]
The only planned part of the Old Town was Havelské Město around the Church of St Havel, whose founder was Eberhard, the first reeve and also master of the mint of King Wenceslas I. The walls ran along the present-day streets Národní, 28. října, Na příkopě and Revoluční, and the stretch around Havelské Město measured five hundred metres.[2]