Page - 183 - in Universities in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 - A Social History of a Multilingual Space

Chapter 5 ♦  183 the Czech or the German University; he joined the latter to give one of his students the opportunity to teach at the Czech institution.31 The fluidity of Bohemian identities begs the question of how many Czech-speaking scholars were working at the University of Prague at the time of its division. This is not easy to answer. For some scholars the decision on which side to support was made in 1882, given that there was no possi- bility of teaching at both universities. Because of the previous dominance of German in publications, scholars who published only in German could have identified as Czech. In any case, the Czech University, and its medical department in particular, was considerably less prepared for its opening than was the German University, and the fears Czech professors had voiced during the debates on the future of the university proved to be correct. For whatever reason, the number of Czech assistants and Privatdozenten at medical faculties was quite low before 1882. The Prague historian Ludmila Hlaváčková states that from 1872 on no Czech scholars had habilitated and that of the thirty-one assistants at the faculty, only three were Czech.32 With only three professors thus choosing the Czech-language medical faculty, its foundation was postponed until 1883, and even then it was opened with only sixteen instructors, while the German faculty numbered thirty-six at the time. This discrepancy, however, did not last forever. In 1910 the two faculties were more or less even, with about sixty instructors each, and the Czech University had a few more professors than the German one (see table 3 in the previous chapter). The second issue aggravating the situation in Prague was the question of clinics, which the Czech medical faculty lacked owing to the regulations governing the division of the university. The faculty soon acquired a new building, which allowed a clinic to operate, but it had to be expanded considerably in subsequent decades.33 The issue of the medical faculty was a vital one for Czech scholars be- cause of its practical connections to health and sanitary institutions in the city. While delayed at the beginning, this issue was addressed by the univer- sity in December 1882, and by 7 January, Franz Joseph wrote to the minister: “I authorize you to begin the preparations to activate the medical faculty of the University with Bohemian [i.e., Czech] as the language of instruction.”34 Since only a few Czech physicians were active in the university, a commission established by the governor prepared for the medical faculty’s opening. It proposed not only candidates for professorships (ironically rely- ing on the professors of the German faculty as experts) but also additional