Francis Lützow

Count Francis Lützow (German: Franz Heinrich Hieronymus Valentin von Lützow, Czech: František Lützow; 21 March 1849 – 13 January 1916) was an Austrian author, historian, critic and revivalist.

Francis Lützow in 1898

Biography

Francis Lützow was born on 21 March 1849 in Hamburg. He was the son of Franz Joseph Johann Nepomuk Gottfried Lützow (1814–1897) and Henriette Seymour (1822–1909), granddaughter of Marquess of Hertford. He was educated at Vienna and Innsbruck and followed a diplomatic career. He was active in Bohemian politics and became a member of the Austrian parliament and Chamberlain to the Emperor Franz Joseph from 1881. He married Anna Gustava von Bornemann (1853–1932) on 18 January 1881 in London.

A tireless champion of Bohemian independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, he was a member of the Royal Society of Sciences in Bohemia, and of the Bohemian Academy.

He was Ilchester lecturer at Oxford (1904), and in 1912 lectured at American universities.

Lützow died on 13 January 1916 in Montreux, Switzerland, at the age of 66. He was buried in the family tomb in Vamberk in the present-day Czech Republic.

Works

Perhaps his greatest accomplishments are his various books regarding the history of Bohemia, Prague, Slavic poetry, Historiography and Literature. His works were intentionally written in the English language and were thus more easily accessible to Western decision-makers who would eventually agree to the formation of an independent Czechoslovakia after the end of World War I. The first president of Czechoslovakia, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk wrote a touching introduction to Lützow's 1939 edition of 'Bohemia, An Historical Sketch' and expressed gratitude for Lützow's various contributions to Czechoslovakia's independence.

• History of Bohemian Literature, Heinemann. London (1899); (2nd ed. April 1907)
• The Story of Prague J. M. Dent & Co. London 1902; 2nd ed. 1907.
• Lectures on the Historians of Bohemia 1905 London: Henry Frowde.
• Life and Times of Master John Hus (1909) E.P. Dutton & Co. London 1909; (2nd ed. 1929)
• Bohemia An Historical Sketch J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd. London 1896; 2nd ed. 1910; 3rd ed. 1939.
• The Hussite Wars (1914) London: J. M. Dent & Sons New York

External links

• "Lützow genealogy". patricus.info. Retrieved 2 August 2011.
• This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rines, George Edwin, ed. (1920). "Lützow, Franz Heinrich Valentin, Count" . Encyclopedia Americana.

External links

• Works by Count Francis Lützow at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Count Francis Lützow at the Internet Archive
• Works by Francis Lützow at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
• Czech Information Center Žampach - of Dr. František Lützow