n poems, some of which have been only recently discovered, are
evidently derived from the pagan period. Libussa's choice of the
country yeoman Perzmislas for her husband, in preference to her noble
suitors, indicates the early existence of a free and independent
peasantry. All these scattered features are however insufficient to
give us a distinct picture of this early period; and here, as among
all other Slavic nations, _history_ commences only with the
introduction of Christianity. The small states originally founded by
the Czekhes, were first united into one dukedom during the last years
of Perzmislas; while under his son Nezamysl, in the year 752, they
are said to have first distributed the lands in fee, and to have given
to the whole community a constitutional form.

The name of Boii, Bohemians, was transferred to the Czekhes by the
neighbouring nations. They continued to call themselves Czekhes, as
they do even now. The Moravians, a nearly related Slavic race, who
probably came to these regions at the same time with the Czekhes,
called themselves _Morawczik_,[5] from _Morawa,_ morass, a name
frequently repeated in Slavic countries. Until A.D. 1029, they were as
a people entirely separated from the Bohemians. They had formed
different petty states; their chiefs were called _Kniazi_, like those
of their eastern brethren. The ancient Moravia, however, spread far
beyond the limits of the present country of this name, and extended
deep into Hungary. Hence this portion of the Slavic race was also
generally comprised under the name of the Pannonic Slavi. We have
shown above, in the history of the Old Slavonic language, that
Moravia, then for a short period a powerful kingdom, was the principal
theatre of Methodius' exertions.[6] As at this time Christianity had
been already introduced into these regions, and the kings Rostislav
and Svatopluk, as well as most of their subjects, were already
baptized, it is very probable that they were induced by motives of
policy to send to Constantinople for a Christian teacher. Oppressed by
the Germans, the usurpations of whose emperors were in a certain
measure sanctioned by the chair of Rome, they desired to secure for
themselves in the Byzantine court a powerful ally. After the
dissolution of the Moravian kingdom in A.D. 1029, the present Moravia
fell to Bohemia; was separated from it repeatedly in the course of the
following centuries; and at length, in the beginning of the
sevente