Chodové

The Chodové (Chods, "Walkers", "Patrollers" or "Rangers") are an ethnic group living in western Bohemia. Today, the Chodové live in an arc of villages near the western border of Czech Republic, including major population centers in Domažlice, Tachov and Přimda (together called the Chod region, Czech: Chodsko, German: Chodenland).

History

During the medieval period, the monarchy of the Kingdom of Bohemia recruited the ancestors of the Chodové from ethnic enclaves within the western Carpathian Mountain region near the borders of what is today Slovakia, Poland, and southwestern Ukraine (possibly including Silesia), relocating these communities to serve as guards along the borders between Bohemia and Bavaria from possible Germanic expansion into Bohemia. These relocations occurred even as the Bohemian monarchy invited selective immigration of Bavarian craftspeople into certain settlements of western Bohemia to assist in the economic and technological development within their Kingdom.

As a condition of their relocation, the ancestral Chodové were made direct servants of the king, with significant privileges that differentiated them from other subjects - including the right of unrestricted movement within the Bohemian Forest region, access to the resources of the forest, and the right to own large dogs forbidden to ordinary Bohemian peasantry. In 1325, the King of Bohemia, John of Luxembourg, acknowledged the rights of the Chodové people to use the woods of western Bohemia, provided that they also protected the borders along them. The Chodové bred special dogs to help accomplish this goal - especially the Bohemian Shepherd (or Chodský pes) which some sources suggest is ancestral to the modern German Shepherd. Chodové traveled widely throughout the mountains of western Bohemia as part of their unique charge and rare freedom, often using special walking staffs, boots, and wide-brimmed hats especially suited to long-distance travel in the mountain forests. Reflected in their ethnonym, implying "walkers," "rangers" or "patrollers," they represent a rare example of a professional identity coming to define a group's overall ethnic designation.

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