Mapy a Atlasy: Atlas Republiky Československé

Summary

This article is a rebuttal by the editorial board of the Atlas of the Czechoslovak Republic to Prof. František Říkovský's critical review, which characterized the atlas as "a lost opportunity for Czechoslovak geography." The author argues that the atlas's flaws do not stem from editorial incompetence but from the concrete scientific, administrative, and financial constraints existing in 1928, when the final program had to be fixed (initially 72 sheets, reduced to 55). The article systematically addresses criticisms: the dominance of statisticians, absence of synthetic and genetic maps, lack of regional/cultural/geopolitical maps, and insufficient involvement of geographers. It explains that many proposed maps could not be produced because the underlying research was immature, data were not yet available (e.g., from the 1930 census), and adding such maps would have delayed publication and raised costs. It also points out that comparable national atlases (Finnish and Polish) lacked synthetic maps, and that several criticized maps, e.g., isochore and population-density maps, are actually geographic in nature. The article defends the inclusion of a chapter on the constitution as appropriate for a state-promotional publication and notes that administrative divisions are visible in cartograms. The author concludes that the atlas was not a lost opportunity but a pioneering work reflecting the level of interwar Czech(oslovak) geography, and that a second edition could incorporate suggestions from critics while doing justice to the original editors' and geographers' labor.