January 16 marks exactly 54 years since Czech student Jan Palach’s self-immolation at the top of Wenceslas Square that would lead to his death in hospital three days later.

Through his sacrifice, the student of Charles University, who was only 20 years old, hoped to rouse his fellow citizens from apathy and resignation months after the Soviet-led invasion that had crushed the Prague Spring.

About half-past one, Jan Palach doused himself in petrol and set himself on fire near the fountain at the National Museum in Wenceslas Square in Prague. After several minutes, those passing managed to extinguish the living torch.

The seriously burnt student was taken to the Faculty Hospital in Vinohrady, but the injuries were so serious that he had no hope of surviving.

He left a letter at the site explaining the motives of his terrible act: “As our nation is living in a desperate situation, and its reconciliation with fate has reached its utmost stage, we have decided that in this way we will express our protest and shake the conscience of the nation …ˮ He died three days later, on 19 January 1969.

Palach called himself “Torch no. 1” in his letter, giving the impression that he was a part of a larger group which in fact did not exist. But several others followed his example in Czechoslovakia and other eastern bloc countries.

“People must fight against the evil they feel equal to measure up to at that moment,” Palach said before he died in hospital on Jan. 19.

Palach’s death did not change the gradual, almost total resignation in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. For almost twenty years, the name Jan Palach could only be whispered in public.

His life story immediately got into “forbidden” songs or strongroom literary works. Only after a change in relations in the autumn of 1989 could historians, documentarists or artists officially and freely present it.

The entire construction was completed at the beginning of the 15th century.

The foundation stone was laid down by Charles IV on the 9^th July 1357 at 5:31 a.m., and the date and time have not been selected randomly.

When we write the numbers down as follows: 1 3 5 7 (year) 9 (day) 7 (month) 5 3 1 (time), we get an increasing and decreasing scale with number 9 at the top:

In addition to this sequence, time was also chosen with respect to the position of the planets – all of the known planets were above the Sunset, which was Lion’s ascendant sign, the Heraldic symbol of the Kingdom of Bohemia. According to the legend, bridge builders added the egg mortar.

Work on the bridge went ahead but Charles IV died long before its completion; in 1378 while the bridge was finished in 1402. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the first of many famous statues were added which came to define the appearance of the famous structure.

From 1883, there was a horse tram passing across the bridge, replaced in 1905 by electrical line. In order to preserve the artistic view of the bridge and not to ruin it with wires leading at the top, Frantisek Křižík came with a special line through the bridge deck.

Yet the heavy carriages vibrated the construction and thus were replaced by buses in 1908. Even the buses were not ideal, so the transport was again stopped the next year, to be renewed in 1932 using buses on tires.

Public transport operated here until World War II, cars stopped driving across the bridge in 1965.

Charles Bridge along with its rich history became one of the most visited, most beautiful, and most valued monuments in Prague.