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Kunigunda of Galicia, the second wife of the Bohemian King Otokar II and later the second wife of the powerful nobleman Záviš of Falkenstein, suffers from a very poor reputation due to her depiction in medieval chronicles, especially the Styrian Rhymed Chronicle written by Ottokar aus der Gaal. Her image as a domineering and morally dubious figure is also echoed in Franz Grillparzer's play "König Ottokars Glück und Ende", which draws partly on the Styrian chronicle as source material. This study attempts to answer the question of what role Kunigunda plays in Grillparzer's drama, and whether she genuinely deserves to be known as a "whore" – a designation which was applied to her immediately after the play's premiere. Grillparzer's version of Kunigunda is also compared with her depiction in the tragedy "Král Přemysl Otakar Druhý" by František Zavřel.
The aim of this study is to present two older literary adaptations of the tragic life story of King Otakar (Ottokar) II – the "classic" play "König Ottokars Glück und Ende" by the Austrian dramatist Franz Grillparzer and the now forgotten drama "Král Přemysl Otakar Druhý" by the Czech author František Zavřel. The article focuses on the controversial depiction of the king and his Czech subjects, which led to a number of angry protests from Czech audiences. The study also explores the causes of the "anti-Czech sentiment" which is said to be found in these plays.