Dobner, Gelasius

(pseudonym of Job Felix). Born May 30, 1719, in Prague; died there May 24, 1790. Czech historian.

Dobner was educated in a Jesuit school. In 1737 he entered the monastic order of Piarists and taught in Piarist schools in Vienna, Mikulov, Kromefiz, and Slany. In 1752 he founded a Piarist school in Prague. Dobner’s major work consisted of critical commentaries on the Latin translation of the Czech Chronicle of Hajek of Libochan (1761-82), in which Dobner for the first time used the method of critical analysis of historical facts and of their confirmation by sources. Between 1764 and 1785 he published the six-volume collection of Czech historical sources Monumenta historica Bohemiae. Dobner’s writings are permeated by a feeling of deep patriotism. He was one of the first “wakeners” of the Czech Renaissance.