Provisional Theatre (Prague)

Bohemia was a province of the Habsburg Empire, and under that regime's absolutist rule most aspects of Czech culture and national life had been discouraged or suppressed.

[2] The Bohemian Diet (parliament) had acquired a site in Prague on the banks of the Vltava, and in 1861 announced a public subscription, which raised a sum of 106,000 florins.

[5] The first principal conductor (or musical director) of the Provisional Theatre, appointed in the autumn of 1862, was Jan Nepomuk Maýr – to the disappointment of Smetana, who had hoped for the position himself.

[5] Maýr held the position until September 1866; his tenure was marked by a professional rivalry with Smetana, who criticised the theatre's conservatism and failure to fulfil its mission to promote Czech opera.

[10] Apart from his own compositions (The Bartered Bride, The Brandenburgers in Bohemia and Dalibor, Smetana introduced works by the Czech composers Lepold Eugen Měchura and Josef Rozkošný,[10] but was nevertheless attacked by some parts of the music establishment for giving insufficient encouragement to native talent.