The Venus of Dolní Věstonice - a ceramic statuette dated to 29,000–25,000 BCE.
Early modern humans had settled in the region by the Paleolithic.(2,5 mil - 750 000 BC)
The Celts Boii gave their name to Bohemia. The Boii founded a city on the site of modern Prague, and some of its ruins are now a tourist attraction.
(450 BC)
The Slavs arrived in the sixth century.
The Czech state, formerly known as Bohemia, was formed in the late 9th century as a small duchy around Prague, at that time under dominance of the powerful Great Moravian Empire.
Whilst an independent principality, the Czech lands formerly within Great Moravia were sometime vassals of the Holy Roman Empire as the Duchy of Bohemia from the 10th century. The Přemyslid dynasty which had ruled Bohemia since the 800s remained in power throughout the High Middle Ages, until the extinction of the male line with the death of Wenceslaus III of Bohemia in 1306.
In 1310, the Bohemian crown fell to the House of Luxembourg, until the death of Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, in 1437. After the Middle Ages, the Kingdom of Bohemia remained under Habsburg rule until the collapse of Austria-Hungary after the First World War.