According to the 1541
Annales Bohemorum by chronicler
Wenceslaus Hajek, the
thermal springs are fabled to have been discovered as early as 762; however, the first authentic mention of the baths occurred in the 16th century. The settlement of Trnovany was first documented in a 1057 deed, while Teplice proper was first mentioned in 1154, when
Judith of Thuringia, queen consort of King
Vladislaus II of Bohemia, founded a
Benedictine convent near the hot springs, the second in
Bohemia. A fortified town arose around the monastery, which was destroyed in the course of the
Hussite Wars after the 1426
Battle of Aussig. In the late 15th century, queen consort
Joanna of Rožmitál, wife of King
George of Poděbrady, had a castle erected on the ruins. Teplice figures in the history of the
Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), when it was a possession of the
Protestant Bohemian noble
Vilém Kinský, who was assassinated together with Generalissimo
Albrecht von Wallenstein in
Cheb in 1634. The
Habsburg emperor
Ferdinand II thereafter enfeoffed castle and town to his general
Johann von Aldringen, who nevertheless was killed in battle in the same year, and Teplice fell to his sister Anna Maria von Clary-Aldringen. Consequently, and until 1945, Teplice Castle was the primarily seat of the
princely House of
Clary-Aldringen. After the Thirty Years' War, the devastated town was the destination of many German settlers. After a blaze in 1793, large parts of the town were rebuilt in a
Neoclassical style. The health resort was a popular venue for wealthy bourgeois like the poet
Johann Gottfried Seume, who died on his stay in 1810, or
Ludwig van Beethoven, who met here with
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in 1812; as well as for European monarchs. During the Napoleonic
War of the Sixth Coalition, Teplice in August 1813 was the site where Emperor
Francis I of Austria, Emperor
Alexander I of Russia and King
Frederick William III of Prussia first signed the triple alliance against
Napoleon that led to the coalition victory at the nearby
Battle of Kulm. In 1895, Teplice merged with neighbouring Lázně Šanov (
Schönau). Upon the dissolution of
Austria-Hungary after
World War I and the 1919
Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the predominantly
German-speaking population found itself in newly established
Czechoslovakia. According to the 1930 census there were 30,799 people living in the city (23,127 of German, 5,232 of Czechoslovak, 667 of Jewish, and 12 of Hungarian ethnicity). Right-wing political groups like the
German National Socialist Worker's Party referred to themselves as
Volksdeutsche and began to urge for a unification with Germany, their efforts laid the foundation for the rise of the
Sudeten German Party under
Konrad Henlein after 1933. In 1938, Teplice was annexed by
Nazi Germany according to the 1938
Munich Agreement and was administered as part of the
Reichsgau Sudetenland. In 1930, 3,213 Jews lived in Teplice and formed 10% of the population. Under the Nazi regime they faced
the Holocaust in the Sudetenland. Many fled and the Teplice Synagogue was burnt during
Kristallnacht. After
World War II, the Czechoslovak government enacted the
Beneš decrees, whereafter the
German-speaking majority of the population was expelled from Teplice. In 1945, the Princes of Clary-Aldringen, lords of Teplice since 1634, were
expropriated. ==Demographics==