The noisiest and naughtiest! What is the history of Brasiliero's U Zelené žáby location?
A Brazilian lunch at Brasileiro U Zelené žáby
"The old-fashioned inn U Zelené žáby is quite popular in Prague," we read 160 years ago about the inn standing on the border of the Jewish and Old Town. "In the evening it is deserted in those parts, but only in the streets; but there is a livelier bustle inside the houses, and above all it is fitting to mention the famous Green Frog. There a select company of daily guests assemble, and they have always drunk to the prosperity of the country, and for the salvation of the nation have baptized the new-born of our hopes with beer, for it must be allowed that they were patriots of capital rank among them..." The excerpt is from a short story, The Labyrinth of Nonsense, published in 1863, whose anonymous author described himself as "the privileged and all-oiled apostle of the Humorist Papers."
A frog through the eyes of the masters of the pen
Dozens of writers of all kinds have been invited to our local tables over the years, including icons of our literature such as Alois Jirásek, Sigmund Winter, Cinderella Biliánová, Josef Hais Týnecký, Josef Kajetán Tyl and Ignát Herrmann. The reason for this is obvious: the inn has been widely known to have been in operation since time immemorial, and so it formed a popular setting for historical novels in particular. If the author wanted a real and ancient establishment, the Frog was a safe bet.
If for a moment we let the literary imagination of writers into real life, we could say that the young Přemyslid king Wenceslas III went here for a beer, as did his namesake Wenceslas IV later. "The liveliest, noisiest, or better said, the most naughty and dissolute people lived in the legendary tavern U Zelené žáby, where for years the wealthy Hejsks, not only from the nobility, came to squander their and their fathers' fortune, Knights, but even those who carefully hid their tonsures under their hoods or birettas could be seen there in disguise," wrote the literary historian Jan Ort in his Tales of Time Past (1977).
Wenceslas IV went in disguise
The most frequently recalled of all are the visits of Wenceslas IV, who was renowned for his fondness for a glass of wine or beer and about whom many legends were told, including the one that he went undercover in the company of his faithful executioner to the Prague wanderings. Firstly, to find out the true opinion of the people about his person, and then to take a break from the worries of rulership.
If we look at the contemporary chronicles, the only source of our ideas about the monarch's personality, we get from them completely different caricatures, depending on the chronicler's relationship to the Bohemian king. According to some, Wenceslas is a democratic people's king who actually goes undercover personally to check whether merchants are cheating on the measure of beer or the quality of bread; according to others, he is a sadistic psychopath who had his own wife deliberately strangled by hunting dogs and a rebellious cook impaled on a spit instead of a pig. As it happens, the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.
Where reality begins and ends in these stories is really hard to discover today. Wenceslas was almost certainly indifferent to what the common people thought of him, and those famous social expeditions among the tradesmen sound too fairy-tale-like, but after all, it could have been some analogy of the king's policy presentation at the time, let's say such castle "public relations". Moreover, Václav IV was also just a man of flesh and blood, and all historical sources agree that he was constantly running away from his political duties, whether to the bowl or to hunting in the woods. So why shouldn't he hide in a tavern now and then?
Even today's monarchs and presidents do it, we don't have to go far. Václav Havel and Jacques Chirac went for a beer at the Kalich, our president had a drink with Bill Clinton at the Golden Tiger and Lech Wałęsa at the Cat, his successor Václav Klaus' signature can be found on the wall in the famous Deminka, and Miloš Zeman personally opened the restored castle restaurant Vikárka. So why shouldn't Václav IV, who, moreover, could hardly be recognised in ordinary clothes among the common people, have a bucket of beer?
The Historical Frog or the Golden Frog
In contrast, we know for sure that one of the first documented owners of the house at the Green Frog was Pavel de Tost, who also worked at the court of Wenceslas IV as a registrar, i.e. a clerk who was in charge of books with records of important documents. Coincidence, or perhaps some connection with the king's secret visits to the granary?
The earliest record of the house dates back to 1403, the name "At the Frog" first appears in connection with it in 1428, and the then owner, Jan of Týn and his wife Katherine, came to be titled as Jan of the Frog. The historian Marie Ryantová delved into the history of the house and traced a contract from 1434, when Katherine of Žába bought Zittau wine from John of Rožmberk. The oldest mention of the inn is therefore as old as the Battle of Lipany.
Later contracts also show that in 1500, for example, the vineyard in Košice belonged to the house. At that time, Žába was given its own colourful name, but then it was still different - while the house next door was called U Černé žáby (At the Black Frog), our house with the number 13 was initially called U Zlaté žáby (At the Golden Frog), and was renamed to green only in the second half of the 16th century.
We do not know for sure whether the house was a beer or wine bar for centuries, but the owners of the house included people of all kinds of professions, from clerks to tailors to doctors, which may not have had any influence on the business. The fact that both trades were managed by the same person was no exception. In any case, information about the operation of the tavern repeatedly emerges from the stream of time, so it seems that the tavern was indeed in operation all the time. For example, we have records of it from 1653, when the owner of the house was Jan Hosaur, the elder of the guild of "tinsmiths, pencil makers and pewterers". The historian and writer Sigmund Winter gave a colourful description of the procession of shoemakers who then moved their guild rooms and treasury to Žaba (With the sound of trumpets, 1902).
The inn of the executioner Mydlář
At that time, the famous Jan Mydlář, according to legend, was still Prague's executioner, another of the pub's famous guests. In this case, it might not be a mere legend, as Mydlář still lived in a house near the Jewish cemetery during the famous execution of twenty-seven Czech lords, so he was literally a few steps away from the beer hall.
"Even today, the innkeeper and his daily guests still talk about the biggest drinking party ever held at the Green Frog as if they had experienced it themselves. However, it is already three hundred years since the executioner Mydlář drank here the ten kopecks of silver thalers he earned for his work that day: the mass execution of Czech lords," Egon Erwin Kisch recalls in his memoir The Marketplace of Sensations (1942).
The inn also had a small chain attached to the wall for centuries. It was said that Mydlář's corbel used to be attached to it. Why? So that no guest would accidentally drink from the same vessel as the executioner.
Revolution of 1848
The taproom was certainly in use in 1713, when the house was owned by Simon Bernard Šíp and the owner used the vineyards on the land of Strahov monastery in Šárka. From the 1820s we know for the first time the name of the local bartender, the then tenant Gottfried Rudisch.
The inn, located in a ground-floor room to the left of the entrance, had an ice and wine cellar, and at that time earned 150 gold coins a year at a rent of 20 gold coins per year. It occupied only one part of the ground floor of the house, while the other part was used for two shops, as Rudisch was not only an innkeeper but also a tailor (like Jakub Pinkas, another famous Prague tavern keeper later on). Another of the many confirmations of the existence of the tavern at Žába across the centuries comes from the record of the house tax commission from 1816.
All sorts of company gathered here, in some times perhaps even those who were not advised to cross the road. There are also frequent reports that it was a favourite haunt of students, especially medical students (however, even the hangman Mydlář was originally a medical student). Some authors sometimes situate the somewhat lighter nightlife here, but authorial license can be understandably broad, especially in fiction.
Nevertheless, even among the guests, it has long been said that it was at these tables that the Prague June Revolution of 1848, which had its nest in the Old Town, is said to have broken out. "It is not known whether this was the result of the sour wine that the innkeeper of the time was sipping or for other reasons. That is why it formed the substance of conversation at the various tables of the old townspeople from evening to evening," Gustav Meyrink, a German from Prague, later described his impressions of the kvelb.
The legend of the name's origin
But let's go back to the very beginning. Why did the house sign with the green frog come into being? In the 15th century, Marciáš Lokýtek, a tailor who had a fondness for travelling conjurers, lived here. He liked to teach himself their tricks and was once intrigued by a snake man's act. So he thought he'd try it too, even sewed himself a green suit similar to the conjurer's, and began to intertwine his legs and arms in possible and impossible positions. But alas, the training was lacking, and the poor tailor found at one point that he could no longer move his limbs back and forth, and was trapped in the goatskin. At that moment, a maid entered the room, and when she saw a strange creature in a green suit on the floor, she ran away screaming. The next moment her voice was heard in the street: "Dear people, the unfortunate Loki has been swallowed by a huge frog!"
All was eventually explained and the tailor was untangled back into human form. But the hilarious story was already making the rounds of the surrounding houses, and soon the place was known as the Frog's. According to another story - perhaps even more unimaginable in today's asphalted city - the house was named after the constantly croaking frogs in the local wetlands. Again, let's just shrug - who knows?
One thing is for sure, though, few people have probably always drunk the water here. Innkeeper, a bucket of beer here! And you, refill your friend's quarter of red!
