Names

Our club was founded on 16 November 1893 as the Athletic Club Královské Vinohrady. This first name was also the name with the shortest life. Since the Vinohrady town hall was not in favor of sport and especially football, it was very difficult for the Rudly brothers, Malečky and other enthusiastic sportsmen to find not only the necessary funds for its organization, but especially a suitable pitch. Already in less than a year, in the summer of 1894, they decided to move their activities to Prague 7, which was to become the club's fateful place. It was clear that the team playing its matches in Maniny could no longer have the not-so-friendly Vinohrady in its name. Without a single objection, the proposal of Vladimír Horejc was agreed, who during a meeting in the Demínka café uttered the unforgettable sentence ''Let our club be called Athletic Club Sparta from now on.”

Although there is no further information from that day about how Mr. Horejc came to the name Sparta, from a historical perspective it is not difficult to find an objective explanation. At the end of the nineteenth century, the trend throughout Europe was to look to the ideals of Antiquity and to worship its heroes. Moreover, if we remember the courageous defiance of ancient Sparta against the Persian Empire, in which a parallel can be found with the contemporary hardships of the Czech lands in the then Austria-Hungary, the choice of the name is not surprising.

Although the original main activity of the club, which was athletics, took a back seat to football over the years, the name Athletic Club Sparta did not change for a long time. And it was undoubtedly the right decision, because that is how the club is twice immortalized in the Central European Cup, under this name fans all over Europe remember the unbeatable teams led by Košek, Káďa, Burgr and Nejedlý. We might still be Athletic Club Sparta today, but the communist coup of February 1948 not only decisively cut off the most glorious period in Spartan history, but also kicked off years of undignified cronyism and intimidating name changes for the club. After a brief episode as Athletic Club Sparta Bubeneč at the turn of 1948/49 came two years of Sokol Bratrství Sparta, followed between 1952 and 1953 by Sparta ČKD Sokolovo (sometimes even referred to by the full name Sparta Českomoravská Kolben Daněk Sokolovo).

In February 1953, the word Sparta, which was a thorn in the side of the party's central committee, finally disappeared from the club's name. The name of the club was changed to TJ Spartak Praha Sokolovo, which lasted for twelve years. It is worth remembering here that our rivals have not fared much better. The decision to change the names of traditional clubs to be closer to the "new era" did not escape Slavia, which became Dynamo for a few years, or AFK/Bohemians, now Spartak Stalingrad. But the spectators didn't care, nobody talked loudly about the Spartak - Dynamo derby, everybody still went to see Sparta and Slavia.

It is only in the relaxed atmosphere of the 1960s that a partial return to tradition will be achieved. The Athletic Club is out of the question, but the word Sparta seems to be more viable for the communist regime than it was in the past years, and the generation of Kvašňák, Mašek and Kramerio is now performing under the name of TJ Sparta ČKD Praha. This calmed down the wild changes of the club name for a long time. The normalization years, spiced with relegation to the second league, as well as the successes of the 1980s, our club is now under the title of the physical education union and ČKD.

Liberation and a return to its roots were brought about by the Velvet Revolution. Just two months of freedom and Sparta got rid of the name of the Vysočany factory. However, TJ Sparta Prague is still not the right one and the new management headed by Václav Mašek knows it very well. In a very short time all the necessary formalities were completed and on 16 January 1991, after forty-three years, the famous Athletic Club returned to the scene. The official name is finally AC Sparta Praha and with a slight modification, which was the addition of the abbreviation of the joint stock company in 1993, it has remained unchanged to this day.