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I figured that there are probably a lot of people on this forum who can answer this question for me.

Why are so many silent movies held only by the Czech National Film archives? Was Czechoslavakia the last stop for films as they travelled around Europe? Was it because Prague was not destroyed in WWII? Some other reason?

I'm very grateful that in fact so much has survived in Prague. But I'm just curious as to why.

Thanks in advance.

My understanding is that the Czech government required that a print of everything that was exhibited in that country be deposited with the Archive.
Fortunately, this material was stored in such a manner that it survived WWII.
It will be interesting if anybody has further details.

In 2000 I interviewed Vladimir Opela, the director of the
Prague archive on this topic.

He said that there was no government requirement to
deposit a print with the archive until after World War II.

He indicated that the Hollywood films held by the archive
came from collectors, not the industry.

While some of the Czech prints are heavily worn, others,
such as their print of Sunrise (included in the Murnau, Borzage,
Fox DVD set) are in very good condition.

David Pierce

When the Nazis came to power, Goebbels began a systematic program to obtain a print of every single film released in Germany (and later Austria, France and Poland). Films were rated for anti-Nazi content, censored accordingly, and stored in the vaults at Ufa. Around 1942-43, Ufa moved their entire establishment to the Barrandov studios in Prague, a facility which was relatively safe from bombing raids. The massive collection from the vaults went along for the ride.
After the war, some minor attempts were made to return the films to their respective countries; but a great deal of the holdings were unidentified, or hidden under misleading foreign titles. Unfortunately, Iron Curtain politics didn't exactly encourage anyone to work overtime, so titles continued to be "discovered" for decades.

Is there any kind on an online catalog of their collection so that a person could at least check for movie titles?

Well, yes and no. The FIAF has an online catalog, but it is only available to subscribing institutions and libraries. You might check the respective archive itself. Sometimes one gets lucky.

Interesting information. OK, did Herny King's THE SEVENTH DAY, and King Vidor's HIS HOUR somehow matriculate from out of this archive? Both have Czech title-cards that have yet to be translated to English. If not, than what is the story? Anyone have the details?