The history of Marianske Lazne, while relatively young, is closely tied to the ancient development and history of the whole part of West Bohemia. The oldest clues of local settlements were left by the Serbian Slavs. At the beginning of our millennium, Bohemian tribes were already settled here to protect strategically important Cheb trails leading from Bavaria to Bohemia. The Czech alderman Hroznata founded a monastery in the nearby Teplá in 1193 and summoned the Czech monks from the Prague Strahov Monastery. The fact that the original settlers in the region were Czechs, is evident from the names of the municipalities in tenure of the Teplá Monastery, mentioned in the Bull of Pope Gregory X from the year 1273. Only after the defeat of the Hussite movement in the 15th century did extensive German settlements appear. The German colonisation was mainly due to the Teplá Monastery, which at that time was already populated by Germans. However, the Czech influence has held on stubbornly in many places and survived entire centuries. For centuries, dozens of mineral springs with carbon dioxide saturated from the depths of the Earth and rich with minerals, well up from the peat moors where Marianske Lazne lies today.

It is unknown when people began to discover the healing powers of these springs. It is certain, however, that the springs were utilised long before Ferdinand (by the grace of God, King of Bohemia and of Hungary) attempted to use one of the springs (nowadays named the Ferdinand spring) for the manufacture of salt in 1528. It is no less certain that at the beginning of the 17th century doctor J. H. Hornik, the Cheb regional physic, prescribed baths in the waters of the Marie spring for his patients. So for many years sick people travelled from great distances to immerse themselves in the healing swamp mud, to drink unbelievable quantities of healing waters, and to bring these waters home with them. Tidings of the miraculous effects of the springs spread afar and prominent scientists of that time performed the first chemical analyses of the waters.

At the end of the 18th century, the first personality of the history of Marianske Lazne arrived – Dr. Joseph Jan Nehr, a native of Teplá and physician to the Teplá monastery with a degree of Doctor of Medicine conferred on him by the Charles University in Prague. After convincing himself of the healing effects of the springs, he dedicated his whole life to their use, to the healing of the patients and to the building of baths. First he won over to his plans the distrustful but enlightened Abbot Trautmannsdorf. After the Abbot’s death, Nehr gave up the monastery for his own house by the Cross spring, where he started treating the first patients there. The interest of the sick people was so great that the monastery built a bath house after all; since it was built at the Marie spring, the small municipality received its name at last: Marienbad -Marianske Lazne in 1808. Ten years later the municipality of Marianske Lazne was officially acknowledged as a spa.

In 1813, an educated and progressive man - Karel Kaspar Reitenberger became the abbot of the Teplá Monastery. He supported the efforts of doctor Nehr from the beginning and gave him considerable amount of money from the monastery funds for the construction of the spa. Reitenberger´s adversaries in the monastery accused him of drowning the Order´s fortune in the swamps and after various intrigues and accusations of imperialistic aims, they forced his resignation and exile in the Tyrol.

During his activity in the monastery, Reitenberger summoned the prominent garden architect Vaclav Skalnik to Marianske Lazne. He devised a magnificent plan for the construction of the grounds and parks, achieving his objectives within six years. In 1824, large landscaping projects began: stone was quarried, the swamps and bogs were drained, hollows were filled up and an enormous amount of earth was brought in. Vaclav Skalnik completely changed the face of the country. His work of art - beautiful parks and gardens with many rare wood species – is, even today, the boast of the town and of the Czech gardening. Marianske Lazne had at that time more than 40 imposing houses and the town - built literally out of a swamp - and was becoming one of the most beautiful watering places in Bohemia.

Marianske Lazne was accorded the status of a town in 1865 and a further period of its building and development began. This period is linked with the personality of Dr. August Herzig, the progressive, foresighted mayor of the town. Many large buildings and facilities were built under his leadership - baths and bath-houses, a town hall, hospital, a dam, power works, sewers, canalisation and street illumination.

The first train came to Marianske Lazne from Karlovy Vary in 1898 and the following year, a record attendance of visitors of the spa was recorded - over 20,000 patients and more than 100,000 town visitors. Powerful rulers of great empires, emperors and kings, pashas and shahs sojourn here - the English King Edward VII., the Austrian Kaiser Franz Joseph I., the Prussian King Frederic William IV., the Greek King Oto I., the Archduke Maxmilian - later Mexican Emperor, the Saxon Queen Carola, the Egyptian Pasha, the Persian Shah, the Prime Minister of France and the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs.

From 1907 to 1913 the number of visitors exceeded 30,000 per year and in 1911 it reached a record of 34,509 persons.

This period of prosperity and cheer was suddenly interrupted by the First World War. It took several post-war years before life in the spa returned to normal. Marianske Lazne was again slowly becoming ”the big world in a pocket edition” one of the most significant centres of world watering-places, of society, political and cultural life. In 1929 the highest number of visitors was recorded - over 41,000 thousand. During the Second World War Marianske Lazne was proclaimed a military hospital town.

MARIANSKE LAZNE TODAY

The fame of Marianske Lazne was founded primarily by its mineral waters. In an inconsiderable area of the town, 40 springs well forth, and there are more than another 100 in the surroundings. All the waters are cool and naturally acidulous with a high content of carbon dioxide, and almost all of them are rich with iron. The most well-known and the most used are - the Cross spring, the Ferdinand spring, the Rudolph spring, the Forrest spring, the Caroline spring, the Marie spring and the Ambrose springs. The mineral waters are for drinking cures and for dioxide baths, the up-welling carbon dioxide is used for gas baths and gas injections. Complex spa cure includes: peat wrapping and mud baths, water treatment, electric treatment, light treatment, gymnastics, massages, inhalations, flushing, diet, hygiene education and all forms of exercise. The most frequent indications are kidney and urinary-tract diseases, diseases of the upper breathing tract - chronic bronchitis, asthma and other allergies, rehabilitation of nerve diseases and post-injury conditions, endocrine function diseases - obesity, mild cases of diabetes, gout.