In the first decades of the 20th century, broad recognition of Francis Galton’s eugenics resulted in the implementation of its demands in the form of eugenic legislation. Particularly drastic form of the latter were sterilization laws, first introduced in the US State of Indiana in 1907, and later in most of the other states, and during the interwar period, several European countries. Between 1934 and 1936 under the influence of the Western “achievements”, especially the German law of 1933, the failed attempts to introduce compulsory sterilization were also undertaken in the Second Polish Republic. When analyzing the regulations proposed by Leo Wernic, the president of the Polish Eugenic Society, it would be advisable to bring in the sterilization laws adopted and applied on a large scale in the United States of America. In the “homeland” of eugenics legislation, the model sterilization law had been already prepared in 1914, and the Supreme Court of the United States upheld its constitutionality in the notorious Buck v. Bell case in 1927.
The text aims to bring attention of the Czech readers to Petrie's contributions to the eugenics movement in Great Britain. It describes his close association with Francis Galton and his resulting pronounced views on eugenics and shows how Petrie's racist opinions and involvement in eugenics influenced his work as an archaeologist and historian. An attempt is made to understand Petrie's views in the context of his times instead of condemning him for his appalling conclusions motivated by his racism and eugenics beliefs. The text offers a perspective which enables the readers to consider Petrie's thoughts in relation to the eugenic movement which was not only favoured by many of his contemporaries, but also had many supporters long after Petrie's death. Any consideration of the influence of past ideologies and context on Petrie's thinking and research also brings forward an unanswerable question of how much each one of us is influenced by the ideologies and the context(s) prevalent in present times and culture.
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