Černí baroni (novel)

Černí baroni (Black barons) is a satirical novel written by Miloslav Švandrlík during the period of the Prague Spring and published in 1969. Subsequent publication of the book in Czechoslovakia was only made possible after the Velvet Revolution, in 1990. The work takes as its background one of the "technical auxiliary battalions" of the Czechoslovak People's Army. The subtitle Válčili jsme za Čepičky (We fought for Čepička) is a reference to then-Minister of Defense, Alexej Čepička. The story was made into a film of the same name in 1992 and a television series in 2003.