state-controlled institution of higher learning in Prague, Czech Republic. The school was founded in 1348 by the Holy Roman emperor Charles IV, from whom it takes its name. It was the first university in central Europe. Among its buildings, scattered throughout Prague, is the Carolinum, one of the oldest existing university buildings in the world.

An early rector of the university, elected in 1409, was the Bohemian religious reformer Jan Hus. During the 17th century, the Jesuits renamed the institution Charles-Ferdinand University after the Holy Roman emperor Ferdinand II, who placed the university under their control, but in the late 18th century, a period of Jesuit suppression, it became a state institution. In 1882 it was divided into separate Czech and German institutions, each called Charles-Ferdinand. When the university was reopened after World War II (1945), the German university was abolished.

Charles University comprises faculties of mathematics and physics, natural science, general medicine, pediatrics, humanities, law, journalism, and education. Also attached are the Astronomical Institute and the Institute of Teacher Education.