The town of Slavkov u Brna - Austerlitz, came to general knowledge thanks to the Battle of Three Emperors, which took place here on December 2nd, 1805. French army led by Napoleon defeated in it allied Russian – Austrian troops. It is considered to be one of the greatest victories of French emperor.

Every year remembrance and pious actions to the anniversary of the battle take place in Slavkov and its environs.
The battlefield at Austerlitz continues to attract visitors from both home and abroad. Every year, on the anniversary of the battle, there are processions to the battlefield, which are associated with the laying of wreaths at the tumulus. People in period uniforms always line the way to the tumulus. Again and again, on the field around Santon Hill, military history enthusiasts re-enact the battle in minature, watched by thousands of spectators. On the eve of the anniversary, fires are lit on Zuran Hill. These are a tribute to the fallen soldiers and another living tradition
The Battle of Austerlitz brought end to the third anti-French coalition, the military pillars of which were Russia and Austria, with financial backing from England. It belongs among the bloodiest battles of the Czech lands' entire history. The Allies were lead by the Austrian Emperor Francis I. and the Russian Tzar Alexandr I. Against them stood the 36-year-old Emperor of the French, Italian King, and the mediator of the Swiss confederation, Napoleon I. Bonaparte.
According to the Gregorian calendar, the battle took place on Monday, December 2, 1805. Russians, using the Julian calendar, dated the battle November 20, 1805. The victorious French, using the revolutionary calendar dating from 1793, fought the battle on the 11th of Frimair in the year XIV.
After minor squirmishes during the night, three Allies columns with the Austrian vanguard attacked, after seven o'clock in the morning, the French positions on the line between the villages Sokolnice and Telnice and conquered both villages before ten o'clock. Hidden by thick fog, the French corps I and IV headed towards Pratecke hills and, just after eleven o'clock, began to endanger the rear of the Allies army in the Golden Stream Valley. Around eight o'clock, Bagration launched an attack along the Olomouc road against the Santon hill and conquered the village of Tvarozna. One of the French divisions managed to penetrate into a three-mile-wide gap between the Allies' right wing and their position on Pratecke hills. The success of the French army's centre was thus expanded to its left wing. Bagration was forced to retreat. Neither the cavalry attacks between the villages of Holubice and Kruh, nor the futile attempt by the Russian guard to defeat the French on Stare Vinohrady hill brought any reversal to the fate of the battle.

The break-through of the centre of the Russo-Austrian army jeopardized the rear of the columns which were gathered around the villages of Sokolnice and Telnice. A tardy effort to retreat from the battle line through the Litava valley and later around the Zatcansky pond ment a loss of canons and a capture of sveral thousands of the Allies' men. The battle ended just after four o'clock by the total defeat of the Allies after nine hours of furious fighting.
The Allies lost 40% of the total of all their troops. The French lost 12 % of soldiers who actually took part in the battle. In about 25 mass graves 18,000 of men from all the three armies were buried. Having signed the armistice on December 6, 1805, at the Slavkov (Austerlitz) chateau the peace treaty was signed in Bratislava on December 26. Austria had to cede 66,000 square kilometers of its territory and thus lost three million of it inhabitants and one seventh of its national product. It also had to pay 40 million florins of war reparation. The Battle of Austerlitz (which took place exactly on the first anniversary of Napoleon's coronation) confirmed Napoleon's position in Europe and brought end to the thousand-year-old Holy Roman Empire.

CULTURAL AND HISTORICAL MONUMENTS IN SLAVKOV´S ENVIRONS

Žurá? is a knoll situated 9 km east of the Brno at the road to Olomouc. It is the best known and historically the most important place of Slavkov Battlefield. It was chosen by the Emperor Napoleon as his command post.
Santon is a knoll west of Tvarožná village, the key position of the French artillery. Visitors can see there a duplicate of a French cannon, the chapel of the Virgin Mary from 1832 with memorial tablets of French Generals, a monument of killed soldiers and the Kosmák wooden cross, standing at the mass grave of soldiers.
Monument of Peace is a memorial in the Art Nouveau style that was built in 1910-1912 on a knoll south of Prace village. Old post house at Pozo?ice - at this place the Emperor Napoleon received Austrian envoys asking for peace when the battle was over.