The article presents a view of the criminological trace both from the point of view of Czech criminology and from the point of view of developments in German literature. The development of Czech and German criminology developed on common foundations, which were laid by the prominent criminologist and criminologist Hans Gross. In the early days of the development of criminology, traces were understood as specific manifestations of criminal activity, the authors focused only on the description of specific types of criminological traces and methods of securing them. Substantial elaboration of the theory of forensic traces took place only in later years. The concept of a criminal trail is compared in the article from the point of view of contemporary criminologists