I remember hearing that there was a fire in Prague, in a theater or something, (can vaguely remember) at around 16th century, that gave start to ideas about firefighting and further on to emergency services. Can someone enlighten me on this? Thanks
Firefighting as a public service, at least, goes back at least as far as Nero in the west. He created a police/fire brigade for Rome.
Firefighting as a profession (but not a public service) is also known to have happened in ancient Rome. Marcus Crassus famously negotiated the prices of his fire brigade while people's houses burned.
However there were lots of cities before Rome that would have had to deal with fires. I cant speak to the absolute oldest fire services but it certainly predates the 1600s.