ossuary

KH Cathedral East End — The Cathedral Church of St. Barbara, Kutná Hora © Ricky Yates

The historic small city of Kutná Hora lies about 70 kilometres east of Prague and it took us around an hour and twenty minutes to drive there on Tuesday 24th July. It is a popular place to visit on a day trip from Prague and of all the places we visited during our recent ‘staycation’, it was the one where we saw greatest number of other tourists.

KH Cathedral West End — The west end of the Cathedral Church of St. Barbara, Kutná Hora © Ricky Yates

During early mediaeval times, Kutná Hora was as significant a settlement as Prague, its wealth coming from the mining of silver in the surrounding hills. It was here that silver groschen were minted which was the hard currency of Central Europe during that time. However, a combination of the silver ore being depleted and the city being ravaged by both sides during the Thirty Years War, led to the city’s decline. It now has a population of 21,000 as against Prague with 1.3 million!

The crowning glory of Kutná Hora is its Cathedral, dedicated to St. Barbara, the patron saint of miners. It was begun in the late fourteenth century and was mainly completed by the middle of the sixteenth century. Its current form dates from restoration work undertaken in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century when a series of impressive stained glass windows were added.

KH Stained Glass 1 — Stained glass window © Ricky Yates

KH Stained Glass 2 — Stained glass window © Ricky Yates

Whilst the stained glass is relatively modern, frescos such as these below, date from mediaeval times. The sheer height of the nave, looking towards the high altar, is extremely impressive.

KH Frescos — Mediaeval frescos © Ricky Yates

KH Nave & High Altar — The nave & high altar © Ricky Yates

Following the upheavals of the Thirty Years War, the Jesuits arrived in Kutná Hora in the latter part of the seventeenth century, as part of the re-catholization of Bohemia that followed the defeat of the Hussites and their supporters. They were responsible for building a very large Jesuit College and various other buildings and Churches within the city. On the opposite side of the street that runs alongside the Jesuit College towards the Cathedral, is a wall with a series of statues of a variety of saints, the arrangement being apparently inspired by the statues on Charles Bridge in Prague.

KH Jesuit College — The Jesuit College at Kutná Hora © Ricky Yates

KH St James Church — The Church of St. James at Kutná Hora © Ricky Yates

Everywhere you look around Kutná Hora the architecture is quite stunning. In writing and illustrating this post, it is difficult to know what to leave out 🙂 However I couldn’t omit this Church, dedicated to St. James. If you look closely, you will see that it is incomplete. It was supposed to have a second tower but only the base was ever built which now has a simple roof and cross constructed on top of it.

Located in the outer suburb of Sedlec is the other main visitor attraction in Kutná Hora – probably the most famous ossuary in the whole of the Czech Republic. It is far better known and receives far more visitors than the ossuary at Melník that we visited the previous week. It is to be found in the crypt of All Saints Church and was created in the late nineteenth century by a local woodcarver, after the Schwarzenberg family purchased the buildings making up the former Sedlec Monastry.

Within the crypt, the remains of about 40,000 people have been rearranged to create, (amongst other things), a chandelier and the coat of arms of the Schwarzenberg family. In both a leaflet we were given and in a guidebook that I have, there is great emphasis that this creation is to remind us all of the transience of human life and the undeniable fact of death. It is right and proper that we are reminded of these things but I have to say that it is a rather unusual way of doing so.

KH Ossuary 2 — Chandelier made of human bones in the Sedlec Ossuary © Ricky Yates

KH Ossuary 1 — The coat of arms of the Schwarzenberg family in the Sedlec ossuary © Ricky Yates

KH Ossuary 3 — All Saints Church, Sedlec © Ricky Yates

Melnik 1 — The Church of St. Peter & St. Paul, Melník © Ricky Yates

Following my recent busy July weekend, I am now on annual leave until the end of the month. For a variety of reasons, we’ve decided to have a stay-at-home holiday or ‘staycation’ as I gather Americans call it. For these next two weeks, we’ve written out a list of places in or around Prague that we either want to visit for the first time, or re-visit because we missed something previously, or because we want to go in summer having previously visited in another season.

On Tuesday 17th July, we visited Melník, a small town which lies around 35 km directly north of Prague at the confluence of the Vltava and Labe/Elbe rivers. Melník comes into the third category outlined in the previous paragraph as we had been there once previously at the beginning of January 2009. On that occasion, there was snow lying on the ground and the two main attractions were both closed! It was also a few weeks before I commenced writing this blog and some months before I bought my current camera, thus meaning I have no written or photographic record of that trip.

The historic centre of Melník is situated on the top of a hill overlooking the confluence of the two rivers with a steep drop down to the water’s edge. Right on top of the hill stand the two most significant buildings in the town – the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul with its tall tower, and ‘Zámek Melník‘, a Renaissance château belonging to the Lobkowicz family.

Melnik 6 — Cobbled street in the centre of Melník with Restaurace U Rytiru on the right © Ricky Yates

We drove to Melník and upon arrival, found a suitable parking spot for the car, and then walked into the centre of the town. We headed for the Church and Zámek, and just before reaching them, decided to have a late lunch at Restaurace U Rytiru, sitting under one of the red Budweiser umbrellas on the right in the photograph above.

Melnik 3 — Cross made from human skulls & bones in the crypt of the Church of St. Peter & St. Paul, Melník © Sybille Yates

Then it was off to see the somewhat macabre feature of the Church – the old crypt which is an ossuary containing the bones of more than 10,000 people, dug up to make room to bury plague victims in the sixteenth century. When the crypt, which had been previously walled up, was re-opened in the late nineteenth century during renovation work on the Church, a professor at Charles University in Prague undertook anthropological studies on the bones and arranged them into some interesting patterns including this cross.

Melnik 2 — The Labe/Elbe River at Melník with the navigation channel and lock that circumvent the first section of the Vltava River © Ricky Yates

Walking between the Church and Zámek Melník, we reached a spot from where there is a wonderful view across the Central Bohemian countryside and, in the foreground, the confluence of the Vltava and Labe/Elbe rivers. A navigation channel and lock, built in the first decade of the twentieth century, allows boats to circumvent the first few unnavigable kilometres of the Vltava. The metal plaque shown below, explains which waterway is which!

Melnik 7 — Plaque explaining which waterway is which! © Ricky Yates

We then headed for Zámek Melník, not least because of the onset of a very heavy thundery downpour! This photograph, taken in the courtyard of the Zámek, shows some of the sgraffito decoration on the exterior walls of the building.

Melnik 4 — Zámek Melník with exterior sgraffito decoration © Ricky Yates

There was also this sundial on one of the courtyard walls which was unfortunately rather redundant in view of the weather 😉

Melnik 5 — The sundial on the exterior of Zámek Melník © Ricky Yates

We took a most enjoyable tour of the interior of the Zámek but, as is sadly now commonplace in many historic houses, no photography was allowed. However, we did appreciate being able to walk through the various rooms at our own pace, without an accompanying guide. As might be expected, there was a variety of antique furniture and historic paintings to observe. We particularly liked the intricate decoration of many of the ceilings.

Melnik 8 — Church tower and vines at Melník © Ricky Yates

Before the heavens opened once again, I did manage to get this photograph which shows the Church tower, together with the vines that grow on the steep slope below the Church and Zámek Melník. Most Czech wine is produced in Moravia but some excellent, mainly white wines, are also produced in Bohemia, particularly in and around Melník.

The vineyard below the Church and Zámek Melník can also be clearly seen in the photograph below which I took, soon after we set out on our journey back to Prague by a different route to the one by which we came.

Melnik 9 — Zámek Melník and the Church tower with vineyards below © Ricky Yates

PS Before anybody points it out, I do know that there should be a hácek above the ‘e’ in ‘Melník’, just as there should be one above the ‘c’ in ‘hácek’. But as I have previously explained, for technical reasons beyond my comprehension, if I put one in, it will appear as ‘M?lník’ and ‘há?ek’.