Czech out Kutna Hora

At the beginning of the 14th century Kutna Hora was second only to Prague as the most important town in the Kingdom of Bohemia. It was King Wenceslaus II (not the Good King Wenceslas of the Christmas carol), a duke of Bohemia in the 10th century, who was responsible for putting Kutna Hora, 84km south-east of Prague, on the map. Silver was discovered here in 1298 and soon afterwards the king established the Prague groschen, a new coin with a fixed content of silver. In 1300, Wenceslaus established the central mint of the Czech lands at a small castle in Kutna Hora later called the Italian Court. I learn this on the train to Kutna Hora as it heads east from Prague, passing kilometres of communist-era high-rise buildings before green fields begin to appear. The Eastern Bohemian countryside is beautiful; we pass lush green fields, market gardens, fields of bright yellow canola, apple orchards, and villages dominated by church spires. A taxi at the station ferries us to Kutna Hora’s old town square, part of a collection of historic buildings in the town’s centre that earned it UNESCO World Heritage status in 1995. The architecture is almost as grand as Prague, on a much smaller scale, and the streets are minus the flocks of tourists you see in Prague. In the main square, surrounded by a parade of historic pastel-coloured buildings, is a gothic stone fountain that once supplied the town, current population around 20,000, with drinking water. Kutna Hora’s most celebrated building is St Barbara’s Cathedral, situated on a hill overlooking the town. Dedicated to the patron saint of miners, construction of the cathedral began in 1388, funded by the vast wealth earned by the silver mines, and it took more than 500 years to complete. This soaring gothic building of local sandstone is a feast of flying buttresses, vaulted ceilings, 15th-century murals, stained-glass windows and magnificent carved wooden statuary. Alongside is the vast Jesuit College, built from 1667, bordered by a long terrace adorned with baroque statues. The building was given to the army in 1773, which used it as barracks and a military hospital, and it remained an army building until 1997. These days the old college’s vast spaces house the Gallery of the Central Bohemian Region (GASK), with collections and exhibitions focused on art of the 20th and 21st centuries, and is well worth a visit. Hradek literally means “small castle” in Czech. Kutna Hora’s Hradek is a former gothic fortress, converted into a palace at the beginning of the 16th century. Today Hradek, in the centre of town, houses the Czech Museum of Silver, which offers two guided tours: the Silver City and Journey of Silver. On the Silver City tour, English-speaking guides give a fascinating insight into geology, archaeology, and the harsh life of miners during medieval times, when they hurtled down a 50m-deep shaft on their bottoms for a 10-hour underground shift hacking out ore before being winched to the top. Those less claustrophobic than me can don a miner’s helmet and lamp and join the Journey of Silver guided tour through 500m of medieval mine shafts beneath the town. The Italian Court, where King Wenceslaus and other Bohemian kings once stayed, is still a government building, and serves as Kutna Hora’s city hall. The gothic building also houses a museum dedicated to coin minting, where we learn that workers were expected to hammer out about 2000 coins every single day, and the noise was so immense that most workers became deaf. Kutna Hora’s suburb of Sedlec, around 2.5km from the old town centre, is home to the town’s most bizarre church. While the Church of All Saints seems unassuming from the outside, in the lower chamber of this Roman Catholic chapel lies the Sedlec Ossuary, which is decorated with the bleached bones of more than 40,000 people. Some were victims of the plagues that ravaged the land over the centuries, and some were casualties of the 15th-century Hussite Wars, a guide explains. Also known as the Bone Church, the Ossuary is an eerie place where the skulls of long-dead humans stare across the gloomy interior. The guide tells us that the story of this sombre interior began in 1278 when King Wenceslaus sent an abbot from the Sedlec monastery to Jerusalem. The abbot returned to Kutna Hora with some soil from Golgotha, the site of the crucifixion, and spread it around the local cemetery, making it a popular place to be buried over the centuries. Kutna Hora grew, the graveyard ran out of space, and the bones were exhumed and piled up in the cellar of All Saints. In 1870 a local woodcarver named Frantisek Rint was appointed to organise the macabre collection, which he did with aplomb: garlands of skulls and femurs are strung from the vaulted ceiling; there are pyramids of stacked bones, and a huge chandelier crafted from leg bones and pelvises. In Kutna Hora old town, some streets have barely altered in hundreds of years. A well-preserved network of cobbled medieval alleys and small squares feature quaint shops, cafes, bistros and pubs, where beer is around half the price of Prague, and I can assure you we need one after visiting Sedlec Ossuary. fact file + From Prague’s main train station, Prague Hlavni Nadrazi, trains take about one hour to Kutna Hora main station. Trains run frequently throughout the day. There are usually taxis at the station and town square. Tickets around €14 ($23) one-way. More at czech-transport.com + Kutna Hora Old Town is relatively small and easily walkable. Sedlec Ossuary is around 2.5km from the old town centre. + Many companies operate group day tours and private tours to Kutna Hora from Prague. Visit tourist information centres in Prague to check out different tours, which range in price from around $95 per person for a group tour. + For more information on Kutna Hora visit destinace.kutnahora.cz + For information on visiting the Czech Republic, go to visitczechia.com