KUTNA HORA & THE BONE CHURCH -

ONCE FEATURED ON A&E Discovery Show.....

Kutna Hora is a superb example of medieval architecture. In the Middle ages Kutna Hora was the second most important town after Prague due to silver mines. The core of the town consists entirely of Gothic and Baroque buildings and it is the unique collection of around 457 objects on an area covering 60 hectares.Of the municipal buildings the Italian Court is the most outstanding. It became the mint of the Czech lands. Minting in Kutna Hora ceased in 1726. You can see there St. Wenceslas and Vladislav Chapel, the council chamber and museum of coins. One of the best examples of Bohemian High Gothic is the Cathedral of St. Barbora, the patroness of miners, began around 1380 and finished in the 16th century. It is the landmark of the city panorama.

Also worth to see is the Ossuary of Sedlec Monastery, 1km behind the town. There are about 40.000,- human bones stored in the crypt, from which the blind monk made the pyramides in the 15th century. The monastery was bought by the Schwarzenberk family and they established the tobacco factory there and one of their artist, Mr. Rint, changed the ossuary into a very bizarre place, he made from the bones the chandelier the coat of arms of the Schwarzenberks and the altar.
This is memento mori, symbol of passing character of life.


HISTORY OF THE OSSUARY IN SEDLEC
A cistercian monastery was founded near Kutna Hora (that didn´t exist that time) in the year 1142. One of the principal tasks of the monks was the cultivation of the grounds and lands around the monastery. In 1278 King Otakar II of Bohemia sent Henry, the abbot of Sedlec , on a diplomatic mission to the Holy Land. When leaving Jerusalem Henry took with him a handful of earth from Golgotha which he sprinkled over the cemetery of Sedlec monastery, consequently the cemetery became famous, not only in Bohemia but also throughout Central Europe and many wealthy people desired to be buried here.The burial ground was enlarged during the epidemics of plague in the 14 th century (e.g.in 1318 about 30 000 people were buried here) and also during the Hussite wars in first quarter of the 15 th. century.
After 1400 one of the abbots had a church of All -Saints erected in Gothic style in the middle of the cemetery and under it a chapel destined for the deposition of bones from abolished graves, a task which was begun by a half blind Cistercian monk after the year 1511. The charnel-house was remodelled in Czech Baroque style between 1703 - I710 by the famous Czech architect, of the Italian origin ,Jan Blazej SANTINI-Aichl. The present arrangement of the bones dates from 1870 and is the work of a Czech wood-carver, František RINT (you can see his name, put together from bones, on the right-hand wall over the last bench).
Our ossuary contains the remains of about 40 000 people. The largest collections of bones are arranged in the form of bells in the four corners of the chapel.
The most interesting creations by Master Rint are the chandelier in the centre of the nave, containing all the bones of the human body , two monstrances beside the main altar and the coat-of arms of the Schwarzenberg noble family on the left-hand side of the chapel.