Sights in Prague
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Charles Bridge
Strolling across Charles Bridge is everybody’s favourite Prague activity. However, by 9am it’s a 500m-long fairground, with an army of tourists squeezing through a gauntlet of hawkers and buskers beneath the impassive gaze of the baroque statues that line the parapets. If you want to experience the bridge at its most atmospheric try to visit it at dawn.
In 1357 Charles IV commissioned Peter Parler (the architect of St Vitus Cathedral) to replace the 12th-century Judith Bridge, which had been washed away by floods in 1342. (You can see the only surviving arch of the Judith Bridge by taking a boat trip with Prague Venice.)
The new bridge was completed around 1400, and t…
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Astronomical Clock
Ironically, if you wish to tell the time in the Old Town Sq, it's easier to look at the clock above this, because this 1490 mechanical marvel is tricky to decipher. The clock's creator, Master Hanuš, was allegedly blinded so he could not duplicate the clock elsewhere, although this is undoubtedly a myth.
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Mucha Museum
This fascinating (and busy) museum features the sensuous Art Nouveau posters, paintings and decorative panels of Alfons Mucha (1860–1939), as well as many sketches, photographs and other memorabilia. The exhibits include countless artworks showing Mucha’s trademark Slavic maidens with flowing hair and piercing blue eyes, bearing symbolic garlands and linden boughs; photos of the artist’s Paris studio, one of which shows a trouserless Gaugin playing the harmonium; a powerful canvas entitled Old Woman in Winter; and the original of the 1894 poster of actress Sarah Bernhardt as Giselda, which shot him to international fame. The fascinating 30-minute video documentary a…
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Vyšehrad Citadel
The main entrance to this citadel is through the Tábor Gate (Táborská brána) at the southeastern end. On the other side of the brick ramparts and ditch are the scant remnants of the Gothic Peak Gate (Špička brána), a fragment of arch that is now part of the information office – all that remains of Charles IV’s 14th-century fortifications. Beyond that lies the grand, 17th-century Leopold Gate (Leopoldova brána), the most elegant of the fortress gates. It’s possible to walk around most of the battlements, with grand views over the river and city. Beside the southwestern bastion are the foundations of a small royal palace built by Charles IV but dismantled in 1…
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Vyšehrad Cemetery
For Czechs, the Vyšehrad Cemetery is Vyšehrad hill’s main attraction. In the late 19th century the parish graveyard was made into a memorial cemetery for famous figures of Czech culture, with a graceful, neo-Renaissance arcade running along the northern and western sides. For the real heroes, an elaborate pantheon called the Slavín (loosely, ‘Hall of Fame’), designed by Antonín Wiehl, was added at the eastern end in 1894; its 50-odd occupants include painter Alfons Mucha, sculptor Josef Myslbek and architect Josef Gočár. The motto reads Ač Zemeřeli Ještě Mluví (Though dead, they still speak). The 600 or so graves in the rest of the cemetery include those …
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Church of Our Lady Before Týn
The distinctive, spiky-topped Týn Church is early Gothic, though it takes some imagination to visualise the original in its entirety because it’s partly hidden behind the four-storey Týn School (not a Habsburg plot to obscure this 15th-century Hussite stronghold, but almost contemporaneous with it). The church’s name originates from the Týn Courtyard behind the church. Though Gothic on the outside, the church’s interior is smothered in heavy baroque. Two of the most interesting features are the huge rococo altar on the northern wall and the tomb of Tycho Brahe, the Danish astronomerwhowasone of Rudolf II’s most illustrious ‘consultants’ (he died in 1601 of a burs…
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Letná Gardens & Terrace
Letná is a vast open space between Milady Horáková and the river, with a parade ground to the north and a peaceful park, the Letná Gardens (Letenské sady), in the south, offering picture-postcard views over the city and its bridges. In summer you’ll find an open-air beer garden. In 1261 Přemysl Otakar II held his coronation celebrations here, and during communist times, Letná was the site of Moscow-style May Day military parades. In 1989 around 750,000 people gathered here in support of the Velvet Revolution. In 2008, the far northwestern corner of the park was torn up to build the enormous Blanka Tunnel, part of Prague’s future ring-road system. When completed (anticipat…
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Estates Theatre
Beside the Karolinum is Prague’s oldest theatre and finest neoclassical building, the Estates Theatre, where the premiere of Mozart’s Don Giovanni was performed on 29 October 1787, with the maestro himself conducting. Opened in 1783 as the Nostitz Theatre (after its founder, Count Anton von Nostitz-Rieneck), it was patronised by upper-class German citizens and thus came to be called the Estates Theatre – the Estates being the traditional nobility. After WWII it was renamed the Tylovo divadlo (Tyl Theatre) in honour of the 19th-century Czech playwright Josef Kajetán Tyl. One of his claims to fame is the Czech national anthem, Kde domov můj? (Where is My Home?), whi…
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Wallenstein Palace
The small Wallenstein Square (Valdštejnské náměstí), northeast of Malá Strana Square, is dominated by the monumental 1630 palace of Albrecht of Wallenstein, general of the Habsburg armies, who financed the construction with the confiscated properties of Protestant nobles he defeated at the Battle of (White Mountain) in 1620. It now houses the Senate of the Czech Republic, but you can visit some rooms on weekends. The ceiling fresco in the Baroque Hall shows Wallenstein as a warrior at the reins of a chariot, while the unusual oval Audience Hall has a fresco of Vulcan at work in his forge. Behind the palace is a huge, walled garden, which is an oasis of peace amid th…
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Jewish Cemetery
Franz Kafka is buried in this cemetery, which opened around 1890 when the older Jewish cemetery – now at the foot of the TV Tower – was closed. To find Kafka’s grave, follow the main avenue east (signposted), turn right at row 21, then left at the wall; it’s at the end of the ‘block’. Fans make a pilgrimage on 3 June, the anniversary of his death. The entrance is beside Želivského metro station; men should cover their heads (yarmulkes are available at the gate). Last admission is 30 minutes before closing.
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Church Of Our Lady Victorious
When a miracle-working 'Bambino di Praga' statue appears in classic Czech novel I served the King of England, it sounds purely fictional. Yet this church really does contain a 400-year-old, wax 'Baby Jesus of Prague', said to have protected the city for centuries. The tradition of dressing the 47cm-tall figure from a wardrobe of 70 costumes continues today, with nuns changing his robes according to a religious calendar.
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Mořský Svět
The Czech ‘Sea World’ has the largest water tank in the country, with a capacity of around 100, 000L. Some 4500 living species of fish and sea creatures are on display, with a good and suitably scary set of sharks. The cramped interior will be disappointing if you’re used to larger ‘Sea World’–type amusement parks around the world. Nevertheless, it’s a fun day out for little kids.
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Prague Castle
Prague Castle – Pražský hrad, or just hrad to Czechs – is Prague’s most popular attraction. According to Guinness World Records, it’s the largest ancient castle in the world: 570m long, an average of 128m wide and covering a total area bigger than seven football fields. Its history begins in the 9th century when Prince Bořivoj founded a fortified settlement here. It grew haphazardly as rulers made their own additions, creating an eclectic mixture of architectural styles. The castle has always been the seat of Czech rulers as well as the official residence of the head of state, although the Czech Republic’s first president, Václav Havel, chose to live in his own house o…
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Prague Jewish Museum
In one of the most grotesquely ironic acts of WWII, the Nazis took over the management of the Prague Jewish Museum – first established in 1906 to preserve artefacts from synagogues that were demolished during the slum clearances in Josefov around the turn of the 20th century – with the intention of creating a ‘museum of an extinct race’. They shipped in materials and objects from destroyed Jewish communities throughout Bohemia and Moravia, helping to amass what is probably the world’s biggest collection of sacred Jewish artefacts and a moving memorial to seven centuries of oppression.
The museum consists of six Jewish monuments clustered together in Josefov: the…
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St Vitus Cathedral
At first glance the western façade of St Vitus Cathedral, which looms above the entrance to the Third Courtyard of Prague Castle, appears impressively Gothic, but in fact the triple doorway dates only from 1953, one of the last parts of the church to be completed. The cathedral’s foundation stone was laid in 1344 by Emperor Charles IV, on the site of a 10th-century Romanesque rotunda built by Duke Wenceslas. Charles’ original architect, Matthias of Arras (Matyáš z Arrasu), began work in 1344 on the choir in the French Gothic style, but died eight years later. His German successor, Peter Parler – a veteran of Cologne’s cathedral – completed most of the eastern part of the …
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Národní Třída
Národní třída (National Ave) is central Prague’s ‘high street’, a stately row of midrange shops and grand public buildings, notably the National Theatre at the Vltava River end.
Fronting Jungmannovo náměstí, at the eastern end, is an imitation Venetian palace known as the Adria Palace. Its distinctive, chunky architectural style, dating from the 1920s, is known as ‘rondocubism’. Note how the alternating angular and rounded window pediments echo similar features in neoclassical baroque buildings such as the Černin Palace.
Beneath it is the Adria Theatre, birthplace of Laterna Magika and meeting place of Civic Forum in the heady days of the Velvet Revoluti…
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Municipal House
Prague’s most exuberant and sensual building stands on the site of the Royal Court, seat of Bohemia’s kings from 1383 to 1483 (when Vladislav II moved to Prague Castle), which was demolished at the end of the 19th century. Between 1906 and 1912 the Municipal House was built in its place – a lavish joint effort by around 30 leading artists of the day, creating a cultural centre that was the architectural climax of the Czech National Revival.
Restored in the 1990s after decades of neglect during the communist era, the entire building was a labour of love, every detail of design and decoration carefully considered, every painting and sculpture loaded with symbolism. Th…
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National Monument
Although not, strictly speaking, a legacy of the communist era – it was completed in the 1930s – the huge monument atop Žižkov Hill is, in the minds of most Praguers over a certain age, inextricably linked with the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, and in particular with Klement Gottwald, the country’s first ‘worker–president’. Designed in the 1920s as a memorial to the 15th-century Hussite commander Jan Žižka, and to the soldiers who had fought for Czechoslovak independence, it was still under construction in 1939 when the occupation of Czechoslovakia by Nazi Germany made the ‘Monument to National Liberation’, as it was called, seem like a sick joke. After 1948 the Comm…
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Old Royal Palace
The Old Royal Palace, at the eastern end of Prague Castle's third courtyard, is one of the oldest parts of the castle, dating from 1135. It was originally used only by Czech princesses, but from the 13th to the 16th centuries it was the king’s own palace. At its heart is the Vladislav Hall (Vladislavský sál), famous for its beautiful, late-Gothic vaulted ceiling (1493–1502) designed by Benedikt Rejt. Though around 500 years old, the flowing, interwoven lines of the vaults have an almost Art Nouveau feel, in contrast to the rectilinear form of the Renaissance windows. The vast hall was used for banquets, councils and coronations, and for indoor jousting tournaments – hen…
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Old Town Hall
Prague’s Old Town Hall, founded in 1338, is a hotchpotch of medieval buildings acquired piecemeal over the centuries, presided over by a tall Gothic tower with a splendid Astronomical Clock. The main entrance is to the left of the clock; beyond that is the House at the Minute (dům U minuty), an arcaded building covered with Renaissance sgraffito – Franz Kafka lived here (1889–96) as a child just before the building was bought by the town council.
As well as housing the Old Town’s main tourist information office, the town hall has several historic attractions, and hosts art exhibitions on the ground floor and the 2nd floor. The guided tour takes you through the co…
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Klementinum
When the Habsburg emperor Ferdinand I invited the Jesuits to Prague in 1556 to boost the power of the Roman Catholic Church in Bohemia, they selected one of the city’s choicest pieces of real estate and in 1587 set to work on the Church of the Holy Saviour (kostel Nejsvětějšího Spasitele), Prague’s flagship of the Counter-Reformation. The western façade faces Charles Bridge, its sooty stone saints glaring down at the traffic jam of trams and tourists on Křížovnické náměstí. After gradually buying up most of the adjacent neighbourhood, the Jesuits started building their college, the Klementinum, in 1653. By the time of its completion a century later it was the largest bu…
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Museum of Decorative Arts
This museum opened in 1900 as part of a European movement to encourage a return to the aesthetic values sacrificed to the Industrial Revolution. Its four halls are a feast for the eyes, full of 16th- to 19th-century artefacts such as furniture, tapestries, porcelain and a fabulous collection of glasswork. The neo-Renaissance building is itself a work of art, the façade decorated with reliefs representing the various decorative arts and the Bohemian towns famous for them. The staircase leading up from the entrance hall to the main exhibition on the 2nd floor is beautifully decorated with colourful ceramics, stained-glass windows and frescoes representing graphic arts, meta…
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Loreta
The square’s main attraction is the Loreta, a baroque place of pilgrimage founded by Benigna Kateřina Lobkowicz in 1626, and designed as a replica of the supposed Santa Casa (Sacred House; the home of the Virgin Mary). Above the entrance 27 bells, made in Amsterdam in the 17th century, play ‘We Greet Thee a Thousand Times’ on the hour. Legend says that the original Santa Casa was carried by angels to the Italian town of Loreto as the Turks were advancing on Nazareth. The duplicate Santa Casa, with fragments of its original frescoes, is in the centre of the courtyard. Behind the Santa Casa is the Church of the Nativity of Our Lord (kostel Narození Páně), built in 17…
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Bethlehem Chapel
The Bethlehem Chapel is one of Prague’s most important churches, being the true birthplace of the Hussite cause. In 1391, Reformist Praguers won permission to build a church where services could be held in Czech instead of Latin, and proceeded to construct the biggest chapel Bohemia had ever seen, able to hold 3000 worshippers. Architecturally it was a radical departure, with a simple square hall focused on the pulpit rather than the altar. Jan Hus preached here from 1402 to 1412, marking the emergence of the Reform movement from the sanctuary of the Karolinum (where he was rector). In the 18th century the chapel was torn down. Remnants were discovered around 1920, and fr…
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National Museum
Looming above Wenceslas Square is the neo-Renaissance bulk of the National Museum, designed in the 1880s by Josef Schulz as an architectural symbol of the Czech National Revival. The main displays of rocks, fossils and stuffed animals have a rather old-fashioned feel – serried ranks of glass display cabinets arranged on creaking parquet floors – but even if trilobites and taxidermy are not your thing it’s still worth a visit just to enjoy the marbled splendour of the interior and the views down Wenceslas Square. The opulent main staircase is an extravaganza of polished limestone and serpentine, lined with paintings of Bohemian castles and medallions of kings and emperors…
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