Today, we left Prague and headed south to Vienna. We stopped at UNESCO World Heritage Site of Kutna Hora. We visited the Sedlec Ossuary or the Bone Church. It is really not the place for the faint-hearted as inside you can see the most usual way to arrange/decorate human bones!!
Henry, the abbot of the Cistercian monastery in Sedlec, was sent to the Holy Land by King Otakar II of Bohemia in 1278. When he returned, he brought with him a small amount of earth from the Holy Land and sprinkled it over the abbey cemetery. The word of this soon spread and the cemetery became a desirable burial site throughout Central Europe. So many people were buried there that the whole place needed to be extended and the bones had to be put in organized fashion. In 1870, a woodcraver was employed by the Schwarzenberg family to put the bone heaps into order-what a daunting job!!!! Four enormous bell-shaped mounds occupy the corners of the chapel. An enormous chandelier of bones, which contains at least one of every bone in the human body, hangs from the center of the nave with garlands of skulls draping the vaults. Other works include piers and monstrances flanking the altar, a large Schwarzenberg coat-of-arms, and the signature of Rint, also executed in bone, on the wall near the entrance.It is one of the most unusual scene I ever come across. For me, it was not a scary experience but rather I was seeing it as a piece of art!!
We then arrived at the city centre of this “small town”. We planned to walk up the hill to the St Barbara Church but a sudden downpour made it impossible. Instead we had some relaxing time for lunch before we continued our journey to Vienna.
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May 17th, 2009
