Lace Gothic Prague Castle

The place is known to everyone, and it is called Prague Castle. Today our tour guide will be already known by our previous walking man – Dr. Frantisek Kadlec, Director of the tourism Department of the Administration of Prague Castle. So, in order to understand when and why the Gothic style appeared in the Czech Republic in General and Prague in particular, let us look a little into history.

Then Charles IV decided to invite to Prague architect and the first architect who comes to Prague for the construction of the Prague Castle became a French architect Mathieu of Arras. In 1344 he laid the first stone of the future Gothic Cathedral. The Gothic style was very different from its predecessor is quite simple Romanesque style. Now we are in the so-called Third courtyard of Prague Castle, and the very structure of St. Vitus Cathedral speaks eloquently about what Gothic architecture is very luxurious and magnificent.

Mathieu of Arras was destined to work on the construction of the Cathedral for eight years. He died in 1352. Then Charles IV was forced to seek a new architect, and he found him in the person of a young native Austrian city of Gmunden Peter Parler, who at the time of arrival to Prague was only 23 years old. He eagerly went to work and continued the work of Mathieu of Arras. Parler was acentuantes and wasn’t afraid to experiment, and therefore made in the architecture of many new elements. For example, thanks to him, for the first time in the conditions of Central Europe appears net a set, which he sold just in the main Central nave of St. Vitus Cathedral.

Here I would like to mention that this is a very unique phenomenon, because in the middle Ages the architect was at the level of the ordinary artisan, and is not erected on a pedestal of society. And the fact that Charles IV decided to put them on your level – on the level of the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, only confirms that he deeply respected their work and appreciated their skill. Well, let’s continue our journey and note that we are now in the Third yard is not only in front of the Cathedral of St. Vitus, but also a remarkable sculpture depicting St. George, which in the Czech Republic called Jiri. This statue is also directly applies not only to the personality of Karel IV, but to the architecture of the time.

This sculpture is a work of two brothers jiří and Martin from Klausenberg is a small town, which is located today on the territory of Romania called Cluj-Napoca, but then he belonged to the Czech state, and these two artists were invited to create the sculpture. The statue of St. George is a fountain, and in the warm months at the mouth of the serpent, which spearing George, flowing stream of water.