Kutna Hora once the most important town in the Czech kingdom.

Kutna Hora, once the most important town in the Czech kingdom after Prague has preserved its charming medieval character. It has kept the original ground plan and here you will find houses, objects and churches founded in Gothic and Late-Gothic, buildings from the Renaissance, Baroque and Empire periods as well as 19th-century objects in historical styles. This unique collection of around 457 objects on an area covering 60 hectares was declared a protected urban reservation in 1961. The town lies 70 km to the east of Prague on spurs of the Kutna Hora plateau merging into the lowlands of the Elbe basin.
This peaceful region was settled by people of different cultures already in primeval times. In the l0th century the Slavnik family minted silver coins with the inscription Malin civitas at Malin settlement. Not far from Malin (today part of Kutna Hora) a Cistercian monastery was built in 1142 at Sedlec near an important trade route. Rich deposits of silver were found on its territory in the second half of the 13th century and reports of this soon attracted an influx of miners from far and wide. The resulting large mining settlement became the core of the future town which was raised to a royal town in 1318. A legend from the 15th century says that it was a Sedlec monk who first found a seam of silver on a wooded hillside.
The rich yields of silver enabled King Wenceslas II (1278-1305) to carry out a money reform by introducing a new means of payment - the Prague groschen, which was minted from 1300 on in Kutna Hora. Its obverse bore the royal crown and ruler's name, on the reverse there was the Czech lion wearing a crown and the inscription Grossi pragenses. This currency was meant to be everlasting and not subject to any economic or political changes. Its era ended after nearly 150 years, the last groschen was minted in Kutna Hora in 1547.
King Wenceslas II invited Italian masters from Florence to Kutna Hora to mint the coins and the place where they worked became known as the Italian Court (Vlasky dvur). Soon after the ruler issued the famous mining regulations called Jus regale montanorum.
For a longtime Kutna Hora was a privileged royal town, due to the silver mines. Its development from the 1330s is demonstrated in the number of stone houses and churches. The Czech rulers granted it several privileges, at times it was the royal residence and its political importance grew; it was at the Italian Court that, on January 18. 1409, Wenceslas IV issued the important Kutna Hora Edict concerning the Prague university, various diets were held here and in 1471 Vladislav Jagellon was elected King of Bohemia here.
Kutna Hora was not spared during the Hussite wars; it suffered disastrous fires, miners' rebellions and the consequences of the defeat of the Czech Estates in 1620: the yield of silver decreased and 1727 the mint was closed down. Keeping aloof from economic life contributed towards the town's decline. In the mid-19th century the main railway line avoided it and no industries of importance were established in the town. It was not till this century that the situation changed.
The Italian Court, a national cultural monument, is a four-winged Gothic building, founded at the end of the 13th century on the south edge of a rocky outcrop above the Vrchlice stream. It was fortified and became the mint of the Czech lands. In 1390-1400, under King Wenceslas IV, a two-storied royal palace was built in the grounds containing halls and the remarkable St. Wenceslas and Vladislav Chapel. In the trapezoid courtyard there are 17 mint-workers' cells, the walls bear the emblems of several towns, the Gothic oriel above the former royal treasury calls attention to the royal chapel. The council chamber with a coffered ceiling in the east wing of the Italian Court has murals painted by J. and K. Spillar after 1900 and showing the election of Vladislav Jagellon as King in 1471 and the signing of the Kutna Hora Edict in 1409. The colored woodcut of the Agony of Christ (1511) is from the town hall. The present appearance of the Italian Court is the result of neo-Gothic alterations made in 1893-1898. The park at the Italian Court provides a lovely view of the Cathedral of St. Barbara.

Immediately beside the Italian Court there is the tall building of St. James' Church, founded in the 1330s. Its 83-metre high tower is a landmark which can be seen for miles around. Two towers were planned originally but never carried out; the south tower was deliberately built asymmetrically. In the first stages of building (cca 1330-1345), the five-sided presbytery was vaulted over with the sacristy and later the triple-nave was added. In the 1380s the open chapels, Mincirska and Ruthardovska, were built into the two aisles. Only fragments of the original 15th-century murals have been preserved. The choir benches from around 1484 are the work of Jirik Lorecky, the valuable altar paintings by the outstanding Baroque artists Fr. X. Palko, Peter Brandl, Karel Skreta and Ignac Raab.
Hradek with an irregular ground plan stands in Barborska ulice (street). It was built between 1400 and 1420 as a Gothic palace with towers, wedged into the southern fortification walls. Its present appearance dates from neo-Gothic reconstruction work in 1485-1505 when both oriels were also built. Inside there are priceless halls with Late-Gothic ribbed vaulting, the St. Wenceslas Chapel with original murals, the Knights' Hall, vaulted on a single pillar and a rectangular hall with unique painted ceiling dating from 1493. The district museum has an exhibition here demonstrating past and present mining methods and collections of medieval art. Another attraction is that Hradek provides access to a medieval mining gallery. In the yard there is a medieval mining machine (horse-capstan, Trejo) from the former Jachymov mint.
Construction of the Cathedral of St. Barbara, the patroness of miners, began around 1380 on the west side of the town. The cost was covered by the town's leading citizens. Up to 1420 the work was done by the Peter Parler workshop. The triple-caved building originally planned was changed later into a five-caved basilica with an elongated chancel with gallery and a ring of chapels.
Work on this magnificent Late-Gothic building was done in five stages. Master Hanus took up where the Parler workshop left off (1481-1489), after him Matthias Rejsek (1489-1506) in the fourth stage (1512-1547) Benedikt Ried who gave the five naves a uniform aspect. In the fifth phase (1547-1595) the tent-like roof was heightened. The west facade was built in 1885-1905 during neo-Gothic alterations.
Several Late-Gothic and Renaissance murals have been preserved inside the cathedral. The minting of coins is depicted in the Mint (Mincirska) chapel, the Smiskovska chapel has the complete decoration from 1485-1492 and the murals in the Hasplirska (after 1493) show work in the mines. The emblems of the guilds and families who shared in the building of the cathedral are painted on the vault of the presbytery and main nave. Two of the choir benches date from 1480-1490. The woodcut of a miner is from the end of the 17th century, the pulpit (1566) was reconstructed in 1665 and the Gothic statue of the Madonna and child dates back to around 1380. The altar paintings are by Peter Brandl and Ignac Raab, the main altar is neo-Gothic (1903).
Close to the cathedral there is the extensive building of the former Jesuit College, a two-storied Early-Baroque object built in 1667-1700 after a design by Giovanni Domenico Orsi. Square towers with onion-shaped cupolas form the corners of the building. A terrace with a parapet built up in front of the college has 13 sculptured groups of saints with St. Wenceslas in the centre, created in 1703-1716 by Frantisek Baugut, a lay member of the Jesuit order.
The Baroque Church of St. John Nepomuk standing in what is today Husova ulice (street) was designed by Frantisek Maxmilian Kanka (1674-1766). It attracts notice by the concave arrangement of the entrance facade with a gable between two little towers and statues of St. Adalbert and St. Prokop in niches beside the portal. The church was built in 1734-1750, it has a hall-like Interior, the vaulting is covered with paintings by Fr. X. Palko and Joseph Redelmayer depicting the legend of St. John Nepomuk (1752).
Another Late-Gothic object of interest is to be seen on Rejsek square. It is the 12-sided Stone Fountain, probably from the Matthias Rejsek workshop. The builders cut the year of its completion, 1495, in the sandstone facing of the spring. It was fed with water through wooden pipes and served as a water tank which supplied seven public fountains as well as houses in the town.
Among the large number of houses in the ancient town core which were reconstructed, altered or built anew over the centuries we can give only a few of those which merit particular attention e.g. the Sankturinovsky,
Knizeci (Princes') house, U Mramoru, Kaderavkovsky, U rytiru. An outstanding work of urban architecture is presented by the Stone House (Kameny dum) which existed already in pre-Hussite times. This two-storied object with a high gable and oriel dates back to the end of the 15th century when it was remodeled in Late-Gothic style. The rich sculptural decoration by Master Brikci on the facade is a first-class example of artistic stone work. In 1900-1902 the house was adapted for museum and contains an exhibition of Kutna Hora arts purposes and crafts.
At the end of Sultysova ulice (street) there stands a sandstone Plague Column, 16,60 meters high, dating from 1713-1715 with a statue of the Virgin Mary on the top and statues on the double plinth which is covered with relief decoration. It is the work of sculptor Frantisek Baugut. Prague Groschen

Around the year 1370 miners founded the Church of the Virgin Mary "na Nameti" with a facade tower on the east side of the ancient town core. After a fire in 1470 it was completed by the end of the century and in 1509-1513 the triple nave was given Late-Gothic vaulting by Masters Blazek and Benes. The vault of the presbytery, ribs and bosses display remarkable sculptural decoration. The Late-Gothic clay-limestone pulpit decorated with figural relief is the work of Master Augustine (1519-1520), the Renaissance guild benches date from 1596. The neo-Gothic altar has the original panel paintings. The renowned Czech Baroque painter, Peter Brandl (1668-1735) is buried in front of the altar steps.
The best-known architect of Czech Baroque, Kilian Ignac Dienzenhofer (1689-1751) enriched Kutna Hora's architecture with a notable building, the Convent of Ursulines, founded in 1735 in the present Jiri of Podebrady ulice (street). Lack of funds prevented its completion however, so that only two two-storied wings arose, richly decorated with figural sculptures on the gables and moldings by J. Brazda of Litomysl in 1738-1739. In place of the proposed church a neo-Baroque Chapel of the Heart of the Lard was built (1898-1901), designed by Bedrich Ohmann.
The monastery Church of the Assumption at Sedlec, part of Kutna Hora, founded in 1142, was later destroyed, rebuilt (1290-1330) burned out (1421) and restored to its present aspect in 1700-1702 by Pavel I. Bayer. In 1703 Jan Santini Aichel began to remodel it in Baroque-Gothic style. The church is one of the first large Early-Gothic cathedrals to be built in the Czech lands. The furnishings of the five-caved basilica originate mainly from the Baroque period. The valuable altar paintings are by Peter Brandl, Michael Willmann, Jan Kristof Liska, the sculptures by Matej V. Jackel. There is a remarkable ossuary at the Gothic Church of All Saints not far away.
The beautiful Empire building of Kacina mansion lies seven km north-east of Kutna Hora as part of Mikulas village. Designed by the Dresden architect, Christian F. Schuricht, it was built in 1806-1824 in a natural park. Today it serves the purposes of an agricultural museum and occasional exhibitions.