Saturday, May 7, 2011

Bone Church of the Czech Republic

Upon the suggestion of my best friend Xavier Caylor of San Francisco who once visited The Czech Republic said that I must see Bone Church while Brendan and I are visiting the country. Bone Church or more precisley named The Sedlec Ossuary is a small Catholic chapel built in the middle ages and is located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints in Sedlec, a suburb of Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic. This creepy chapel is decorated in human remains of between 40,000 and 70,000 bones that are artistically arranged to form decorations and furnishings for the chapel. Urban myth has it that a monk went mad and made things from the bones, and there are stories to suggest that partially blind monks entrusted with the care of the chapel were the first to begin piling the bones into geometric shapes. So if you ever travel to Prague, rent a car and take a nice drive through the countryside about an hour south of the city and visit this place. It is incredibly interesting and should not take more than 15 minutes to get the idea and move onto the next attraction. 

 The Sedlec Ossuary or Bone Church
Floor at the entrance to the Bone Church

 Bone Chandeliers and other decorations
 The family crest of the Schwartzenberg family who once owned the land at the time commissioned this bone decoration as a reminder of the impermanence of human life and inescapable death.
One of the several huge piles of bones 12 feet high and 12 feet wide
 Many of the skulls have holes in them showing that 
many of the people died violent deaths
Brendan standing in the middle of the church.
Lamps and urns made of bones

Bone Church Video 

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