June 23rd, 2015
Today we forego the claustrophobic comfort of the Clam-Gallas Palace of old city in favor of the Bohemian Bone Church of Kutna Hora! Clam Palace——>Bone Church! Field trip!!!! Amped up on potatoes and avocado we scoot over to the train station and take the hour-long journey to Kutna Hora, in the opium-field dappled wonderland of Bohemia. The ossuary is pretty neat. I guess some medieval pilgrim brought some dirt over from Jerusalem and put it in a field. So THEN, the field was totally magical from that point on. Every dead person who was buried there was fully decomposed- their bones bleached white- after just 4 days. Then the bones made their way into the church, and a baroque Italian monk decided to arrange them in this totally metal way. Lots of dudes who died in the Hussite War now compose this fabulous ossuary decor. A sternly worded plaque lets the viewer know that these decorations are not sacrilegious, but in fact totally meaningful! I’m not making fun really, but I just wish that people didn’t need to mask their morbid fascinations with religious meaning!!! I really just think that people like this church because its supper titillating and bizarre. Its great! Anatomy! History! Art! Its got all the things. Impossible to take a bad picture there. Then we walk a few miles to the proper town of Kutna Hora, and see the Cathedral of St. Barbara, named for the patron saint of miners. Its truly one of the most gorgeous and well-designed churches I have ever seen. Both Lisi and I feel like if we lived here at any point in human history since its construction and prior to the enlightenment, it would have made us instantly religious. Just massive and inspiring and intense medieval frescos with unicorns and stuff. Lots of gold and silver because the region is rich in these resources. There are chapels for the miners and the minters. While we are here we also eat at a restaurant specializing in recreating medieval cuisine. We drink the delicious house mead and I order a Moravian smoked pork and dumpling dish. Huge portions, salty, smokey and awesome. Its Ren-fair-ilicious in there, and Lisi tells me stories of the good old days selling fairy wings and painting faces at the Maryland Ren-Fair. After all that mead, we need LOTS of coffee. No performances today, but the next few days are super busy, so it was nice to have a little tourist day off. Oh- our drawing assignment, medieval-inspired animals.