St. Barbara’s Church, Kutná Hora: A Gothic Mining Church in Czechia
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.8
- Popularity
- High
- Country
- Czechia
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Holy Roman Empire, Kingdom of Bohemia
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Church
On this page16 sections
History
St. Barbara’s Church is a Roman Catholic filial church in Czechia, dedicated to Saint Barbara of Nicomedia, and begun in 1388 in the Gothic period. As a filial church, it was a subsidiary church rather than the principal parish church of its locality. Saint Barbara’s traditional association with mining reflects Kutná Hora’s dependence on silver production. The building was founded through the initiative of the Brotherhood of the Body of Christ and financed by the town’s burghers, who intended it to express both religious devotion and the strength of Kutná Hora as a royal mining town.
Foundation and the first building phase
An earlier chapel dedicated to Saint Barbara stood on the promontory above the Vrchlice stream. The larger church was deliberately placed outside the town walls, on land belonging to the Prague chapter and beyond the spiritual administration of Sedlec Abbey. Its location and financing reflected tensions between Prague and Kutná Hora, as well as the town’s emancipation from Sedlec Abbey. The first construction phase was undertaken by the workshop associated with Peter Parler, probably under the direction of his son Jan Parler. The original plan called for a three-aisled building with an eastern ring of chapels.
Work advanced in stages and was closely tied to the prosperity of the local silver mines. The Hussite Wars, religious and political conflicts in fifteenth-century Bohemia, interrupted construction for about sixty years. During the conflict, Utraquists, followers of the Hussite reform tradition who emphasized communion under both kinds, looted the church. Confessionals were destroyed, paintings were torn apart, and the treasury was stolen. When Catholic re-Christianization took place in the 1620s, Utraquist symbols were removed.
Late-Gothic expansion and interruption
Construction resumed around 1481 or 1482, with local builders continuing Jan Parler’s design. Matěj Rejsek directed the work from 1489 until his death in 1506, and construction followed his design until 1509. Benedikt Rejt took over in 1512 and radically reshaped the upper part of the church. His intervention produced a late-Gothic hall-like level above the earlier structure and gave the building much of its distinctive internal organization.
Work continued after Rejt’s death in 1534, but declining silver production reduced the available funds. The central nave remained unvaulted until 1547, leaving the unfinished building exposed to rain. Construction stopped definitively in 1558, before the final western section could be completed. The western end was closed by a provisional wall, and later work initially concentrated on maintenance.
Jesuit alterations and modern restoration
In 1626 the church was transferred to the Jesuits, members of the Society of Jesus, a Catholic order active in education and Counter-Reformation work. They built a college beside it. After a fire, the Jesuits introduced Baroque alterations, particularly a Baroque roof structure, while much of the medieval Gothic fabric remained.
A major purist reconstruction and restoration took place from 1884 to 1905 at the initiative of the local Vocel archaeological society. The church was extended westward by one vault bay, a new Neo-Gothic facade was erected, and the Baroque roof was replaced with three Gothicizing tent roofs. The final alterations were completed in 1905 under Josef Mocker and Ludvík Lábler. Early in the twentieth century, donors also commissioned stained-glass windows showing Christian subjects and contemporary historical events, including Emperor Franz Joseph I’s visit to the church. Between 1995 and 2014, repair work received support through the Czech Architectural Heritage Rescue Programme.
St. Barbara’s remains in Roman Catholic use within the Diocese of Hradec Králové and the Kutná Hora archdeaconry. Its religious calendar includes Saint Barbara’s feast on 4 December, the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, the midnight service, and the local silvering ceremony. In 1995, the church became part of the UNESCO World Heritage property “Kutná Hora: Historical Town Centre with the Church of St Barbara and the Cathedral of Our Lady at Sedlec,” inscribed under criteria ii and iv. It is also a National Cultural Monument of the Czech Republic.
Remains
St. Barbara’s is an east-oriented, five-aisled Gothic cathedral-like building approximately 70 metres long, 40 metres wide, and 33 metres high. Its original three-aisled basilica was soon enlarged with two broad outer aisles. These side aisles were later raised to the height of the main nave, transforming the building into a late-Gothic hall church. The structure uses a skeletal system in which the piers of the outer aisles project from the surrounding wall envelope. Sandstone from nearby quarries or mines is the principal building material.
Choir and eastern chapels
Choir and ambulatory
The eastern end is formed by an elongated choir with a polygonal ambulatory, a passage running around the sanctuary. Its lower level is surrounded by radial chapels that form a unified block. The original design included eight chapels with trapezoidal interiors, each covered by a hipped roof. A richly patterned late-Gothic net vault spans the choir, while the first-level choir is bordered by arcades of sharply profiled arches carried on smooth polygonal piers.
Sacrament house and choir stalls
The choir contains a late-Gothic sacrament house, or pastophorium, used to contain the Eucharist. It was made by the workshop of Matěj Rejsek around 1510. The choir stalls contain carvings by the woodcarver Jakub Nymburský dating from 1480 to 1490. Together, these furnishings preserve elements from the church’s late-Gothic phase.
Transept and exterior supports
A transept crosses the choir at its western end. It is as high as the ambulatory chapels and has the same width as the outer aisles. Two massive exterior piers emphasize it, and these supports carry gargoyles for drainage. Above the outer aisles and choir chapels, a large symmetrical buttress system supports the building. The buttresses rise into substantial pinnacles ending in finials, while carved gargoyles and other stone sculpture occupy the upper exterior and side facades.
The exterior sculpture includes plant and animal forms, satirical figures, demons, and mythical creatures. A statue of Saint Barbara also appears on the side facades. These carvings are concentrated especially around the upper exterior and the buttress system, where they form part of the church’s stone architectural decoration.
Interior vaults and upper galleries
Main nave and arcades
The central nave, transept, and first-level choir are enclosed by arcades with sharply profiled arches. The arches rest on smooth polygonal piers, and the vault ribs merge directly into them without separate supporting shafts. Above the arcades are a cornice, a narrow wall strip, and a balustraded gallery belonging to the upper hall-like storey. The main nave has a late-Gothic curvilinear-rib vault extending across seven bays. Six bays belong to the original building, and one was added during the nineteenth-century westward extension. The vault is probably attributable to Benedikt Rejt.
Upper hall and stairways
Rejt’s design created an upper late-Gothic hall church above the earlier structure. Its two side aisles open into the main nave as galleries positioned 1.15 metres below the level of the triforium, the upper gallery or passage above the main arcades. Altars were placed unusually on this second level, reinforcing the impression of a “church above a church.” Large windows with Flamboyant tracery, a late-Gothic pattern of flowing flame-like curves, open the upper gallery walls. Two spiral staircases connect the transept and choir area.
The vaults of the inner side aisles use curvilinear ribs arranged in a different pattern from those of the main nave. The nave vault is lighter and flatter than the structurally different vault of Prague’s Vladislav Hall because it rests on slender piers, while the external supports directly carry only the side-aisle vaults. Its more elaborate pattern develops the basic motif of the Prague vault. Jan Santini is thought to have seen it before beginning the Baroque restoration of the Cistercian monastery church at nearby Sedlec.
Chapels, paintings, and furnishings
Mining chapels
Late-Gothic frescoes connect several chapels with the mining economy that supported the church. The Hašplířská Chapel shows miners operating a hoist or winch, along with scenes of underground work and a praying miner. The Mint Chapel depicts the medieval process of striking silver coins.
Smíškovská Chapel
Frescoes in the Smíškovská Chapel date from 1485 to 1492. Their subjects include the Queen of Sheba approaching King Solomon, the Judgment of Trajan, the Vision of the Tiburtine Sibyl, and the Crucifixion. The lower part contains a painting of litterati, learned clerics preparing liturgical vessels or instruments for worship. The painter was familiar with contemporary Italian painting.
West facade and organ
The five-part entrance facade belongs to the nineteenth-century reconstruction and is Neo-Gothic, or pseudo-Gothic, in character. Its upper section contains three tall pointed-arch windows with Flamboyant tracery. The lower windows are placed irregularly, disrupting the facade’s symmetry. On the west gallery stands the present organ, built in 1905 by the Rieger-Kloss firm and installed in an earlier Baroque case. It has three manuals, a pedal, 65 stops, and pneumatic action.
Stained-glass windows, altars, pulpits, and choir stalls complete the interior furnishings. Early twentieth-century stained glass includes works by František Urban. In 2014, a window depicting Saint Agnes of Bohemia, a thirteenth-century Bohemian princess and Franciscan abbess venerated as a saint, was installed in an opening of the south aisle.
