The House Husband

Now I’ve seen quite a few strange things on my various travels but few compare with the ossuary at Sedlec. I saw a piece on the television years ago which featured it but had completely forgotten about it until we spotted the day tours brochure for, among other places, Kutna Hora.

Some old bones

Kutna Hora was made very wealthy on silver and, at one time was a mint, stamping all the coinage for Bohemia until 1547. They have a nice display of some very old coins in the room where some poor people had to stamp (by hand) 2,000 coins a day.

15th century silver coin

The building that houses the mint has gone through quite a few changes – most of it is the present town hall and quite a bit just a museum. The entire complex is called the Italian Court, named after the Italian chaps who were responsible for the minting reforms of King Wenceslas II.

And the Italian Court is in the city of Kutna Hora which we instantly fell in love with. It’s gorgeous. Wide footpaths, few cars, lovely buildings. And a population of only 22,000 people.

We had a wonderful day with a tour group of eight other people (four of them were Australians, two Americans and two Canadians) and a hilarious guide lady who used the word ‘incinerate’ rather than ‘cremate’ when discussing Czech funeral practices.

Mirinda chats with our wacky guide

A lot of her humour was completely unintentional and involved using the wrong words for things but she had me giggling all day.

When discussing the Czech wine industry, she told us that during the Communist rule, the Russians, in a bid to increase the agricultural output, told the Czechs to make wine. The Czechs laughed but the Russians insisted. The Czechs have a saying “If the Communists say throw a goat, you throw a goat”. So they made wine. And, strangely enough, it turned out brilliant.

However, the highlight of the day; dare I say, of the entire trip was the Ossuary at Sedlec. It was once a cemetery attached to a Cistercian Monastery. During various periods of history, quite a few people died in the area (30,000 from plague, a few more thousand as a result of the Hussite Wars) and the cemetery just kept growing (that seems a bit of a habit around these parts and is probably why they incinerate people now).

All of these bodies meant a lot bones and, in 1511, for reasons only known to himself, a half blind monk decided to pile them into pyramids. Then, in 1661, the ceiling of the chapel collapsed, forcing a slight redistribution of the bones.

What we saw today was a result of work carried out in the 18th century by Jan Santini Aichl. He made all manner of sculptures using the bones including his signature which also gave the date of the final piece.

Finally, in 1784, Josef II abolished the Sedlec Monastery and the whole place was purchased by the Schwarzenbergs from Orlik who gave it a thorough overhaul. Frantisek Rint created a few more pieces, including the coat of arms of the Schwarzenberg family.

The Schwarzenberg family crest

Meanwhile, back at Kutna Hora and, more specifically, the cathedral of St Barbara, we were treated to a feast of art nouveau “…stained glasses…” made by the same husband and wife couple who decorated the chapel at the Italian Court.

Art nouveau stained glass at St Barbara's

The chapel, by the way, was the private praying place of Wenceslas IV, who was really, really short. All the doors are made to his height with a crown on his head. This still means they are really, really short.

Beautiful paintings on the wall of the chapel

That’s all well and good but the highlight for Mirinda was dinner tonight. We were pretty sick of the lousy food we’ve been ingesting. It’s been a great disappointment for us. So, tonight, Mirinda swore we would dine well.

Looking in our handy and perfect little guide book that the car driver gave us last week, we decided to try La Degustation Boheme Bourgeoise which just happens to be close by the hotel.

Turning up without a reservation was clearly a risk but we were eventually offered what is called the chef’s table. This is two high stools up against the servery, with a clear view of the action in the kitchen. And what a fantastic experience it was.

Not only was the action fun to watch but the food (all 15 odd courses) was probably the best food I’ve ever tasted. Mirinda is pretty definite that it WAS the best food she’s ever had.

And rather than a bottle of wine for the whole meal, I had a small glass to complement each main course, chosen especially by the sommelier. He did a magnificent job. Seriously, this is what food is all about. Pure magic for the mouth.

The chefs hard at work

And having had only Czech wines with dinner, I can vouch for the goat throwing skills of the Czech wine makers.

So, today, Dawn and I attended a day course in forensic archaeology, ostensibly about Egyptian archaeology. I think I’ve been spoilt by university. The debates, the cut and thrust of opinion, agreeing and disagreeing with the lecturer. This wasn’t like that. Our lecturer (and I use the term loosely) was an ex-teacher of primary school children. And you could tell.

Her experience was excellent. Her slides were of actual Egyptian burials and her anecdotes were about digs in Egypt. All very interesting. The group of attendees was varied but generally not particularly scholarly. I’m sure they all had a lot more from the day than I did and, to be completely honest, I would have been just as happy had I not attended. I was tempted to not go back after lunch but Dawn was getting a lot more from it so I put up with the second half. Actually I struggled to stay awake because of the windows.

When we first arrived, I was amazed at how airy and cool the room was. Perfect for a lecture, I thought. Big windows around the ceiling were wide open and a lovely breeze ensured that the air was fresh. A good chance to stay awake, I thought. About five minutes into the talk and a fussy woman in front of us started coughing. The lecturer, full of motherly concern, asked the woman if she’d like some water.

This wasn’t the only interruption. The first hour was dotted with silly little technical problems which involved changing overhead projectors, shuffling the skeleton around and wrestling with a portable white screen. Had it not been a serious lecture, it would have been hilarious. Actually, it was hilarious without meaning to be.

The thing about this day course was that last time it ran it was oversubscribed and proved very popular. I’m not really sure why. But, anyway, the organisers decided it was so popular they would run it again. And that’s the one we were on.

Anyway, the coughing woman replied to the offer of water with the comment that it was because the windows were open. There was then a mad rush to shut them all. This more or less guaranteed I’d be asleep in the afternoon. Clearly the woman was allergic to air. I purposely had a minor coughing fit about half an hour later, waiting to be asked if I was ok, so I could say I needed the windows open. Sadly, she didn’t care about my well being and I remain unasked.

Lunch was great. We wandered down to a pub that, while it served 6X, did not do food on a Saturday and ended up at the next corner in an Italian place which did an excellent Fiorentina pizza and Peroni. So far, this was the highlight of the day.

It was also Ladies Day at Ascot today. So arriving at Waterloo was like Friday night rush hour except everyone was dressed to the nines. It was ridiculously crowded and strange at the same time.

The afternoon at the lecture was pretty dire. We had a big quiz thing where we had to look at a very large collection of objects and write about them. At the end of the day we were asked what we thought of each of them. This sounds like it should have been quite interesting but it was bit ‘Show and Tell’ if you ask me.

When it finished, I was quite glad to get out. The tutting of the self confessed vegan sitting in front of us, activated whenever I whispered to Dawn (not often and only where relevant) helped. We went to the pub that served 6X and had a grand time drinking and chatting about the stupid lecture, the Weasels, Nicktor and trying to remember the name of the woman who measured the bones of the Korean War dead for her PHd. We didn’t and it was Trotter.

We sat on a lovely high padded backed bench which, like a bench in a church yard, had a dedication plaque on it to a chap who used to like to drink in the pub. A lovely spot. After a while we realised it was getting pretty late so we wandered to the bus stop and left for Waterloo and home.

Though, somehow, we ended up sitting on a train for about half an hour, thinking it was leaving for Portsmouth Harbour in five minutes. It turned out to be going to Weymouth. Fortunately we found out before it left and switched trains.

To sum the day up, the company was delightful, the lecture was a bit dull. And here’s a photo of Dawn drinking a pint and a half of 6X.