Kutná Hora & the Bone Church: The Complete Day Trip Guide from Prague

A Kutná Hora day trip from Prague is one of the most extraordinary excursions in the Czech Republic — and not only because of the Bone Church, extraordinary as it is.

Seventy kilometres east of Prague, Kutná Hora was once one of the most powerful cities in Central Europe. Its silver mines funded empires. Its Gothic cathedral rivals anything in Bohemia. And in a small chapel on its outskirts, the bones of 40,000 people have been arranged into some of the most remarkable — and unsettling — art you will ever see.

Here is everything you need to know before you go.

A city built on silver

The story of Kutná Hora begins in 1260, when silver was discovered in the hills east of Prague. What followed was one of the great medieval boom towns of Europe. Within decades Kutná Hora had become the second richest city in the Czech lands after Prague — its mines the deepest in the world, its silver exported across one-third of Europe, its royal mint producing the Prague groschen, the most important currency in Central Europe for two centuries.

The wealth is still visible today. The medieval street plan is almost unchanged. The stone fountains, the Gothic churches, the Italian Court where the mint once operated — all preserved in remarkable condition, because after the silver ran out there was no money to rebuild. The city froze at the height of its medieval prosperity, and has barely thawed since.

In 1995 Kutná Hora was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

St. Barbara's Cathedral

The most dramatic monument to Kutná Hora's silver wealth is St. Barbara's Cathedral — the Gothic masterpiece begun in 1388 and not completed until the early 20th century, five centuries later. Named after the patron saint of miners, it was funded by the mining guilds rather than the Church or the crown, which gives it a distinctive character: this is a monument to the people who dug the silver out of the earth, not to the rulers who spent it.

The cathedral is one of the finest Gothic buildings in Central Europe. Its soaring flying buttresses, its ribbed vaulted ceiling, its 15th-century frescoes depicting scenes from the lives of the miners — all of it on a scale that is genuinely breathtaking. Standing inside for the first time, most visitors simply stop and look up.

St. Barbara's Cathedral is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and open to visitors throughout the year.

The Bone Church — the Sedlec Ossuary

In 1278 the abbot of the Sedlec Cistercian monastery, returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, scattered a small amount of holy soil from Golgotha over the monastery cemetery. Word spread quickly. Sedlec became one of the most sought-after burial sites in Central Europe — people travelled from across Bohemia to be buried in holy ground.