According to legend, Prague was founded sometime in the 9th century after Libuse, a princess belonging to the Czech tribe, had climbed the hilltop now known as Vysehrad, and looked upon a visionary city whose splendour outreached the stars. She took as her consort the ploughman Premysl, who realised her dream and established the line of rulers known as the Premyslid dynasty. A thousand years later, the composer Bedrich Smetana, used the legend as the basis for his festive tableau, Libuse, written for the opening of the Czech National Theatre. Smetana had already immortalised Vysehrad in his symphonic cycle, Ma Vlast. The castle here once vied in importance with Prazsky Hrad (Prague Castle) but was later allowed to fall into neglect. The castle and the settlement of Hradcany, on the opposite bank of the Vltava, was founded by the first Premyslid ruler, Duke Botivoj, in the 9th century. His grandson Vaclav (Wenceslas) became Duke of Bohemia and he built a church dedicated to St Vitus within the castle compound before he was murdered in about 929 by his own brother. Wenceslas was later canonised and became the patron saint of Czechoslovakia. This is the ‘Good King’ Wenceslas of the 19th-century English carol, though the narrative is a complete invention with no basis in Czech literature.
The earliest Prague Castle was a timber structure, surrounded by a ditch and moat, but in 1135 Prince Sobeslav I began a major programme of reconstruction which was continued by his successors well into the 13th century. The completed Romanesque fortress comprised newly-fortified walls and watch towers, a remodelled cathedral of St Vitus. the convent and basilica of St George. a bishop’s residence and a royal palace.
In 1157 the wooden bridge spanning the Vltava was destroyed by flooding. It was replaced almost ‘immediately by a new stone bridge. named after Judith, wife of Duke Vladislav who became the first king of Bohemia By then. the settlement on the opposite bank of the river. known as Stare Mesto — the Old Town was well entrenched as a thriving centre of international trade and commerce and Prague established its place as the leading city of Bohemia. Archaeological evidence suggests that the entire area from Celetna to the river was heavily built up and densely populated. Only the large Jewish community was excluded and confined behind the walls of a ghetto in the quarter known today as Josefov. The entire town was enclosed within fortifications, begun in about 1230, which followed the route now taken by Narodni, Na prikope (At the Moat) and Revolucni streets.
In 1257 King Ottokar II founded a third settlement, the ‘New Town Below Prague Castle’, now known as the Maid Strana or Lesser Quarter. Growth centred on the square called Malostranske namesti, originally the outer earthworks of Prague Castle. Markets, shops and houses occupied by millers, brewers, lawyers, physicians and wealthy burghers were developed here and a Town Hall was built near the first St Nicholas Church (1283). The Augustinian monastery of St Thomas on Letenska dates from the same period, but the most impressive religious foundation was undoubtedly the fortified monastery of Maltese knights. The Church authorities exercised independent administration over the entire area, which included more than 50 merchants’ houses. The Carmelite convent and church of St Mary Magdalene, on modern Karmelitska, dates from the early 14th century.
No monarch had a greater influence on the development of medieval Prague than Charles IV, King of Bohemia from 1346 and subsequently Holy Roman Emperor. One of the best educated figures of the period, Charles had studied at the famed University of Paris and was determined to put Prague on the intellectual map. A new university, the first in the region, received its charter in 1348 and attracted scholars from all over the Empire, including distinguished Humanists like Cola di Rienzi and the Bohemian Chancellor, Johann of Neumark. The university moved to its present home, the Carolinum, in 1356. A great deal of building work took place in the Old Town during Charles’ reign, including the redevelopment of the Tyn church and the construction of a new bridge across the Vltava which now bears Charles’ name.
Development outside the Old Town was even more remarkable, On Hradcany, the Emperor commissioned, first, Matthias of Arras and, later, the renowned Peter Parler to rebuild the cathedral of St Vitus in the fashionable Gothic style. The settlement around the castle grew apace, extending as far as Loretanska, where Parler had his own house (now the Hrzan Palace) and the area of Petfin Hill called Novy Svet (New World). Here also Charles built a new system of fortifications marking the boundary of the Lesser Quarter, including the ‘Hunger Wall’, a public works project conceived to give assistance to the hungry and unemployed of the city. Part of the wall still stands today.
With the building of a fourth settlement, Nove Mesto (New Town), Prague became one of the largest urban communities in medieval Europe. The New Town is also remarkable for being a planned development where the width of streets, the heights of houses and the materials to be used were all strictly pre-ordained. At the heart was a wide street called the horse market, known today as Wenceslas Square.