What Prague looked like under Charles IV: You wouldn’t want to live in the dirty city of sin
Prague under Charles IV. rise up. But also as a city of sin.
670 years ago Charles IV laid personally the cornerstone of the New Town of Prague. After its completion, Prague was to be transformed into the economic and political center of Europe. But despite Karl’s great effort and dream of making Prague the center of Europe, his wish did not come true. Prague did not rise to the European level and after the death of Charles IV. returned to its established provincial character.
Charles IV. he conceived the reconstruction of Prague as a grand celebration, because he loved celebrations. Moreover, at the time when he moved to Prague in 1333, he felt very alone. He was over seventeen years old and it was hard for him to bear the fact that he could not meet any of his family in “Böhmen”. Moreover, he no longer spoke or understood Czech. And that was the moment when he gained responsibility for the Czechs. On the one hand, they flourished, but on the other on the other hand, they became a den of vice and fornication.
He took on the task responsibly
Charles decided to begin regaining control of a number of important castles and cities and tried to influence the royal estates that had been mortgaged or stolen after his mother’s death. But at the same time, he also started rebuilding Prague.
First, it was necessary to build a place where he would live himself. And so he began to build Prague Castle.
Along with the rebuilding of the castle, Charles’ other major interventions in Prague were also started – he founded Charles University and planned a completely new city to the south and east of it. His effort was to house the hordes of immigrants who were looking for a living in the economically booming center. And that’s exactly what the New Town was meant to be used for. It had regular floor plans with straight Romanesque streets and a very large central marketplace. Everything was surrounded by a wall and there were numerous seats of religious institutions. Central to this civic religiosity was the annual procession of royal insignia. Karel collected the relics of the Passion, which he buried, gangster-styled and probably also stole all over Europe.
In 1357, the construction of the new, later Charles Bridge, which had previously been washed away by a flood and people had to be transported, began. The bridge not only solved this problem, but also functioned as a ritual passage between the cathedral, the castle and the emperor’s city. That is why it was never lined with buildings, as we know from Florence and other cities, for example.
Where did the Habsburg lip come from? The deformity was brought about by this ugly Lithuanian princess
Natalia Borůvková
reading for 3 minutes
The image of Prague
During the construction period, Prague looked like a construction site for a long time, until the 15th century. Even so, there was an emerging sophisticated urban scene, which was already under the rule of Charles IV.
New Town developed rapidly because Charles gave the people concessions: For 12 years they were exempted from all taxes and salaries of the royal chamber. Whoever acquired the land had to start building the house within a month and have it ready for living within a year and a half. But the builders had to build from stone and not from wood or half-timbered masonry.
This video tells how crafts and trade were:
Source: Youtube
Crowds of artisans who were needed flocked to the city. Malters, brewers, wheelwrights, blacksmiths and metalsmiths. And together with them, on the other hand, the image of Prague changed. Humpbacks sprung up everywhere and vice flourished!
Harappan, Hampej, Helmbrecht, Chaldean and Hurvy
Yes, there is indeed an h at the beginning. The oldest craftswomen in the world initially had a “k” at the beginning of the “h”. Even then, their craft was profitable, if only for those who operated brothels. The owners of hampeys were often prelates, and brothels were built directly in their houses near the church. The very profits from prostitution also flowed to the cities and filled their coffers.
Women became harapannas due to poverty and desperation. At the same time, society stigmatized them and they had to wear a yellow scarf in public.
Medieval prostitution had its internal unwritten rules. Hampejs next to mostly women, who tied their employees with loans of money, so that they were consigned to a lifetime stay in the so-called pubic cottage. The brothel owners had bribed city officials under their thumb, to whom they provided free sexual services.
Prostitutes were often found in spas and inns, the poorest were sold on the street. They took their customers beyond the walls to the Vltava River, where they provided their services among the piles of wood piled up by rowers, which is why they were called “Halde”.
Even among prostitutes, there was a hierarchy and terminology, and individual “houses” rivaled each other. In the second half of the 14th century, Venice and Kraków (today’s Krakovská Street) were the most famous outlawed houses.
Prague as one brothel
Because the situation was becoming unbearable, there was an effort to regulate the city’s brothels and brothels. A preacher appeared on the scene Jan Milič from Kroměříž, who was zealous and drew attention to local prostitution until he gained the support of Charles IV. He began to build the so-called New Jerusalem on the site of the hampejs, i.e. a place of correction for fallen women and a shelter for prostitutes who had repented. Unfortunately, Jan Milič did not finish his life’s work. After him came the period of Master Jan Hus, who also did not give the “priestly women” a break.
In 1419, there was a mass destruction of hampeys and the expulsion of prostitutes from Prague. A special office was even established for their disabilities.
Prague gradually went from being a city of filth and fornication, albeit in a beautiful coat, to gradually becoming somewhat calmer and less sinful. I when…
Resources: