Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
(22) Sts Cyril and Methodius
In 1890, the two Jesuit statues on this pier were swept away
by a flood: the statue of the order's founder, St Ignatius Loyola, was replaced with the most
recent additions to the bridge (in 1938), these ninth-century missionaries who introduced
Christianity to the Slavs.
(23) St Francis Xavier
The Jesuit missionary survived the order's unpopularity and was re-
placed by a copy after it was swept away. One of the more unusual sculptural groups: the
saint, who worked in India and the Far East, is held aloft by three Moorish and two “Orient-
al” converts; Brokof placed himself on the saint's left side.
(24) St Anne
Mary's mother with Jesus and Mary.
(25) Joseph
With a slightly older Jesus at his feet, this is a nineteenth-century replacement
for another Brokof, this time destroyed by gunfire during the 1848 revolution.
(26) The Crucifixion
Where the original fourteenth-century crucifix stood alone on the
bridge for years. The gold-leaf, Hebrew inscription, “Holy, Holy, Holy is Our Lord of the
Multitude”, from the Book of Isaiah, was added in 1696, paid for by a Prague Jew who was
ordered to do so by the city court, having been found guilty of blasphemy before the cross.
The city's Jewish community persuaded the local council to erect a plaque here, explaining
that the charges were drummed up and the inscription designed to humiliate Prague's Jews.
ApartfromChristhimself,allthefigures,andthePietàopposite
(27)
,wereaddedinthenine-
teenth century.
(28)
TheDominicansplacedtheirfounder,
StDominic
,andtheirotherleadinglight,
StTho-
mas Aquinas
, beside the
Madonna
; in among the cherubs is a dog with a burning torch in
his mouth, a reference to the vision of Dominic's mother.
(29) St Barbara
The patron saint of miners, whose beautifully sculpted hands so impressed
Kafka, is accompanied by
St Margaret
and
St Elizabeth
.
(30) The Madonna
presides over the kneeling figure of
St Bernard
, and a bubbling mass
of cherubs mucking about with the instruments of the Passion - the cock, the dice and the
centurion's gauntlet.
(31) St Ivo
The patron saint of lawyers, flanked by Justice and a prospective client, stands
with an outstretched hand, into which Prague law students traditionally place a glass of beer
after their finals.
(32)
At the very end of the bridge stands
Charles IV
himself, a work by Dresden sculptor
Hähnel, erected in 1848.
