Tagungsbeitrag

Mařiková-Kubková, Jana:

Ecclesia Sancti Viti, Wenceslai, Adalberti et Sanctae Mariae et monasterium ecclesiae pragensis: A Reconstruction of the Building Phases and Liturgical Topography of the Cathedral and the Chapter Area

The Romanesque Basilica of St Vitus at Prague Castle was erected in the second half of the 11th century; the area with the chapter house, chapels, hallways and dwellings developed in its surroundings within the next two centuries. In recent years this area was subject to interdisciplinary research combining building history, archaeology, liturgy, musicology, and archivistics.
The elementary revision of the preserved remains was followed by a new geodetic measuring. A map was created, into which we entered extinct parts documented mainly by Josef Mocker and Kamil Hilbert from the 19th century to the 1930s, but as well newer finds. Projecting the reconstructed building remains onto the original terrain yielded important facts concerning the foundation of the church and the hierarchy of individual districts at Prague Castle.
The combination of building-historical and archival research helped to describe individual building phases of the basilica and the adjacent monastery. Co-operation with a music historian and a liturgist supplied an image of the liturgical topography of individual building phases, the position of individual altars, chapels, important graves, but above all of the liturgical operation of the whole area.
The analysis of the find assemblages enabled us to recognise also fragments of wall paintings, and we are able now, at least for some epochs, to determine floor types, elements of interior architecture, and small-scale decoration.