Gargoyles are a common feature on Gothic or medieval buildings. They are primarily meant to ensure water does not trickle down masonry, but some of them are merely decorative.
During the Middle Ages, gargoyles1 were chosen to represent concepts of evil or other important points. The illiterate population would have understood the symbolic representation, so the purpose was more than merely decorative. In many cases, gargoyles tend to be animals but there are instances where you find human figures used too.
Prague, with its incredible concentration of decorative architecture is no stranger to gargoyles. One particular church featuring gargoyles is St-Martin-In-The-Wall2. The church was originally built in the 12th century which makes it almost a thousand years old. At the time, Prague was nowhere as large as it is today and this church was built in a village considered to be outside the city.
In the thirteenth century, the city built walls to protect it from invasion. What is now the Old Town surrounded itself by huge walls and the village of Ujezd was bisected by them. The church was next to the planned wall. When the wall was finished, the church ended up encased in the wall which is where it gets its name.
You can follow the entire perimeter of the Old Town with my guided walk.
The walls are long gone now and the church is once more a free-standing structure. It is part of what is considered the New Town and is just south of the main touristy part of the city. You can get there by walking towards the National Theatre from the famous Wenceslas Square. Halfway along your route, duck into a small roofed alley on the right. This leads to a quiet square where the church can be found.
Walk around the church. The westernmost corner is built like a tower. It is perhaps the only part of the architecture that reveals this part of its history. Diagonally opposite the tower, look up and you will see a gargoyle of a little boy on one of the pillars. (The photo here does not do it justice) This is a little unusual only because there is no specific reason to have a boy – and just one – as a gargoyle.
Predictably, legends soon emerged about this.
One legend tells us that the boy was the mischievous son of a local widow. She caught her son running on the roof of the church one morning. Embarrassed and ashamed, she cursed him for defiling holy property. Her curse turned him into stone where he remains to this day.
Other stories suggest he stole eggs from the pigeon nests on the roof of the church. Or that he was a roofer repairing the church roof and mocked a priest who was giving the last rites. In both cases, his punishment was to be turned to stone.
Which was a common punishment in the dark ages. Obviously.
Myths aside, take an extra half-hour to wander off the main tourist thoroughfare and enjoy another legend of Prague.
What gargoyle stories do you know of?
- Carving Gargoyles Grotesques, and Other Creatures of Myth: History, Lore, and 12 Artistic Patterns; Cipa, S; Fox Chapel Publishing Company; ISBN 978-1-56523-329-4[↩]
- St Martin in the Wall; Prague Experience; (Retrieved 2019-06-27) [↩]