Žďár nad Sázavou - Zelená hora, poutní kostel sv. Jana Nepomuckého

Pilgrimage Church of Saint John of Nepomuk on Zelená hora was built in close proximity to the former Cistercian monastery in Žďár nad Sázavou. The monastery was founded in 1252 by Cistercian monks from the monastery in Pomuk in western Bohemia, the birthplace of Saint John of Nepomuk. In the years 1705 to 1738, the head of the Žďár monastery was one of its most important personalities, abbot Václav Vejmluva. This abbot was a great admirer of John of Nepomuk and was therefore intensively involved in efforts for his beatification and canonization. In 1719, at the opening of the martyr's grave in the Saint Vitus Cathedral, the Beatification Commission found little piece of organic matter. The doctors identified it as a tongue, which confirmed the legend about Saint John not breaking the confessional secret, even under torture. Abbot Vejmluva considered this find to be miracle and even though John of Nepomuk was not canonized at the time, he decided to build a temple dedicated to this future saint. Perhaps even this miracle helped Abbot Vejmluv to obtain Jan Blažej Santini-Aichl (1677-1723) for the construction of the new church. Santini richly elaborated abbot Vejmluva's idea of ​​a church resembling a star among stars and designed his life's work here, in which he broke away from the artistic conventions of the time and created a timeless church interwoven with numerical symbolism. The close cooperation between the two creators is obvious from the project. The result is a work that is based on the aesthetic principles of Baroque architecture, but at the same time it is characterized by a completely new iconographic concept associated with mysterious symbolism.The artistic and above all iconographic rendering of the temple and the ambits proves that elements from the field of symbolism and Kabbalistic doctrine were significantly applied in their layout and creation, such as the symbolic shapes of the saint's tongue and stars. Also interesting is the speculative symbolism with the numbers 5 and 3, which was converted both into geometric shapes and into the number of individual motifs. The church in the form of a five-pointed star not only recalls the five legendary wounds on the Savior's body, but is also a symbol of true martyrdom, which is a reflection of Christ's succession. This symbol then appears repeatedly in other elements of the building. The church area is accessible through five entrances, the temple has five chapels with five altars. The star, reminiscent of the Cistercians and the legend of the discovery of John's body, influenced the five-pointed plan of the church and certainly also the appearance of the colored stained glass windows above the entrance door. Five letters also have the Latin inscription TACUI - I kept silent. The number three symbolizes God's trinity. Windows in the form of a spherical equilateral triangle symbolize the Holy Trinity. Windows in the shape of a bishop's mitre are related to the builder as the abbey emblem and part of the coat of arms. In 1721, abbot Vejmluva acquired a rare relic of the lingula, a bone to which the martyr's tongue was attached. This relic elevated the pilgrimage temple to a so-called reliquary chapel. The tongue of Saint John is depicted in the shape of curved arches, in a dome, in the shape of mirrors and in the sculpture above the pulpit. The main altar with the central statue of Saint. John was designed by Santini himself, the figure of the saint standing on the globe was created by Jan Pavel Czechpauer from Chrudim, and the angel was probably created by Ignác Rohrbach. The five eight-pointed Cistercian stars on the globe represent five continents on which Christianity was spread. Five angels and three archangels optically take the saint to heaven and symbolically remind the age at which he died, 53 years. The side altars in the form of triangular chapels are dedicated to the four evangelists St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke and St. John and were supposed to symbolize the position of St. John of Nepomuck as the fifth evangelist. Each of them, in addition to his attribute, holds an open Bible in his hand with a text from his gospel. The altars were created by Matyáš Braun's pupils Řehoř Thény, Jan Pavel Czechpauer and Ignác Rohrbach. The dome is dominated by a large red tongue, an attribute of Saint John, surrounded by a circle of flames from which rays shine through. Fragments of the original paving were preserved in the side areas of the temple, into which symbolic intentions were also projected. Pentagrams and rhombuses appear in them, giving the impression of swirling movement. The outer ambits were not built at the same time as the building of the temple, but followed after a short time interval. The floor plan of the ten walls of the corridors has concave sides on the outside, in the middle of which four-sided gates and five-sided chapels are inserted alternately. In the Baroque period, they served pilgrims as a refuge from bad weather and a place to sleep occasionally.In 1784, a big fire engulfed the entire area, which completely destroyed the roof of the church. The monastery was subsequently abolished and the internal equipment of the church was moved to the surrounding villages. It was only at the end of the 18th century that efforts were made to restore it, which continued throughout the 19th century. In 1994, the pilgrimage church was included in the UNESCO World Natural and Cultural Heritage List. Since its consecration in 1722, the church of Saint John of Nepomuk, become one of the most famous and most visited pilgrimage sites of Baroque Bohemia and Moravia.

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