# Sedlec Ossuary



## MapThePlanet (Nov 12, 2010)

Have a friend that is spending New Year's Eve and Day here. Thought it was just up our alley. I find it strange, creepy and yet pretty cool

http://www.sedlecossuary.com/

and better photos here:

http://www.ludd.luth.se/~silver_p/kutna-1.html


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## Hauntiholik (May 17, 2006)

I've always loved the pictures from that place.


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## Johnny Thunder (Feb 24, 2006)

Very cool.


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## Copchick (Apr 10, 2012)

*All Saints' Chapel was converted or bone storage building*

I was checking out some sites looking for examples of skeleton chandeliers when I came across this. This is in the Czech Republic. I've included the accompanying description of the pictures I'm pasting in here. I think these are terrific examples for decorating projects for the big day.

Enjoy!









By far the strangest tourist attraction in Kutna Hora isn't in the old town, but rather in a former town called Sedlec which is now a suburb of Kutna Hora. The local monastery's graveyard began to overflow during an outbreak of the plague and so the 14th century All Saints' Chapel was converted into an ossuary, or bone storage building. Then in 1870 a woodcarver called Frantisek Rint came up with the idea of arranging all of those boring bones into various interesting patterns and structures, like crosses and the meter and a half tall goblets you can see on either side of the stairs leading down into the chapel. He even used the bones to spell out his name on the right-hand wall at the bottom of the stairs.









In the center of the main chamber is a large candelabra, apparently constructed from every bone in the human body or, more precisely, several human bodies. And in case you're still in any doubt, yes, those are all real human bones. Presumably part of the rationale behind this peculiar form of decoration is a desire to convey the transitory nature of all human life, a lesson that's rather disarmingly made by those cute little cherubs tooting their horns with real human skulls draped across their knees!










With around 40,000 skeletons stored in the ossuary, Frantisek certainly had plenty of materials available to flex his artistic skills. For instance, here's the coat of arms of the same Schwarzenberg clan who were responsible for the Schwarzenberg Palace, and who footed the bill for Frantisek to do his work. Part of the coat of arms is a picture of a Moor having his eye plucked out by a crow, depicted here by a real human skull and a crow made out of other human bones! 
Even so, that's a lot of bones and so he can be forgiven for having a few left over; in fact he had an awful lot left over, which he arranged into four large pyramids of bones, one of which you can see behind the coat of arms.

These were seen on the site: http://www.richard-seaman.com/Travel/CzechRepublic/Highlights/index.html


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## Hairazor (Mar 13, 2012)

My boss went to the Czech Republic a few years ago and when she was showing pictures she said here's one for you, meaning me, and I think it was this place. Amazing!


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

That's a thing of beauty.


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## Dark Angel 27 (Sep 11, 2008)

*wide eyes* coooollll!


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## MommaMoose (May 15, 2010)

This is one of the reasons I won't tell my husband why I want to go to the Czech Republic. I just let him think it is a hockey thing. (My favorite player is Czech) I keep saying that it is the old gothic style buildings. If he knew about this place he won't ever want to go there. The pics of this place is amazing.


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## Spooky1 (Aug 25, 2008)

Looks like a place I'd like to see some day.


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## diggerc (Feb 22, 2006)

I saw a bit about this back when History, Discovery, or Natgeo, actually showed this kind of interesting stuff.
Great Pictures


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## Saturday8pm (Sep 5, 2012)

Jan Svankmejer used this location for one of his shorts ... truly horrific, yet I dunno what to think!


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