The Marian Column (Mariánský sloup)

Sculptural decoration

Like the original, the replica is made of sandstone, and at the top is a beautiful statue of the praying Virgin Mary Imaculata (Immaculate) with a halo with 5 gilded stars. The Imaculata stands on a dragon, which symbolizes the sin, evil and suffering that the Virgin Mary protects us from. The creator of the original sculptural decoration was one of the most important Czech early Baroque sculptors, Jan Jiří Bendl. The decoration originally included four angels fighting monsters, symbolizing the victory of virtues (Bravery, Justice, Wisdom, and Temperance) over sin and heresy. However, these sculptures were not sufficiently preserved to make copies and are therefore missing from the replica.

The column’s removal

The Marian Column was built as part of the re-Catholicization after the Thirty Years' War and remained the largest landmark on Old Town Square for over 350 years. In 1915, a monument to Master Jan Hus, the most important Czech reformer of the church, was erected on the square. For three years, the distinctive vertical of the figure of Hus figure balanced the height of the Marian Column.

After the end of the First World War and the proclamation of the Czechoslovak Republic in 1918, however, the Marian Column was torn down by a group of Prague citizens as a symbol of the former Austria-Hungary and Habsburg rule.

Over the next century, many efforts were made to restore it because of its historical, artistic and religious value. The renewal always had its supporters and opponents. During the communist era, its supporters were even persecuted. After the Velvet Revolution, the Society for the Restoration of the Marian Column was formed and work on the replica has been underway since the 1990s. In 2018, after 395 years, the chalice with the host was returned to the facade of the Catholic Týn Cathedral as a gesture of ecumenical reconciliation. Both monuments stand on Old Town Square once again as of June 2020.

The Marian column as a sundial

A few years after its placement, the Marian Column began to serve as a gnomon, or sundial indicator, perpendicular to the dial. In the case of Old Town Square, three rows of stones functioned as the "dial", marking the “Prague meridian” in the paving. At the moment the shadow cast by the pillar exactly coincided with the paved meridian line, the people of Prague knew that noon had arrived. It was a widespread method of determining time in the 17th and 18th centuries. The meridian has been marked with a brass plaque since the 1990s. Only now, however, has the sundial regained its marker and is once again fully functional.