Historical Image

In ancient Greece, the protection of the city was symbolically ensured by a wooden statuette of the goddess Pallas Athena, said by legend to have been brought from Troy. Later, the term palladium came to be used for images or reliefs believed to have a protective function. A metal relief of the Virgin Mary with the Child Jesus, which according to legend was passed down from Saint Methodius through Saint Ludmila to Saint Wenceslas, was venerated as an object of special protective power and began to be spoken of as the Palladium of the Czech lands. It became the model for a number of Gothic images, among them the St. Vitus Madonna. A faithful copy of it, painted in tempera on three panels of Alpine pine covered with hemp canvas, was also owned by the gemstone cutter Dionysio Miseroni. The image was displayed on his house at the corner of Old Town Square and Železná Street, and during the Swedish siege in 1648 the people of Prague prayed before it for the salvation of the city. At that time the burgomaster Mikuláš František Turek of Strumfeld and Rosenthal carried it along the ramparts and onto Charles Bridge to encourage the defenders. After peace was concluded, the people of Prague attributed their victory to the intercessions of the Virgin Mary.

The column was built between 1650 and 1652 with the support of Emperor Ferdinand III, who understood it as a votive gift for the “defence and liberation of the city”. The sculptural decoration was led by Jan Jiří Bendl, the first great Czech Baroque sculptor, whose work represents the very earliest phase of Baroque sculpture in the Czech lands. The Prague Marian Column of 1650 is at the same time the first Marian column in Bohemia. Its material conception is equally exceptional: it is the first Marian column in Europe whose sculptural decoration is made entirely of sandstone, rather than of bronze or marble, as had previously been customary.

How swiftly and with what gravity the construction was begun is documented by an entry dated 22 April 1650 in the memorial book of the Old Town of Prague. The document records the decision of the town council, which entrusted Dionýs Misseroni with oversight of the construction. The foundation stone was laid as early as 26 April 1650. The entry explicitly states that the column was being built as a thanksgiving for the salvation of the city – not merely as a work of art, but as an expression of collective memory and spiritual gratitude. The image associated with intercessions for the salvation of the lives of the defending citizens of Prague was placed in the sacred space at the centre of the column. In this respect, the Prague Marian Column differs markedly from the older Marian columns north of the Alps – the one in Munich on Marienplatz (1638) and the one in Vienna on Am Hof (1647) – which places it in an entirely exceptional category among Marian columns.

During the Prussian siege of Prague in 1757, a cannonball struck the angel with the cross, shattering this statue. Its place was filled in the 19th century by a modern replacement with a spear, which, however, was seriously damaged when a beam from the wooden scaffolding fell upon it during the replacement of the Corinthian capital due to weathering. During the work on the replica of the statue, a flood then delayed its completion in 2024. The Marian Column stood on Old Town Square for 268 years, until 3 November 1918, when it was torn down by a mob. The mob then made its way to Charles Bridge with the intention of toppling the statues there into the Vltava, but was prevented from doing so by an armed guard. The atmosphere of the first days of the newly proclaimed republic was full of euphoria but also of anti-Catholic sentiment. Efforts to restore the column arose very shortly after its demolition, led chiefly by Catholic associations. These initiatives failed, however, because the political representatives of the First Republic were strongly opposed to the Church and public debate was burdened by historical myths. These later became the basis of Communist anti-Church propaganda, which amplified them further.

The restoration of the Marian Column in the 21st century would have been extraordinarily demanding even without these historical burdens. It required a combination of careful gathering of period documents and archival photographs, archaeological investigation, measurements, and modern structural calculations. The designers and restorers made use of surviving fragments held at the Lapidarium of the National Museum, old drawings, descriptions, and period photographs. Every detail had to be reconstructed with the greatest possible fidelity, from proportions to surface texture. Modern technology made it possible to find a suitable replacement for the original sandstone from quarries that no longer exist, while traditional stonemasonry and sculptural craftsmanship ensured that the final appearance faithfully corresponds to the Baroque original.

The Marian Column thus stands today not only as a reminder of Baroque piety, but also as a testimony to its deep rootedness in the history of Prague. Its story connects medieval Marian devotion, Baroque art, the dramatic events of 1632, 1648, 1757, and 1918, and the effort to restore national memory, no longer constrained by Communist censorship. The Marian Column stands once more today as a symbol of continuity of values founded on Greek thought, Roman law, and Christian ethics – a continuity that not even the horrors that marked the entire 20th century were able to sever.