A castle and a city of the Middle Ages： Český Krumlov １

＜　Krumlov　Castle　＞

At the end of October 2009, I visited this city of the world heritage of Czech Republic in East Europe.

It seemed that I slipped back in time to the medieval small kingdom.

The scenery of this city is different from the big city of the Middle Ages of Europe.

2009年10月末、チェコ南部の山間部にある世界遺産の小さな町を訪れた。

まるで中世の小国にタイムスリップしたようでした。

この町には、ドイツの中世大都市にない趣があります。

＜　The red mark shows Český Krumlov.　＞

＜　a bird's-eye view:  the old city is inside of the bending river. A castle is outside of upper part river. ＞

This city that was surrounded by Moldau is a diameter of about 250 m.

The city and the castle begin in the 13th century, and the atmosphere of the early medieval period is left.

The scale of a castle is large and is looking down on the small city from heights.

The curved river functioned as a fosse, and three bridges were built.

This river passes through this city and Prague of the capital, and finally came to the North Sea.

Moldau is famous in the symphony "My country" of Smetana.

This place was in an important place of the traffic from the ancient times, and the amber of the Baltic Sea would have been carried to Rome through here.

Although this city developed with handicraft and commerce medieval times, it was left behind before long in the times.

Therefore the cityscape remained without receiving a change greatly.

This whole area was called Bohemia from ancient times, and was the place where Slav intermingles with Germanic peoples of the Holy Roman Empire.

Because of that, this area early was civilized among countries of Eastern Europe, but there was much misfortune.

In the 15th century, the forest of this south Bohemia became a lodgment area of Protestant (The Hussites ) of a religious war.

この町はモルダウ川の湾曲部に囲まれた直径２５０ｍほどの大きさです。

この町と城は１３世紀に始まり、中世ルネサンスの趣を残している。

城の規模は大きく、高台から小さな町を見下ろしている。

湾曲した川が掘りの役目をし、三つの橋が掛けられている。

この川は、この町と首都プラハを通り、やがて北海に抜ける。

このモルダウ川はスメタナの交響曲「我が祖国」で有名です。

この地は古代より交通の要衝で、バルト海の琥珀がローマに運ばれたことだろう。

この町は、中世、手工業と商業で発達したが、やがて時代に取り残され、街並みが大きく変化を受けずに残った。

この地域一帯は古来ボヘミアと呼ばれ、神聖ローマ帝国のゲルマン人（ドイツ人）とスラブ人が混じり合う所だった。

おかげで東欧の中では文明化されるのが早かったが、不幸も多かった。

１５世紀、この南ボヘミアの森は宗教戦争でプロテスタント（フス派）の拠点となった。

＜　going a ground of south Bohemia　＞

＜　viewing the old city of Český Krumlov from the castle. A tower of church is seen in the center.　＞

＜　The leaves just are turning yellow, and an angler is in the Moldau. ＞

＜　The bridge links a garden and the castle of right side.　＞

＜　I look up at a tower of the castle from the courtyard of it.　＞

＜　pictures of the wall surface in the castle　＞

Next time, I introduce photograph of cityscape and four seasons.

次回は、街並みと四季の写真を紹介します。