Cistercian Order

Lore & Background

The Cistercian monastery in Sedlec was founded before 1278, when its abbot Henry was sent to the Holy Land by King Ottokar II of Bohemia. He brought back earth from Golgotha and sprinkled it over the abbey cemetery, making it a desirable burial site throughout Central Europe. In the mid 14th century, during the Black Death and after the Hussite Wars in the early 15th century, many thousands were buried in the abbey cemetery, so it had to be greatly enlarged. Around 1400, a Gothic church was built in the center of the cemetery with a vaulted upper level and a lower chapel to be used as an ossuary for the mass graves unearthed during construction. After 1511, according to legend, a half-blind monk of the order was given the task of exhuming skeletons and stacking their bones in the chapel. Between 1703 and 1710, a new entrance was constructed to support the front wall, and the upper chapel was rebuilt in the Czech Baroque style, designed by Jan Santini Aichel.

In Their Own Story

In 1870, František Rint, a woodcarver, was employed by the Schwarzenberg family to put the bone heaps into order, yielding a macabre result. The ossuary is estimated to contain the skeletons of between 40,000 and 70,000 people, whose bones have been artistically arranged to form decorations and furnishings for the chapel. Four bell-shaped mounds occupy the corners of the chapel. A chandelier of bones, which contains at least one of every bone in the human body, hangs from the center of the nave with garlands of skulls draping the vault. Other works include piers and monstrances flanking the altar, a coat of arms of the House of Schwarzenberg, and the signature of František Rint, also executed in bone, on the wall near the entrance. The ossuary is among the most visited tourist attractions of the Czech Republic, drawing over 200,000 visitors annually.

Reader's Guide

The Sedlec Ossuary is a Roman Catholic chapel, located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints, part of the former Sedlec Abbey in Sedlec, a suburb of Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic. The ossuary is estimated to contain the skeletons of between 40,000 and 70,000 people. In the game *Kingdom Come: Deliverance II*, Henry, the player character, goes to the ossuary and arranges the bones into pyramids. The ossuary is presented as almost empty and in disarray. It also features the blind monk of the legend, whom they called Morticius. The ossuary has appeared in various media: a 1970 film by Jan Švankmajer, the documentary *Long Way Round* with Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman, Dan Cruickshank's *Adventures in Architecture*, the John Connolly novel *The Black Angel*, the *Dungeons & Dragons* movie, *Blood & Chocolate*, and two versions of *The Amazing Race*.

Did You Know?

• In 1278, Abbot Henry of the Cistercian monastery in Sedlec was sent to the Holy Land by King Ottokar II of Bohemia and returned with earth from Golgotha.
• The ossuary is estimated to contain the skeletons of between 40,000 and 70,000 people.
• A chandelier of bones hanging in the chapel contains at least one of every bone in the human body.
• After 1511, according to legend, a half-blind monk was given the task of exhuming skeletons and stacking their bones in the chapel.
• The ossuary draws over 200,000 visitors annually.