Gold Coin 2500 CZK Klementinum in Prague 2006 Standard

1/4 Oz gold coin - Cultural monuments of technical heritage - Klementinum in Prague

The obverse of the coin features baroque stylized clouds from which streams of rain fall. On the left edge of the streams of rain is the denomination of the coin "2500" stylized in the form of a graduated cylinder, to the right of them is the abbreviation of the monetary unit "CZK". Above the baroque clouds are stylized heraldic animals from the great state emblem. On the intermediate ring is an unsealed copy with the name of the state "CZECH REPUBLIC" and the title of the cycle "CULTURAL MONUMENTS OF TECHNICAL HERITAGE". The mark of the Czech Mint is placed on the right edge of the coin above the baroque stylized clouds.

On the reverse of the coin is the astronomical tower of the observatory in Prague's Klementinum, with the year of mintage "2006" divided by the astronomical tower at its left and right bottom edges. From the top of the tower comes an artistic stylisation of an astronomical measuring instrument. In the upper left edge of the coin is a stylized transcription of a part of the depiction of the comet's movement from the book 'Descriptio cometae' by Tadeáš Hájek of Hájek. The inscription "OBSERVATOR PRAŽSKÉ KLEMENTINUM" appears on the intercircle. The author of the coin design is Mr. Josef Oplištil, his author's mark, connected by the letters "OJ", is placed in the upper right edge of the coin.

The Clementinum (historically Clementinum) was originally built by the Jesuits as a college in Prague, which was founded after the Jesuits accepted the invitation of Ferdinand I of Habsburg and came to Prague in 1556.

The Jesuits built the site in its present size between 1653 and 1726, on the site of a Dominican monastery which had been established in 1227 at the Church of St. Clement and which the Jesuits took over from them.

This already grand early Baroque site was further modified, modernised and extended - through the High Baroque to the Classical period - and needed no major alterations for most of the 18th and 19th centuries until the early 20th century.

Until the division of the university into Czech and German in 1882, it housed the Faculty of Philosophy and the Faculty of Theology of the Charles-Ferdinand University, which taught primarily, if not exclusively, in German. After the partition, only the Czech part remained here, and since 1930 only the extended university library.

The Klementinum is the seat of today's National Library - as it has been called again since 1990 (previously the National and University Library since 1935, the Provincial and University Library since 1939, and part of the State Library of the Czechoslovakia since 1958) - under this name (Bibliotheca nationalis), founded in 1781 by Karel Rafael Ungar, including the technical library, expanded in 1924-1931 by architect Ladislav Machon, with the cooperation of sculptor Otto Gutfreund.

The local astronomical observatory became the basis of the Astronomical Institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in 1953.

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