Silver medal Kunětická hora Castle 2012 Proof

Kunětická hora

Kunětická hora is a lone prominent hill (307 m above sea level) in the Bohemian Plateau near Pardubice. It forms a dominant feature of the Polabí region. The mountain is marked on one side by stone mining, which ended here in 1920. On the top stands the castle of the same name from the beginning of the 15th century. It is a popular excursion spot for the inhabitants of Pardubice and people from the surrounding area. From the top of the mountain there is a magnificent view of the surrounding area and under favourable conditions it is possible to see the peaks of the Krkonoše Mountains.

It is only with the Hussite wars that the mountain is mentioned in history. From here, on 25 June 1420, armed people led by the priest Ambrose marched on Hradec Králové, then occupied by Sigismund's garrison, and conquered it. After the sacking of the nearby Opatovice Monastery, the Hussite governor Diviš Bořek of Miletínek, who later led the victorious Panska Unity at the Battle of Lipany in 1434, acquired extensive ecclesiastical territory, including Kunětická Hora. In 1423 Diviš built a castle on Kunětice Mountain as a military and administrative centre of his domain.

After Diviš's descendants, the castle was owned by King George of Poděbrady and his sons. Already then the castle was being supplemented by construction. In 1491, the Moravian Grand Duke William of Pernštejn bought Pardubice and the Kunětice Manor with Kunětice Mountain. Under him and his sons Vojtěch and Jan, the castle was magnificently rebuilt into a massive two-tower building, but already in 1560 Jaroslav of Pernštejn was forced to sell the whole Pardubice estate and Kunětice Mountain to the royal chamber.

At that time the castle consisted of the so-called "lower enclosure", the forecourt and the palace part. The fortification consisted mainly of a system of artillery bastions and six gates connected on both sides of the road by a serrated wall.

During the Thirty Years' War, on 17 November 1645, after the futile conquest of Pardubice, the Swedish general Torstenson conquered Kunětická hora and had the castle burnt and destroyed. Although the castle was very strongly fortified and modern for that time, it was defended by a very weak garrison of 28 men. It could not withstand the Swedish superiority.

However, the destruction of the castle continued due to neglected care and stone breaking, especially on the south-western side, which caused the collapse of part of the castle in 1884. In 1896, a fire destroyed the farm buildings in the castle's substructure.