9 WEEKS OF BAROQUE FESTIVAL

Week 9 | The Sušice area (24.8. - 30.8. 2015)

24.8. 2015 Svatobor wandering
25.8. 2015 Church of Strašín
26.8. 2015 The Museum in Sušice
27.8. 2015 Hrádek u Sušice Chateau  
28.8. 2015 Baroque night in Horažďovice
29.8. 2015 Church Dobrá Voda by Hartmanice
30.8. 2015 The Town of Sušice  

The Sušice area is a kind of wedge of civilisation thrust into the Šumava foothills. Long ago, life came here from the Otava upstream. We can find very old churches and castles here with Roman and Gothic roots and many beautiful Baroque buildings. If feels as if the old churches honoured the principles of later sentiments. They were built on visible spots and their towers created a network of beacons. Probably so that a man living and working in his narrow valley could see that he was not alone, that there were other people with the same fate living behind the forest. Baroque came and beautified the stern medieval buildings, it gave them charm and a feeling that the sky was not too high above...

Baroque also left its footprint in one of gateways to Šumava, Sušice, in the look of the Parish Church of St Wenceslas, the town hall and the Capuchin Monastery as well as the picturesque tower of the Church of the Virgin Mary. The nice view of the town is overlooked by a Baroque estate with cloisters around the Chapel of the Guardian Angels. The pilgrim place in Strašín is still perceived by many as the centre of lines of force which come out of the earth right below the Baroque church. There are many legends about this place. The Baroque church has Roman walling bearing evidence of the devotion shown to the Mother of God since the Middle Ages. Grandiose Strašín funfairs played an important religious and social role in the life of the scattered settlement of the Šumava foothills.