Entering Prague like a King – The Powder Tower
When touring a city, we tend to see it the way it is now. After centuries of development, certain nuances are lost or hidden and it is only if you are particularly resourceful that you can discover certain treats the city has to offer.
This article explains the hidden stories behind Prague’s magnificent Powder Tower.
In days gone by, cities were planned based on a number of celestial events
This is also true of specific buildings – Malta’s Mnajdra Temple was built aligned on the solstices.
Prague was laid out along an East-West axis based upon the sunset and sunrise at the solstices and equinoxes. This was a common thing to do – Paris is laid out like this too – but in Prague, this axis was then also used as the Royal Way for coronations when Bohemia was still ruled over by kings.
Charles IV, King of Bohemia
Emperor Charles IV, the same Charles after whom the Charles bridge is named, defined careful steps and a detailed ritual for coronations along a specifically marked route. His reign led to what historians now call the Golden Age of Bohemia and one of his key acts was the founding in the 14th century of what is still called the New Town – Nove Mesto – which surrounds the Old Town.
I’ve written a walking guide to the Old Town walls. Follow that route to understand where the New Town is.
By the 17th century, Prague became the European capital of alchemy and esotericism and this Royal route was turned into a city-wide allegory of the discovery of the philosopher’s stone. This Royal Way therefore now had two purposes – it led the coronation process (culminating in a new king) and, through the symbols in the towns, led the alchemist to the Evening Star in the West.
You can follow the Royal route and the alchemical symbols in Prague using my walking guide to alchemy in Prague.
History
This Royal Way starts at one of the easternmost points of the Old Town – at the Powder Tower (Prasna Brana, in Czech). There used to be an older tower here which was a gateway into Prague through the Old Town walls1. The walls are no longer there, having been demolished to make way for an ever-increasing city. This older gate was part of the old walls and in ruins.
The old tower served as a customs entry point into Prague because the road that led to it also led to the silver mines of Kutna Hora1.
On 30 March 1475 Czech King Vladislav laid the foundation stone of the current tower1.
Prague councillors knew they had no need for a tower or a gateway so they designed the tower to be ornamental. They wanted to show off and asked their mason to build something similar to the Old Town bridge tower on the Charles Bridge. Today, these two towers bookend the first part of the Royal route.
The foundations are deep – 9m below street level – and the walls are 2.1m thick at the base1. The connection to the Royal Court came later in 15681.
Czech royalty abandoned the Royal court next door and so this tower was left to rot. It was reconverted into many other uses over the years until it was used to store gunpowder in 17151. That, for some reason, is the name that stuck.
It was heavily damaged in 1757 during the Prussian siege of Prague. It took almost a century before reconstruction works started and this led to the current design of the tower. The neo-Gothic revival was in vogue at the time1 and led to the tower becoming more than just a functional unit of the city.
Today, the tower is open for visitors prepared to brave the 186 steps1 to the top and get a view over the roof tops of Prague. From there, you can look at Prague Castle and wonder what the soon-to-be-King would have been thinking as he set foot from this point along the Royal route to his ultimate destination.