Prague is a city built on legends and stories which abound with every street corner. One of my favourite activities here is to roam around noting the magnificent designs on the facades of buildings. Which is how I discovered the legend of the Golden Well.

If you’re walking from the Old Town Square, home of the Astronomical Clock, to the Charles Bridge, your main worry is fighting through the throngs of tourists making the same trek.

There’s plenty of superstition around the Charles Bridge if you like that sort of thing.

My good friend Raphael pointed out to me once, never forget to look up or look back.

As you push your way on to Karlova, which is the winding cobbled street linking the Little Square (‘Male Namesti’) to the Charles Bridge, you would miss the splendid facade on the Renaissance building that sits in the fork between Karlova and Seminarska street if you ignore Raphael’s advice.

The facade of the Baroque building is known as the House of the Golden Well. Previously it was called ‘At the Red Chair’ because it was the seat of apostolic nuncio sometime in the 15th century and his chair was red.

A common sense approach to naming, as you can see.

It also had the title of ‘At the Golden Sun’ which explains the sun motif that is clearly visible between the first and second floors.

The remaining figures are all catholic in origin and you can see statues of St Sebastian (tortured by Romans for being Catholic), St Roch (Caught the plague while tending to their needs but was cured by a dog), St Vaclav (murdered by his brother), St John of Nepomuk (tortured and drowned by a Bohemian king) and St Rosalia (lived in a cave).

A fun-filled facade, in other words.

The current title comes from a legend about the place.

The well that is situated underneath the building always produced the clearest and cleanest of water which led the locals to wonder if perhaps gold was buried in the well. What else can make water so clean and clear?

A scullery maid who was employed there had heard this and used to peer closely into the well, in the hope of finding some gold for herself. One day, she thought she saw something shiny and leant in. Unfortunately she leant too far, fell in and drowned.

History does not record how we know why she leant in and I wonder what really happened.

Later retellings of this story embellish it further by adding that when the well was being cleaned, stones in the wall of the well were dislodged and buried treasure was indeed discovered.

A mediaeval, ‘and they all lived happily ever after’ addition, perhaps.

The building is now a well-located hotel so if you’re brave enough to live with the possibility of the ghost of a dripping wet maid appearing, teeth a-chattering, you can live for a few days right in the centre of Prague.

You can continue on your walk now, towards the Bridge, but do look up, note the imagery on the buildings and wonder what stories and legends lurk beneath the surface …