When I go across the Wenceslas Square I am always mad at the piles of people who are squeezing at me and everyone is getting in the way. So I always go away quickly. But what I take as a normal place where I go from the one metro station to another, others consider as a Prague monument. And that led me to think that I should stop at Wenceslas Square, look around and find out more about its past because I don't know much about it. I was rather attracted by the future of this square and its architectural appearance, which has been talked about for a long time.
Formerly Wenceslas Square was a market place, founded in 1348 by King Charles IV. as part of the New Town of Prague, located under today's National Museum. The market was called the Horse Market. Already by the name you certainly know what was sold on the market. Along with the Horse Market, many other markets were established at other open locations within the New Town of Prague. There were traded other cattle and poultry.
In the upper part of the square was also the gateway - The Horse Gateway. Over the years, people have been trading new things. For example, food, weapons, substances. Wenceslas Square looked more like a rural market than a square, demonstrating the city as it is today.
At the end of the 19th century, the appearance of the square began to change step by step. The original surface of the square was replaced by cobble, the whole area was illuminated and shortly the tram started to drive on the square. Which was a step forward for the historic city.
As times go by, instead of rails, planted pots with flowers and shrubs were planted in the middle of the square and while before the trams used to cross the square from top to bottom through the center, today the rails run only in the middle of the square.
The present appearance of the square is more modern. At the beginning of the 20th century, the main focus of the square is the place of commercial companies, tourist offices, fashion houses and restaurants or bars which are slightly overpriced.
Wenceslas Square is now well-known for the National Museum in the upper part of the square, which is newly renovated and whose reconstruction I have already written about in the past. And just below the National Museum, we find a Statue of St. Wenceslas. On the site of the Statue of St. Wenceslas used to stand his monument, which, however, has a different author than the statue that stands on Wenceslas Square today. The sculpture of St. Wenceslas by Josef Václav Myslbek. Thanks to the statue you will often hear the sentence "Let's meet under the tail.", which is popular with Prague citizens. It is a meeting point just below this statue.
And what awaits the square in the future? Hard to say, maybe a return to the past. The authors of the new project want to restore the trams driving throughout the square. The only difference is that the tracks will be running along the square and not through the center. We can also expect several newly planted trees, which is a big plus for the city, especially in the hot summer.
https://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Václavské_náměst%C3%AD
From our external collaborator Tereza Kultová