kostel Nanebevzetí Panny Marie (Družec) Church

The Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary in the small village Družec is a dominant part of the landscape and an important part of the life of the local community. Its beginnings date back to the first half of the fourteenth century, although the first written mention of the village itself dates back to 1320, when it was received from King Zdislav of Good as part of his property. The church itself with the parish is remembered for the first time in 1352 in the records of tithes.

The building gradually became an important pilgrimage place. The main pilgrimage, which is carried by the believers, is traditionally held on Sunday after the July 2nd. During the Thirty Years' War, however, the church passed through tragedy - in 1634 it was burned and plundered. However, I appreciate it and therefore had it rebuilt between 1688 and 1690. It is in this Baroque form that we know it today.

The architecture of the church speaks of the long history of the building. It is a one-ship building with a square presbytery in a plan whose original Gothic face is made up of a cross rib arch. The ship is rectangular with a flat ceiling. The tower closes the tin pit with a pointed lid and clocks that forever proclaim time to the antlers. The Baroque altar dates back to the time of reconstruction at the end of the seventeenth century and is its central element.

The heart of the church is, however, the most famous object - the Lady of Life, about 90 centimetres tall, now displayed in a protective glass niche in the middle of the altar. This statue is associated with a rich presentation of legends. Družec, vicar Václav Alexius Zelenka, wrote in 1677: "Many great graces have been achieved since the miraculous statue of the Virgin Mary every year." According to the local legend that Zelenka reproduced, the statue had miraculous power before the Hussite Wars - when the mercenary Zizka lit the church, but the statue remained in flames. This legend continues to live in the memory of the village.

The church's surroundings are also more interesting monuments. North of the building stands a Marian pillar with a statue of the Virgin Mary, which was erected in 1647 by the stonemason Jiří Gran along with his wife Regina. On the right of the facade lies a sandstone block called the Stone Man. According to the legend recorded by Father Joseph Kubishta around 1840, this stone was to mark the grave of a man who blasphemed the Virgin Mary. The blasphemers traditionally did not bury themselves in the cemetery among the believers, but outside its walls, and their graves were marked with such stones.

The parish in the Družec was destroyed by the merger under the parish Unhosti at the end of 2008, but the temple remains a living part of the local community. Every Sunday at ten o'clock there are still services and believers here seek comfort at their patron - as they did for centuries before.