Kostel svaté Markéty (Strakonice I) Church

Church of Saint Margaret is a single-nave late Gothic church in the center of Strakonice, near the confluence of the Otava and Volyňka rivers. It was built between 1580 and 1583 and is one of the city's most striking landmarks. It is protected as a cultural monument.

Its origins date back to the Strakonice Hospitaller hospital. The oldest written record of it dates from 1225. At that time, King Přemysl Otakar the First confirmed the donation of Bolemila, wife of Bavorius of Strakonice. She gave the hospital and convent the estate of Chlum with the forest of Lazec, Koryta and the surrounding forests. The Strakonice hospital is thus the oldest in the Czech lands. In 1318, Václav Bavorius confirmed the hospital by the bridge to the convent, and in 1358 his rights were also confirmed by Charles the Fourth. There was probably already a chapel next to the hospital at that time, and its original dedication was later transferred to the new church.

At the end of the 14th or the beginning of the 15th century, the chapel was expanded. In 1442, a fire destroyed the hospital and in 1454 the Hospitaller Grand Master endowed it and possibly re-established it. In a document from 1464, the church is spoken of as new. It differed from the castle church of Saint Procopius and from the old parish church of Saint Wenceslas in Lom in the suburbs. Because the parish lay far from the city, the chapel also served parish functions. Around the end of the 14th century, a cemetery was established near it. The citizens of Strakonice buried their dead there until the 16th century, when the main cemetery was established at Saint Wenceslas.

The city guilds also had their altars here. In 1482, the tailors acquired it. In 1557, the main altar belonged to the butchers. Most of the inhabitants of Strakonice were Utraquist at the time. The church remained Utraquist until the Battle of White Mountain, despite being under the patronage of the Maltese priors from the castle convent.

In the 16th century, the building was already too small in scope. At the initiative of the city administration and Grand Prior Christopher of Vartenberg, it therefore underwent a comprehensive reconstruction, completed in 1583. It was led by the Italian Vincenzo Vogarelli from Bormio, settled in České Budějovice. A memorial plaque above the northern entrance with the date 1583 commemorates him. The church was built in the style of late Gothic and Renaissance. The builder used the older external walls of the original Gothic building and the then hospital building. The walls were then covered with sgraffito.