Kostel svatého Martina (Lipany) Church

The Church of Saint Martin in Lipany stands on the site of an older sanctuary, which was early Gothic or perhaps still late Romanesque. It probably dates from the beginning of the fourteenth century and was apparently a smaller building oriented toward the east. The church is first documented in writing in the year 1352. Lipany at that time belonged to the Hospitaller commandery in Uhříněves and the right of presentation was held by the general prior of the order. From the year 1364 the village was partly transferred to Uhříněves and partly to the highest burgraviate.

During the Hussite wars in the year 1421 part of Lipany came into the possession of the Tátks from Kuří. The former Hospitaller part was administered by the Prague citizen Jan Kbelský and after his death by his son-in-law Jan from Kunvald. The Lipany parish broke up during the Hussite period and the care of the church was taken over by the Utraquist priests. In the year 1448 the widow after Jan from Kunvald had to accept the incorporation of the Uhříněves estate under the Old Town of Prague. Before that the co-owner Pešík from Kunvald fled from there when George of Poděbrady laid siege to Prague.

The estate was confiscated by the Old Town in the year 1547 for participation in the estates' rebellion. Three years later it was purchased by the knight Hanuš Reinšperger and in the year 1579 by Jaroslav Smiřický. In the year 1621 Albrecht of Waldstein became the owner and two years later Prince Charles the First of Liechtenstein.

During the Thirty Years' War Lipany were plundered in the years 1639 to 1643. The church was damaged, the bells were stolen and the rectory was burned down. The church then fell to the Uhříněves parish and after the war it was repaired. In the year 1751 Maria Theresa purchased the burgrave's part of Lipany and attached it to Uhříněves. Seven years later she founded an endowment for the churches of the estate and the Lipany church received three hundred gold coins from it. From the year 1787 Lipany fell under the Říčany parish. At that time a wooden bell tower was added, which was replaced by a brick tower in the year 1796. At the same time a cemetery was created.

The nave of the old church was in very poor condition, so it was torn down in the year 1863. Only the tower remained, to which a Neo-Romanesque church was attached. It consists of a rectangular nave with a saddle roof and on the east a semicircular apse. On the west stands a tower from the eighteenth century with a hip roof. The main portal on the north side leads directly into the nave and is topped with a semicircle with a profiled archivolt. A smaller portal in the tower is framed by a simple aedicule. The windows in the bell tower are rectangular with a semicircular arch, and in the apse and on the south side of the nave they are circular.

In the nineteen sixties the church was no longer used for services and the building fell into disrepair again. It underwent renovation in the year 1970. Today it is a filial church of the Roman Catholic parish of Říčany near Prague and mass is held here once a month.