Kostel Zvěstování Panny Marie (Plaňany) Church

In the village Plaňany in the district of Kolín stands a stealth, yet an exceptional church. The Church of the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary - dedicated to St. Peter by 1620 - is a Roman Catholic philistine church of the Parish of Peèka and a Romanesque building from the third quarter of the 12th century. In its existence, it bears witness to the ancient and relatively significant settlement of this place.

The history of the site is even older than the church's appearance today. Archaeological research from 1937 showed that a sacral building from the period from the 10th to 11th century stood at the same place - the remains of a circular building, namely a rotunda, were found under the floor of the present church. The church was built in its place as a fortified church (castellatum): from the south it was protected by a pond, from the remaining three world sides probably a protective wall. The year of its creation is evidenced by the year carved into one of the blocks of the southern wall of the ship - "1168- 1892" - with the first number indicating the time of establishment, the second year of overhaul.

In the last quarter of the 14th century, the church was extended to the highest Gothic presbytery with a rib arch. The foundations of the original priesthood were uncovered in 1938 two metres below the floor; The Gothic victory arch in the eastern wall of the ship was probably broken. In 1716 came a disaster in the form of lightning - after the fire it was necessary to reduce the tower by the last, it is assumed that a completely wooden floor.

In the third quarter of the 18th century, the Baroque reconstruction was carried out on the instruction of Marie Tereza of Savoy. Originally a flat-ceiling ship received a baroque general vault with window lunettes, the interior was decorated and a musical ring was formed on the site of the Romanesque bleachers. During the reconstruction of 1792-1805, the original narrow, high-laid Romanesque windows were blinded and new windows were broken, without a clear meaning. That's when the original Romanesque southern portal was destroyed - only fragments left in the southern wall of the ship. In 1892, the western entrance was set up with a simple sandstone rectangular lining and the windows of the priesthood were gotivated with sandstone and circles. Six years earlier, in 1886, there was a puristic adjustment that tried to restore the original Romanesque look - historians are considered inconsiderate.

The exterior of the church captures the first time. The single-boat construction of small dimensions - the ship measures 13.5 metres in length and 7.6 metres in width - ends in front of the west facade with a massive square tower 38.5 metres high with a length of 6,4 metres and a wall strong on the ground floor. The tower survived for centuries, untilled by its own foundations, separated from the base of the ship by a mere two-centimeter spasm. Special attention deserves to be paid to the masonry: the walls of the ship and the tower are made up of regularly carved sandstone blocks laid in horizontal layers of uneven width, with the builder alternating red rock sandstone with a yellow nutty. The result is an extraordinary colour effect which is expected to be inspired by North Italian architecture.

After the construction of the larger church of the Born of St. John the Baptist in 1910-1913, the old church served as a cemetery and gradually disintegrated. In 2014, 600 000 CZK was released to repair the architectural heritage program. Since 2018, further work has been carried out - the church has received new roofs and interior modifications are being planned.

For an inquisitive tourist, Plaňany is a stop where a thousand years of construction history intersects in one place: rotunda covered by a Romanesque ship, Gothic vaults, baroque reconstruction and traces of purist intervention. The alternately coloured wall itself is worth a stop.