Zahrada Černínského paláce Garden

The garden of Černín Palace is located on Hradčany near Loretánské náměstí and covers an area of one point seventy-two hectares. Together with the palace, it is protected as a cultural monument and serves the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Count Humprecht Jan Černín of Chudenic began building the palace in sixteen sixty-nine. The garden was created from sixteen ninety-three according to the plans of architect Francesco Caratti. His heirs continued the work, Count Heřman Jakub Černín, and in seventeen twenty-three the founder's grandson, Count František Josef Černín, completed it. Architects Domenico Egidio Rossi and later František Maxmilián Kaňka also contributed. The summer house here is attributed to Kaňka, but it apparently has nothing to do with him. It was built by master mason Jakub Schedel. Who designed it is not known. It was most likely Schedel himself or Anselmo Lurago, the author of the tower of the Church of Saint Nicholas in Malá Strana.

During the Prussian siege in seventeen forty-one to seventeen forty-two and in seventeen fifty-seven, the garden was severely damaged. It was restored by sculptor Jan Antonín Quitainer, painter Josef Bartoloměj Kramer, and gardener Jan Paul. In seventeen ninety-one, banquets, concerts, and balls were still held here for the coronation of Leopold the Second. But at the end of the eighteenth century, the Černín family moved to Vienna. From seventeen ninety-six to eighteen nineteen, the picture gallery of the Society of Patriotic Friends of Art, the predecessor of the National Gallery, was located here. Then a hospital, a playing card factory, and a hop storage took turns. From eighteen fifty-one, the complex belonged to the military and served as barracks with stables. At the beginning of the twentieth century, architect Otokar Fierlinger restored the original baroque appearance of the garden including the fountains. In nineteen twenty-eight, the state acquired the palace with the garden, and Fierlinger conducted another complete renovation in nineteen twenty-nine. The most recent general reconstruction took place from nineteen ninety-four to nineteen ninety-seven.

Rossi designed two fountains already in sixteen ninety-two. On June tenth, sixteen ninety-three, a water supply was brought into the garden, and on August third, the water jet in the lower basin was successfully tested. The pools rest on a brick foundation with a stone border by Santino Aichel, and sealed with a layer of clay. Today there is an upper, larger basin for the water jet. In the axis of the garden facade is also a smaller fountain with two marble basins of irregular shapes. Water from the upper one overflows through a fine comb into the lower one. Apart from two small shells, it has no ornaments. In the shaded part of the garden lies a small sandstone pool hidden in a retaining wall with a mask serving as a drain.

On October sixteenth, nineteen ninety, a boundary stone from the Czech-Bavarian border from seventeen sixty-six was placed here. The Minister of Foreign Affairs received it as a gift as a symbol of the opening of borders.