Saint Vitus Cathedral

St. Vitus stands within the walls of Prague Castle and it can be seen from all of Prague.  It is the base of the Archbishopic of the Czech Republic.  There have been at least two other incarnations of this cathedral, the ruins of which can be viewed from the side of St. Vitus.  The present gothic behemoth was commissioned by Charles IV (of the Charles Bridge), and the architect was Peter Parler.

All of the gargoyles are completely different, I learned that their purpose is to expel the bad spirits away from the cathedral (along with rain water).

It's very tall, and very elaborately decorated.  I do not think I took a picture of the flying buttresses, but they were multi-teared and highly ornamented.

The grandiose scale of this cathedral is breathtaking.  Parler used an intricate double cross vaulting method on the ceiling in order to have a continuous feel to the main body of St. Vitus.

I entered the cathedral as the sun was setting.  The intense light coming through the stained glass at the entrance of the church created an ethereal atmosphere.  You can see just how bright the sun was in the next picture.

I may have over done the stained glass pictures, but here are a few of the ones that came out nicely.  I personally liked the contrast between the pieces that were mosaic-esque and those that used much larger sections of glass.

Here is a massive stone staircase in the middle of the Cathedral.

The organ of St. Vitus was a sight to see in its own right.  You can also see another example of the double cross vaulting used in the ceiling.

The next two pictures are of some of the decorations in the chapels, in the asp of the cathedral.

This is the chapel of St. Vaclav, or as we know him Wenceslas (the one from that Christmas carol).  St. Wenceslas is the patron saint of the Czech lands.  He was killed by his brother for being a christian, hence the saint status.  To this day his skull is kept in this chapel and on every St. Wenceslas day, the archbishop takes it out puts the royal crown on it and shows it to the people of Prague, no joke!