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House At the Unicorn, At the White Horse (Jazz and Blues Restaurant Bílý koníček - Dům U Jednorožce)
Staroměstské náměstí 20 Praha 1 - Staré Město 110 00 Phone: 221 421 160 http://www.bilykonicek.comAbout
House At the Unicorn, At the White Horse | One of the most ancient Prague houses is situated on the corner of Železná Street and the Old Town Square. The house is namely significant for its Romanic core from the 12th century. Deep cellars document its Romanic past. The original Romanic ground floor and exceptionally also a part of the first floor got below the street level in about the mid-13th century, due to the anti-flood proceedings, when the terrain was greatly elevated via filling up with earth. The Romanic premises with Greek masonry and cobble-stone paving are vaulted towards a central pillar, above which the towered early-Gothic palace was probably built. The house has a large land plot with two yards; there were two houses originally, which were joined together constructionally in the years 1357 - 59. During the 15th century, another bricked central part of the house was built, and a bay chapel was built on the yard facade of the Southern wing when Bishop Lucian of Mirandola dwelled here. The new owner, shopkeeper Jiří purchased the house in 1493 and gave it the name At the Unicorn, in accordance with his other house located behind the St. Nicholas Church. Soon afterwards, he had the house rebuilt in a generous way by a prominent builder of the Vladislav’s Gothic and a stone master Matyáš Rejsek. He is the author of the late-Gothic preserved house passage, the vault of which is one of Prague’s architectural treasures. The ribs go down to gudgeons, of which some are decorated by hewn leaved ornaments, one forms an emblem of the owner Jiří of the Unicorn, and others form Rejsek’s signage with a date 1496. The original passage portal was not preserved. Today’s facade of the house was done in high-Baroque style in the 18th century, when the house got a name Bomšejnský House according to its owner, and it was not spared of Classicist interventions. During the 17th century, the house was owned by the supreme royal judge Heřman Černín of Chudenice, and then it was owned by the Černín Family for more than 100 years. Karel Havlíček Borovský lived here for some time after he arrived at Prague, and in 1848, Bedřich Smetana opened his private musical vocational school here, which is commemorated by a memorial plaque installed on the corner of the house. The house was restored in the 1960s, and that was when the above mentioned bricked parts from the 15th century were discovered in the yard.At the end of the 20th century, there was a youth club named White Horse operating in the Romanic cellars, accessible via a steep staircase. This name for some time gave the name to the entire house.Last update: December 10, 2013,© Pražská informační služba 2013
