From the Old Royal Palace rooms the next attraction is right around the corner, St George Basilica. It is one of the attractions that we would have skipped if we wouldn’t have already paid for it, we already saw St. Vitus Cathedral, how can any other church here compare with it? And it does not, it is smaller but still beautiful from outside while inside it is quite austere, very different from St Vitus. And in this, the smallest and least known attraction in the castle, we are getting accosted by the security guard in a quite aggressive way. He almost shouts at us that we cannot take photos without a permit, and when we show him the permit there is no apology or anything just a sullen retreat.
The ceilings and the walls are also not renovated, the frescoes are faded and broken up, we are joking that even our hotel room has a better fresco.
As in St Vitus you can go around the altar area with some nice views of the small church.
One of the attractions here are tombs of the kings and saints that were buried here. In the center is the tomb of Vratislaus I, the duke of Bohemia who established the St George Basilica in the 10th century, yes it is a really old church.
The other important tomb here is that of St Ludmila, a martyr venerated by both Orthodox and Catholics. She was the grandmother of Wenceslaus, posthumously declared to be a king and patron saint of the Czech State, and had a great influence on him and is also considered to be the patron saint of Bohemia.
Exiting the church we decide to rest a bit to recuperate after all of our walking and sighseeing. And why not also get some ice cream while resting? Refreshed we continue then to the next and last attraction in the castle, the Golden Lane.
