Hi,
I was looking forward to today's trip to the village of Hronsek, I guess a little more than others. The reason is simple. We plan to visit several interesting historical places and one of them is a wooden articular church registered in UNESCO.
In this village in central Slovakia, there are a lot of monuments. Judge for yourself. There is a water castle, a mansion and a wooden church. It is proof that this village was important in the past.
We parked our cars near the church. We are going to see him. We arranged the tour by phone in advance. It is necessary if you want to look inside. There is no cash register where someone is always there. I called that we were here and waiting by the church, and the lady was with us once or twice and opened the door for us.
We sat down in the pews and the lady who let us in played a recording for us to learn as much as possible about the church. The Church of St. John the Baptist was built at a time when Catholics in Hungary came to the fore at the expense of Evangelicals. At this time, Count Imrich Tökoly of Kežmar opposed the Austrian emperor and, with the help of the people and foreign allies, forced Emperor Leopold I to convene the Sopron Diet in 1681. He confirmed religious freedom in the country and allowed evangelicals to build two churches in one capital.
In 1725, construction began. However, it was not that simple. Article 25 stipulated five conditions that had to be met during the construction of the church. The church had to be built within one year, without a single nail, the entrance to the church could not be directly from the street, the church had to be entirely made of wood and could not have a tower.
Fortunately, in this case, everything was successful and the church was built in the fall of 1726. The church has an incredible 1100 seats. The altar is unusually placed in the middle of the church and people sit around it. I have to admit that until now I have not seen such an arrangement in any church. I am enchanted by the unusualness of this place.
The church has the plan of a cross and there are five entrances and thirty windows. It has excellent acoustics, so it is a suitable place for holding concerts.
There is a wooden bell tower near the church. It was built the same as the church in 1726.
Another cultural monument that we are going to see is the Gothic-Renaissance water castle. This castle was built in the 14th century by the Géczy family. It originally had four towers and a moat filled with water. You could go to the castle via the drawbridge. This defense was due to Turkish raids.
Since there was no church in the village until the construction of the church, one of the rooms of the castle served as a prayer room. Ján Simonides also worked here. He was a well-known Slovak evangelical priest and writer.
During the uprising of František Rákoczi, coins were minted at the castle. There was a prison in the basement.
Due to lack of time, we did not go on a tour of the interior. However, I read that there are nice paintings in the interior. Various animals are depicted on them, which proves that the owners were hunters. In the former prayer room we can see religious motifs.
We passed two monuments out of three that we were going to visit here. The third is a mansion. It is located nearby. The Soosovsko-Géczyovský Baroque mansion was built in 1775. It is built in the Baroque style.
In the photo we can see the coat of arms of the Géczyovská family and Juraj's wife - Estera.
It is possible to take a tour of the mansion only one day a year. It is made available on the Festive Day of the Hronsek village.
However, we walked through the extensive park that surrounds this mansion. We discovered that a linden tree that is more than two hundred years old grows here. It is 25 meters high.
Time has moved on and we must move on. The village of Hronsek is extremely rich in cultural monuments. I would definitely recommend stopping here to anyone passing by.
Thank you