About Jindřichův Hradec
Jindřichův Hradec is situated in the picturesque landscape of the South Bohemian fishponds, northeast of České Budějovice.
History
The earliest mentions of the Přemyslid fortified settlement here date back to the 9th and 10th centuries. Around the year 1220, Jindřich, the first Lord of Hradec, built a Gothic castle on the foundations of an ancient Slavic stronghold, naming it ‘Nový hrad’ (New Castle). The name of the castle soon passed on to the emerging market settlement which grew beneath it.
Thanks to its strategic location on the route between Prague and Vienna, the settlement quickly flourished. A key milestone came in 1293, when Jindřichův Hradec was first officially referred to as a town. By that time, it had likely already been fortified, and over the following decades, the systematic construction of stone townhouses continued.
The town continued to flourish throughout the 15th century and reached its zenith in the 16th century under the rule of Jindřich IV of Hradec and his son Adam. Renaissance buildings were added to the Gothic structures, mainly thanks to the presence of many Italian builders who converted the castle into a modern chateau.
The golden age of the town came to an end in 1604, when the lords of Hradec died out and the estate passed to Vilém Slavata of Chlum and Košumberk. The outbreak of the Thirty Years’ War marked the beginning of the town’s decline, despite the fact that Jindřichův Hradec was, at the time, the second largest town in the Kingdom of Bohemia.
From the end of the 17th century, the estate was owned by the Czernin family of Chudenice, who ruled here until 1945. However, the town was struck by two major disasters, in 1773 and then again in 1801, when a devastating fire destroyed over 300 houses and killed dozens of people. In the aftermath of this tragedy, Jindřichův Hradec took on a new Neoclassical appearance which still partly characterises the look of the town today.
