This week, I had the pleasure of speaking about free speech in Prague and my book,“The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.” While the trip was relatively brief, I was able to venture out to see this unique city. Prague is, in a word, magical. This ancient city on the Vltava River is overwhelming in its beauty, history, and culture. It is one of my favorite places on Earth, and I hope that readers will visit Prague if they are coming to Europe. Trust me, you will leave in awe of the “City of a Hundred Spires.”
I arrived on a rainy evening and stayed in the Pytloun Old Armoury Prague, charming old hotel next to a gymnastics training center. (It was odd to pull up and see bodies flying by the three-story windows). While the rooms are old Europe (including tiny showers and no central air), the highlight is the arched dining room where they serve a terrific breakfast every morning.
The night I arrived, I went walking through the streets and found a small out-of-the-way pub for a wonderful local beer and cabbage-mushroom-sausage soup. Walking back in the dark, I passed little pubs with groups of Czechs, including a couple where small groups were singing folk songs around accordion players.
As many of you know from past travel blogs, I tend to take a day just walking around a city, wandering into historical sites. In Prague, it is impossible to walk more than a hundred feet without stumbling upon historic sites. It is the ideal walking city. It is clean and I never had the slightest concern about crime during the day or the night. Unlike many cities heavily damaged in World War II, much of the old architecture survived in Prague, including the famed Jewish section.
The Czechs have a respect for history and lovingly preserve these buildings. To put it simply, if it is Baroque, why fix it?
You will actually find a wonderful mix of Baroque, Romanesque, Gothic, and Renaissance architecture – a reflection of the fact that Prague was not only a global hub, but, at one time, the capital of the Kingdom of Bohemia. It was also the home of Holy Roman Emperors and Kings, including Charles IV and Rudolf II. It thrived under the Habsburgs and Austria-Hungary empire. It also has some of the regrettable architectural contributions of the Communist period. (There is no love for either Russia or communism in this city, as you will quickly find in any discussion of contemporary issues. These days the only invasion is by tourists, making Prague the fifth most visited city in Europe).
Any walk in Prague will inevitably take you by the glorious Charles Bridge. Originally built by King Vladislaus I in 1170, it had to be rebuilt in 1342 after it was destroyed in a flood. It offers lovely views of the city, including the distant Prague castle. One of the statues is of a saint with five stars who was thrown into the Vltava River. He would become the patron saint of sailors due to his famed death in the water (though historians have concluded that he was dead from the torture and beatings that he endured before he was tossed over the side of the Charles Bridge).
I was able to visit the Prague Castle by walking up the steep hill in the morning. It was a great choice. I beat the tourists and took the first available tour at 9 am. The castle is immense and stunning.
The Cathedral is one of the largest and oldest in Europe. (Taking the tour gives you access to the center area of the Cathedral). One of the rooms houses the national jewels, which are secured behind a door that can only be opened by seven keys. All must be used to open the door and they by tradition are held by seven office holders in the church, government and academia. If any were to lose their key, the door could not be opened.
The cathedral still has the emergence balcony from where the King and his family could cross a bridge from the royal apartments and enter the Cathedral without mingling with the commoners.
Across from Cathedral is the home and offices of the current Czech President and his staff.
After the tour, your ticket allows you to venture down the “golden street” with little dwellings, medieval shops, and even a torture chamber.
It is possible to take public transportation up to the Castle, but the steep walk allows you to see more of the lovely winding roads and buildings. It also allows you to enjoy the fanatic Czech beer and food as well as seeing such sights as the Prague astronomical clock built in 1410, the third-oldest astronomical clock in the world and the oldest one still working.
You will also find a church on every corner with soaring domes and ancient carvings and paintings.
It is impossible to do justice to the beauty and culture of Prague. You have to come and experience it yourself. Believe me, you will never forget the experience.
Professor, thank you for your courage in defending free speech all over the world. This week has made it abundantly clear how much defenders like you are risking for the rest of us.
Defend… risking… Good Lord man, he is not defending free speech, he’s collecting speaking fees. You are dummer than a rock.
Take off that furry costume. You look ridiculous.
Thank you so much for this wonderful post on your travel to Prague!
Thanks also for your posts explaining law and freedom of speech!
Thanks for the memories. I spent 3 days in Prague in 2010 and loved the city. It was beautiful experience.
3 days? Then you saw nothing of the city. Did you find a McDonalds at least.
Why was it necessary for you to insult me? I believe that I saw most every thing the city had to offer. I was also busy rehearsing for that stop on my concert tour with my choir. I was the soloist.
Prague remains one of my favorites. A small note: The stained glass windows shown above in the middle column were designed by Alphonse Mucha, a prominent artist of the Art Nouveau movement. This genre of art truly lends itself well to stained glass, especially as crafted by this particular artist.
Here is a link to a closeup image. (You might need to click on the image to enlarge the detail.)
Beautiful!
Enjoy it while you can. The remnants of the Churches in Dresden Almaty are a reminder of what becomes of such beauty when World War III breaks out.
Beauty & Destruction (peace or war) are on the edge.
When I am asked to rank cities in Europe in terms of beauty, Prague is in the top 4. The other three are St. Petersburg, Paris and Vienna.
I have always wanted to visit Eastern Europe, more than Paris or London. Now you have really convinced me !
Gorgeous! Thank you.
Thank you professor for sharing your travels with us. Great pictures too!
This is Trudy Taylor from Longview TX. You were a wonder of a teacher answering every email I sent you back in the waning days of the Nineties into the 2000 election.
Now I hope you get this email today. Your praise of Prague is so perfect. I knew you had ( lurking in your eyes and heart ) the soul of a photographer, but your pictures of my favorite place are such a balm for my ragged nerve endings this week. Thank you also much. Thank you for loving Prague and giving all of us something lovely to meditate on this cloudy Sunday. Thank you for every day since 2000 that you have guided us with your patience, calmness, knowledge of the Law, and home photography and love of sharing with all of us.
God bless you.
Trudy Taylor
Impressive travelogue. Prague is definitely a place to be experienced. I walked many of those same streets in about 2007 and it was wonderful. These photos are superb and really bring home the essence of this incredible city. When we took a tour of Eastern Europe Prague was highly anticipated and we were able to spend 3 days there just soaking up the sights, the people, the history. Never to be forgotten. People were friendly, a little reserved but easy to talk with and get directions and every corner you turned was a photo moment. You so want to get the photos for remembrance that you can forget that you have to live the city as you walk through. Loved the bridges, the castle (and it is a hike up to it). The food was different but very good. It was interesting eating Goulash in 4 different countries and tasting the differences but all were excellent.
Reportedly the Czech’s have the highest beer drinking per capita, at least at the time I was there. Great light beers. I am truly envious of you, Professor
Thanks, Prof. Turley, for this lovely tour of Prague through your eyes.
Dear Professor Turley,
Thank you for this wonderful travelogue, on Sunday morning. My wife and I were in Prague two summers ago for a three days after a brief stay in Pilsn. You’re wonderful description of the sites, combined with your pictures, may cause me to book a return visit soon. I also found the citizens of the Czech Republic to be wonderful people. Thank you, again, for starting the day off in an enjoyable way fashion
After what the Czechs went through at the hands of Moscow’s tyrannical Communist domination for 44 years, during which propaganda and censorship were the major tools of mind control, I’m curious how Czechs view deliberate inauthenticity in the public square using today’s open media. Clearly state control over speech would give too much power to the state vs. the Czech People. That said, do political parties and wealthy activists (e.g. George Soros) have the “freedom” to spew self-interested disinformation without consequence?
This is the unsolved problem of the modern era. How can society have a free and open public square while deterring inauthentic-manipulative actors? How can the what passes for public discussion be trusted as reliable? It should be obvious that public confidence and esprit de corps will wither away exposed to a constant babble of artful deceptions and willful half-truths. Poor decisions and paralysis are the immediate consequence — and longer-term, out of sheer frustration as a last resort, the public may turn to authoritarianism.
America has not solved this problem, and in fact, is naively wading in more treacherous waters with unregulated AI.
What are the Czechs doing/thinking? Could you pen an article, JT?
So Turley posts photos of his trip and this guy inserts politics into the blog. Geezzz…
If this blog were a travel log you wouldn’t show up to complain.
He went to Prague to give a talk on Free Speech. Is it out of line to ask about the ideas exchanged?
He will probably write a column about that later. Meanwhile enjoy his description and photos of an incredible city which I visited 20 yrs ago when the wounds of communism were fresher. I don’t know if it is still open but we went to the Communist Museum that showed the atrocities committed during that period perhaps as a reminder to its own people are others
Is this a first visit? It looks awesome. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for the tour! I may never make it to Prague but I can certainly see how it has attained such a reputation for beauty – loved the photos. I always enjoy your columns, and this travel article of beautiful spaces in a calm and safe city is a much needed change from the current news.
Thanks for the photos and travelogue. Imagine – a clean, crime-free city. Siunds like an Old World fable. How delightful.
Thanks for the wonderful photos and words. These are even more important now, in a world seemingly consumed with anger.
the internet has become a very dark place with vileness, lies, hatred and contempt for life are constant threads that support it. We would do well to limit our exposure to these demonic forces like the comment by L. Golden at 6:22 am
Boy, if you think L. Golden is a “demonic force”, I suggest you read your response again, but slowly or have someone with intellect read it to you.
Also, suggest you stay off the internet, it too harsh for you. You could try games. But that may be too much for you.
If you don’t realize that by now, you are lost. But I think you already are.
Why such a personal, ad-hominem response? Meritocratic argument has left the building.
Please explain what the “Meritocratic argument” is and how you would apply it in this intercourse?
Please stay there. We do not need or want you in the USA. Thank you, L. Golden
Wow. To get up on a Sunday morning and to see this comment as the first attached to a delightful, erudite and purely non-political description of a beautiful city, is a real eye-opener. Now I see a bit more clearly the forces behind the two murders we saw on TV last week. I am sure that the good Professor, who has devoted his career to the promotion of Free Speech as a fundamental American value, would defend your right to express such hateful thoughts. I find it impossible.
My mother was born in a small German-speaking village, later to be known as the Sudetenland, not far from Prague when it was still part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Tells you how old I am. That part of the world has seen more than its share of hate over the centuries. Very sad to see that it continues here.
Hate? Seriously? So now we’re being inundated by a bunch of geriatrics how great their anonymous lives were.
Geriatrics are so past tense, can’t shut-up how great they were.
Then why didn’t you fossils do something to save America from leftist. You failed America in a time of need.
Truly sad that is continue here AND there.
You are no doubt celebrating a tragedy that occurred last week. So sad. So frightening.
Playing the hater card are we? You are disgusting by claiming “you” is a hater just to get others to attack someone. Just hope you don’t have a guns stashed in you car or home.
Nowadays Karens are always inserting themselves in any and every discourse .