Alchemists and Their Homes

In the 15th century Hynek, Duke of Münsterberg, the youngest son of King George of Poděbrady, devoted himself to alchemy. Around 1480 he bought the Knajslík House in Kutná Hora and had an alchemical workshop installed in the tower at its rear. Since then called the Münsterberg or Princely House (no. 377), it stands on today’s Palacký Square. The alchemical workshop occupies the tower’s second floor and is decorated with hermetic ornaments. There is a hearth on one side and a drain and liquid channel on the other. Legends of hidden gold and silver treasure are also associated with the house. Digging took place here in the 17th century; an empty hiding place was found in the cellar, but the legends persist. Mint masters also practised alchemy in Kutná Hora. Petr Hlavsa of Liboslav, later a laboratory worker in the service of the Rožmberks, was mint master here from 1553 to 1561. In 1552 the German Šebastián Essen of Kempten took charge of smelting the Kaňk pyrites. He was later imprisoned for poor management and died in the White Tower at Prague Castle. Lazar Ercker first worked as mint master in Kutná Hora and later became the Kingdom of Bohemia’s chief mining official. While working in Kutná Hora, he published his Book of Assaying in German in Prague in 1574. It describes ore testing, assessing yields and production processes. The book made him famous, and during roughly the next 150 years it went through seven German editions, three English editions and a Dutch edition. Other alchemists mentioned in Kutná Hora include Mikuláš of Řásná, who accidentally poisoned both himself and his wife at work. The alchemist Kryštof Putz was summoned to Kutná Hora to introduce a new smelting method. Similarly, David Wolfram, alchemist to the Elector of Saxony, was invited here in 1600 to improve the mines’ yield through his “art”.