patron-saint-of-smart-asses:

archer-bro:

deadbilly:

hostile-ghost:

bechdels:

while we’re on the subject of catholicism…

And the bone church is still the most Goth thing ever…

Do I want to know where those bones come from?!

In the mid 14th century, during the Black Death, and after the Hussite Wars in the early 15th century, many thousands were buried in the abbey cemetery, so it had to be greatly enlarged.

Around 1400, a Gothic church was built in the center of the cemetery with a vaulted upper level and a lower chapel to be used as an ossuary for the mass graves unearthed during construction, or simply slated for demolition to make room for new burials.

After 1511, the task of exhuming skeletons and stacking their bones in the chapel was given to a half-blind monk of the order.

Between 1703 and 1710, a new entrance was constructed to support
the front wall, which was leaning outward, and the upper chapel was
rebuilt. This work, in the Czech Baroque style, was designed by Jan Santini Aichel.

In 1870, František Rint, a woodcarver, was employed by the Schwarzenberg family to put the bone heaps into order, yielding a macabre result. The signature of Rint, also executed in bone, appears on the wall near the entrance to the chapel.

Essentially it was a popular burial site for wealthy Catholics and they ran out of room. Eastern Europe is wild. [X]