About 1.5 kilometres northeast of Kutná Hora’s historic centre, in the district of Sedlec, stands the Church of the Assumption of Our Lady and St John the Baptist, widely known to visitors as Sedlec Cathedral. It began as the convent church of a Cistercian abbey, not as the seat of a bishop; today it serves as a Roman Catholic parish church. The distinction matters because the building’s identity comes from monastic life and the silver wealth of the region, while “cathedral” has become part of its established visitor name. Its Gothic fabric and Baroque Gothic restoration make it a compelling counterpart to the mining town’s better-known St Barbara’s Church.
A Cistercian monastery was founded at Sedlec in 1142, and a Romanesque church stood on the site before the great Gothic building. Silver discovered on monastic land and income from leases for mining helped finance the church between 1290 and 1320, according to the official Sedlec history. The three-nave structure included a transept and a choir with an ambulatory and radiating chapels. For centuries it was among the largest religious buildings in Bohemia and Moravia. The project linked a monastic institution in the countryside with the expanding mining economy that made nearby Kutná Hora a powerful royal city.
