Jílové u Prahy history: the royal gold-mining town near Prague

Jílové u Prahy, a town in the north of the lower Sázava basin, grew out of several mining settlements, drawn by gold. The first mention of the town, in 1045, was later recognised as a forgery, so the oldest reliable records date from the 14th century.

The town took its name from the former name of the hill at whose foot residents washed gold out of clay. People had settled here as early as the Stone Age, as archaeological finds confirm.

Gold, the Hussites and fires

In 1310, the oldest book of Prague’s Old Town recorded that Konrad Stadler of Jílové had received Old Town municipal rights. Around 1350, Emperor Charles IV confirmed Jílové’s status as a royal town and granted it a number of rights and privileges.

During the Hussite Wars, in 1422, Jan Žižka came to the town, and his warriors destroyed both the mines and the town itself. Recovery came only under King Vladislaus Jagiellon. Gold also attracted the famous alchemist Edward Kelley: in 1590 he acquired several estates in the surrounding area and bought a number of buildings in the town itself.

Much of the town’s history will remain a mystery forever, because documents perished in frequent fires, especially in 1567 and 1636. The Thirty Years’ War then destroyed half of the houses. Before the war, the town had three breweries.

An age of change: from self-government to the railway

In 1623, during the forced re-Catholicisation, a Minorite monastery was founded here; it was dissolved in 1785. In 1849 the town gained its own elected self-government and became the centre of a district, which it remained until 1942.

The 19th century brought the town a post office (1851), its first pharmacy (1864), school and public buildings, an amateur theatre, a museum (1891) and, finally, the railway in 1897. Fifty-two local residents did not return from the fronts of the First World War.

In the 20th century the town was electrified and gained a water supply and sewerage, and during the German occupation it was called Eule. German soldiers left Jílové on 9 May 1945. Unprofitable gold mining ended in 1968, and Swedish-designed scaffolding was produced in the former mine buildings. In 2017 the Sekanka educational trail was opened.

What survives today

Among the oldest buildings, the Church of St Adalbert from the first half of the 13th century, the 14th-century town hall and the Minc House of 1356, now home to the regional museum, have survived. The town hall, both churches and the Minc House have been protected as monuments since 31 December 1965. In 1992 the Ministry of Culture declared the historic core an urban conservation zone.

Natives of the town include the builder Rudolf Zobel, the Czech Republic’s second woman doctor Růžena Machová, the botanist Josef Podpěra, the politician and diplomat František Chvalkovský and the legal historian Václav Vaněček. The best book on the town’s history is considered to be Leopold Čihák’s “Memories of the Royal Mining Town of Jílové and Its Gold Mines”.

Read also: Studio ALTA: how an abandoned brewery in Libeň became a home for contemporary dance in Prague

Around Prague, based on reporting by turistika.cz