The mountain towers majestically on a single hill above the flat landscape of the Elbe region. Technically it is a hill, but it is a mountain nonetheless. And it is Kunětická. The first castle settlement dates back to the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries. Today, a majestic-looking castle sits atop the eastern Bohemian Říp. However, if you had visited the same place more than a century ago, you would have been offered a completely different view.
The medieval castle was a ruin. The existential threat to it was the long-standing extraction of stone from the hill on which it stands. In the 1920s, the local Museum Association stepped in to save the castle, and thanks to the tireless activity of many rescuers, it eventually saw its first reconstruction, designed by the famous Slovak architect and "poet of wood" Dušan Jurkovič.
During the Second World War and then with the advent of communism, the castle fell into disrepair again. It was not until the 1990s that the iconic building saw better days. The current castellan Miloš Jiroušek and his wife have also played a major role in its revitalisation. He also tells about his beginnings in the overgrown and crumbling castle through a poetic pipe.
Thanks to Poesiomat, the listener will get a glimpse into the thoughts of the "poet of wood" Dušan Jurkovič or listen to Ivan Martin Jirous' poems about the kuňka. At the end, the poetic pipe will then croak like a yellow-bellied marten to passers-by.
Poesiomats at castles were created with the support of the PPF Foundation.