Muzeum Policie ČR
Museum · Praha · Czechia
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The unmistakable octagonal dome and tower rising above Ke Karlovu belong to one of Prague's most unusual churches, and the courtyard behind it hides a Mi-2 helicopter and vintage police vehicles parked out in the open. Emperor Charles IV founded the church and Augustinian monastery here in 1351, giving the nave an eight-sided plan that deliberately echoes Charlemagne's palace chapel in Aachen, a design with no parallel in Gothic Bohemia, and Archbishop Jan Očko consecrated it in 1377 with Charles IV himself present. The Hussite wars left the complex damaged and abandoned, and in 1785 Emperor Joseph II dissolved the monastery and converted it into a hospital. The Ministry of Interior took over the site in 1960, and since 1990 it has run as the Czech Police Museum, tracing law enforcement and criminalistics from 1850 to the present through the old cloister buildings.
Before it became a police museum, the building had already done time as a warehouse, a hospital for infectious diseases, an almshouse, and, during the First World War, a centre for convalescing soldiers. The monastery church itself was originally dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St Charles the Great, before Emperor Joseph II dissolved the monastery and turned the whole complex over to the state. When the Ministry of the Interior acquired the site in the 1960s, it first set it up as a state regional archive, only converting it into a museum later. Today's exhibits trace the specialized departments of the state security corps, including criminal investigation, from 1918 to the present, across the former Czechoslovakia as well as the Czech Republic.
Practical
- Hours
- Tu-Su 10:00-17:00
Hours per OpenStreetMap, may be outdated.
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Common questions
- Why stop at Muzeum Policie ČR on a bike ride?
- The unmistakable octagonal dome and tower rising above Ke Karlovu belong to one of Prague's most unusual churches, and the courtyard behind it hides a Mi-2 helicopter and vintage police vehicles parked out in the open. Emperor Charles IV founded the church and Augustinian monastery here in 1351, giving the nave an eight-sided plan that deliberately echoes Charlemagne's palace chapel in Aachen, a design with no parallel in Gothic Bohemia, and Archbishop Jan Očko consecrated it in 1377 with Charles IV himself present. The Hussite wars left the complex damaged and abandoned, and in 1785 Emperor Joseph II dissolved the monastery and converted it into a hospital. The Ministry of Interior took over the site in 1960, and since 1990 it has run as the Czech Police Museum, tracing law enforcement and criminalistics from 1850 to the present through the old cloister buildings.
- Where is Muzeum Policie ČR?
- Muzeum Policie ČR is in Praha, Czechia (Czech Republic).