Architecture

Smiřice Castle was not built in one go. Over six centuries it grew from a Gothic fortified manor into the present castle with four wings around an arcaded courtyard. The building-historical survey by Martin Ebel and Ladislav Svoboda (2003) maps these layers. The plans below show, floor by floor, which period the masonry dates from; the colours in brackets refer to the legend.

Six centuries in stone

Gothic (red), 14th century. By 1392 a fortified manor house (tvrz) stood here, on a rectangular site of about 35 by 41 metres between the branches of the Elbe. The residential hall stood in today’s west wing; the massive gate tower on the south side is now the projecting centre bay with the main entrance. Walls 1.2 to 1.8 metres thick survive in almost every wing. The researchers count this manor among the most important in East Bohemia.

Renaissance (blue), from 1498. The Trčka family turned the manor into a closed four-winged castle: an east wing outside the old wall, a south wing and a masonry second floor were added, and the tower was lowered. Galleries ran around the courtyard, of stone below and of timber above.

Baroque (brown), 17th and 18th centuries. The early Baroque main portal with reliefs of war trophies, the most valuable detail of the building, dates from the time of the Gallas family, as probably does the roof truss. The Chapel of the Three Kings and the connecting wing followed in the early 18th century. Under the Paars the rooms received stucco ceilings; the richest adorns the great hall on the second floor.

Neoclassicism (green), after 1780. When the castle became a military hospital for the construction of Josefov fortress, the present arcades were built in a plain ‘barracks style’. In the early 19th century the building was fitted out for government offices.

19th and 20th centuries (orange and yellow). In the 1860s the Liebieg family created representative rooms with rich ceilings, new doors and a staircase hall, and covered the roof with slate. Offices and schools followed, often adapting the interior with little care.

According to Svoboda himself, the dating in the plans is hypothetical: hatched areas are assigned on the basis of wall thickness, vaults and ceilings.

The castle from outside: from the park, a corner with the dormer windows, and with the tower of the Chapel of the Three Kings on the left (2015).

Inside: a stone coat of arms and a stucco ceiling with chandelier.

A vaulted gallery around the courtyard, and the early Baroque main portal with reliefs of war trophies.

The arcades around the courtyard, built in their present form after 1780, and a vaulted passage.

Plan 1 – Ground floor: construction phases.

Plan 2 – First floor: construction phases.

Plan 3 – Second floor: construction phases.

Plan 4 – Attic and roof structure: construction phases.

Heritage value

The last three plans look at the same floors from a conservation point of view. They show which spaces and features are especially valuable, what is neutral or was added later, and where further investigation is needed. Among the most valuable elements the survey lists the early Baroque main portal with its doors, the façades with their stucco details, the arcades around the courtyard, the vaults, the stucco ceilings and the series of Neoclassical and Neo-Renaissance doors.

Note: the colours in these plans mean something different from those in the construction-phase plans above.

Plan 5 – Ground floor: heritage value.

Plan 6 – First floor: heritage value.

Plan 7 – Second floor: heritage value.

Sources: Martin Ebel and Ladislav Svoboda, Zámek čp. 1 ve Smiřicích – stavebně historický průzkum (building-historical survey, Pardubice, 2003). Plans: L. Svoboda, 2003, based on measurements from 1968; English edition of titles and legends.

See also the history of Smiřice Castle and the restoration of the castle.