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To the Birthplace of Jan Žižka of Trocnov

To the Birthplace of Jan Žižka of Trocnov
  • Cycling Cycling

The trip through the history of the Hussites will lead you to Doudlebsko, one of the most remarkable ethnographic areas in South Bohemia. The area around the Malše and lower Stropnice rivers, shrouded in many myths and mysteries, is named after the ancient Slavic tribe of Dudlebs, who settled in the area more than a thousand years ago and built a hillfort on a promontory above the Malše, which was the cultural and administrative center of the area. However, the region was the cradle of one of the most important and most inconsistently interpreted sons of the Czech people, the famous military leader Jan Žižka of Trocnov.

The cycling trip around Doudlebsko starts by viewing Žižkovo Square with a statue of Jan Žižka and its broad surrounding area in the town of Borovany, which you can reach on a ČD train. After that, follow cycle trail no. 1123 via Ostrolovský Újezd and Rankov to Trhové Sviny. Before Trhové Sviny, stop by to look at Buškův hamr, past Trhové Sviny, the Baroque Church of the Holy Trinity. About a kilometer later, leave cycle trail no. 1123 in Čižkrajice and follow the designated cycle trail named “Pamětí Slepičích hor”, which will lead you via Slavče and Dobrkovská Lhotka to the tiny town of Besednice. From there, follow cycle trail no. 1128 to Ločenice, and a one-kilometer climb will reward you with a splendid vista of the wide Doudleby countryside from the church in Svatý Jan nad Malší. From there, follow cycle trail no. 1018 to Dolní Stropnice, where you will abandon it and enter the footbridge over the Stropnice with a degree of caution, and take the pleasant pebble road to the village of Doudleby, where you join cycle trail no. 1018 again. Enter Doudleby by crossing the Malše over a weir, and leave it along the Max Biaggi footpath. You will be crossing the Malše again a few kilometers later, by traversing the covered bridge, a technical heritage site from the golden age of the rafting industry. The next village is Plav, where you abandon trail no. 1018 and follow no. 1121 via Heřmaň, Borovnice, Střížov and Strážkovice to Trocnov, where you take a right turn before the railway bridge, along cycle trail no. 1122, to reach the destination and finish the trip to the birthplace and memorial of Jan Žižka of Trocnov, which includes a nature trail and a permanent exhibit on the Hussites in South Bohemia. The last stretch to cycle is along CT1122 and CT1123 to the Borovany train station.

Tourist attractions: 

Borovany: 

Ostrolovský Újezd:

  • Renaissance fort with granary
  • Jan Žižka’s wife came from the nearby village of Čeřejov; her family’s farmstead in Čeřejov served as the dowry. This fact is commemorated by a small memorial installed in 1938 with the inscription: “This is the site of the farmstead of Jan Žižka, Squire of Trocnov”.

Trhové Sviny:

  • Gothic Church of the Assumption of Our Lady
  • Baroque column with the statue of St. John of Nepomuk, built in 1722
  • Hexagonal stone fountain at the center of the square from 1868
  • Buškův hamr
  • Church of the Holy Trinity
  • Utility vehicle museum - trucks, buses, fire trucks
  • Family homes of Karel Valdauf (today a museum) and Emil Hácha

Boršíkov

  • Chapel with belfry and wayside shrine

Čižkrajice

  • Ruins of Čižkrajice Fort
  • Statue of St. John of Nepomuk
  • Column of crucifixion in nearby Chvalkov

Besednice

  • Church of St. Procopius and rectory
  • Baroque alcove Chapel of St. John of Nepomuk
  • Wayside shrine from the 16th century
  • Mohylník - nearby archaeological find site

Svatý Jan nad Malší

  • Ruins of fortifications of former Velešín Castle - view of Římov Reservoir
  • Pilgrimage Church of St. John of Nepomuk, a single-nave Baroque structure with a triangular chancel, a square tower in the west frontage, and a vestry along the church axis at the eastern end
  • Village square with a statue of St. John of Nepomuk in the middle, and a memorial to those fallen in WW I and II
  • Parish house art gallery - exhibition of paintings and Moldavites

Římov

  • The first mention of Římov dates to 1395
  • Church of the Holy Spirit with cloisters built in 1672-1697
  • “Passion Trail” with 25 unique stations of the cross
  • Římov drinking water reservoir built in 1971 - 1978
  • Roubenka Museum with permanent exhibit of “Římov engines, or from the horse-drawn to modern railway”
  • 2008 Tree of the Year - J. Gurre’s linden

Doudleby

  • The first mention of Doudleby in Cosmas’s Chronicle refers to the year 981
  • Church of St. Vincent
  • Chapel of St. Barbara built in 1680

Plav

  • Old burial mounds in nearby forest
  • Rustic homesteads with granaries
  • Technical monument: covered bridge with a timber raft barrier
  • Metal statue of St. John of Nepomuk, view from Kobylnice nad Malší

Heřmaň

  • Patriot’s monument: a memorial mound in honor of Czechoslovak independence and fellow citizens fallen in WW I
  • South Bohemian vernacular architecture, wayside cross

Borovnice

  • Pseudo-Gothic Chapel of the Virgin Mary, built in 1898
  • Alcove chapel by house no. 19
  • Alcove chapel northeast of the village
  • Rustic homesteads from the end of the 19th century

Střížov
The village center contains the Church of St. Martin, where Jan Žižka is said to have been baptized, and the Strychů house, which legend says belonged to a family that was friends with Žižka’s parents.

Lomec

  • Baroque Chapel of St. John of Nepomuk in the village square
  • Gables of some homesteads in the Rustic Baroque style
  • Baroque alcove chapel
  • Town cattle scales - cultural heritage site

Strážkovice

  • Historic municipal smithy
  • Smithy trail
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