The Rotunda of St. Catherine (), known as the Znojmo Rotunda (''Znojemská rotunda''), is a Romanesque rotunda located in

Znojmo Znojmo (; ) is a town in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 34,000 inhabitants. Znojmo is the historical and cultural centre of southwestern Moravia and the second most populated town in the South Moravian Region. The hi ...

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

. It is the town's most valuable monument, and features one of the oldest

fresco Fresco ( or frescoes) is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the painting become ...

compositions in the

Czech lands The Czech lands or the Bohemian lands (, ) is a historical-geographical term which denotes the three historical regions of Bohemia, Moravia, and Czech Silesia out of which Czechoslovakia, and later the Czech Republic and Slovakia, were formed. ...

. Besides the religious motives, of particular importance is the praising portrayal of the ruling

Přemyslid dynasty The Přemyslid dynasty or House of Přemysl (, , ) was a Bohemian royal dynasty that reigned in the Duchy of Bohemia and later Kingdom of Bohemia and Margraviate of Moravia (9th century–1306), as well as in parts of Poland (including Silesia ...

. The building was originally a castle chapel, dedicated to Virgin Mary, built in the mid-11th century. The painting was commissioned by Konrad II of Znojmo on the occasion of his wedding with Mary (''Marija''), daughter of Uroš I of Serbia in 1134. Apart from the donor couple, Konrad and Mary, the identity of the other depicted members of the dynasty is disputed among the historians. With two exceptions being the Přemysl the Ploughman, the legendary ancestor of the dynasty, and Vratislaus I, the first

King of Bohemia The Duchy of Bohemia was established in 870 and raised to the Kingdom of Bohemia in Golden Bull of Sicily, 1198. Several Bohemian monarchs ruled as non-hereditary kings and first gained the title in 1085. From 1004 to 1806, Bohemia was part of th ...

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External links

The Ducal Rotunda of the Virgin Mary and St Catherine

{{Authority control Churches in Znojmo Round churches National cultural monuments of the Czech Republic 11th-century Roman Catholic church buildings