No Bones About it - This is One Creepy Chandelier
There are famous chandeliers and there are infamous chandeliers and there is everything in between.
Chandeliers were once made simply to create better light.
The term chandelier comes from the French word for candle; chandelle.
They have be made from wood, tin, elk horns, and nearly every material imaginable.
Wood presented a problem because of woods relationship to fire.
Iron chandeliers became very popular because they were durable.
An iron chandelier could be shaped and hung with crystal.
Other materials were used to hang lights, and soon chandeliers became an ornamental object.
Of all the stunning and creative chandeliers ever made, none comes close to the horrific drama of a chandelier hanging in a Gothic church in the Czech Republic.
Sedlec Ossuary sits in Sedlec, a suburb of the town of Kunta Hora.
It is part of a Roman Catholic church with an ancient and interesting history.
It is part of the Church of All Saints, and the ossuary sits beneath it.
An ossuary is a place that bones of those buried can be gathered.
Burial space is premium property and like a house can see a variety of residence over the years.
The former residents, unable to move on by themselves are collected and interned together with many other skeletal remains.
This can be a chest, a room, a cave, or a building.
The bones and skulls are often arranged respectfully and even artistically.
Seldom are the arranged in such a dramatic way as they are in the Sedlec Ossuary.
To put things in perspective it is important to emphasize the overwhelming demand for burial space and the limited plot.
In addition, over the years, expansion of the living has reduced the amount of space available.
Back in the 13th century, when it was a little monastery, an abbot went to the holy land and brought back earth from Golgotha.
He sprinkled the earth about the cemetery making it a desirable place to be buried.
Word got out across Europe and soon the dead came knocking.
With the Black Death and Hussite wars the graveyard or church garden was more then full.
When a chapel was built an ossuary was included to house the remains dug up to accommodate the building.
Today, it is estimated that the Sedlec Ossuary houses between 40,000 and 70,000 skeletal remains.
In the 18th century, a carpenter was hired by the Schwarzenberg family, made up of nobles and counts, to bring order to the Sedlec Ossuary.
Frantisek Rintz was the woodcarver that was tasked with organizing the bones.
He organized the skeletons with great enthusiasm.
He constructed a Schwarzenberg coat of arms out of bones, but this was tame compared to the other projects.
Rintz created a giant chandelier made up of bones and skulls.
It contains every bone in the human body and has skulls sitting on top of clavicles to catch the dripping wax.
Femurs hang like crystals, and skulls are placed through out.
Above it garlands of skulls and bones hang from the vaulted ceiling.
Chandeliers have a long and vaunted history.
They have often been designed to create awe and wonder.
The Sedlec Ossuary chandelier is at once awesome and horrific.
Chandeliers were once made simply to create better light.
The term chandelier comes from the French word for candle; chandelle.
They have be made from wood, tin, elk horns, and nearly every material imaginable.
Wood presented a problem because of woods relationship to fire.
Iron chandeliers became very popular because they were durable.
An iron chandelier could be shaped and hung with crystal.
Other materials were used to hang lights, and soon chandeliers became an ornamental object.
Of all the stunning and creative chandeliers ever made, none comes close to the horrific drama of a chandelier hanging in a Gothic church in the Czech Republic.
Sedlec Ossuary sits in Sedlec, a suburb of the town of Kunta Hora.
It is part of a Roman Catholic church with an ancient and interesting history.
It is part of the Church of All Saints, and the ossuary sits beneath it.
An ossuary is a place that bones of those buried can be gathered.
Burial space is premium property and like a house can see a variety of residence over the years.
The former residents, unable to move on by themselves are collected and interned together with many other skeletal remains.
This can be a chest, a room, a cave, or a building.
The bones and skulls are often arranged respectfully and even artistically.
Seldom are the arranged in such a dramatic way as they are in the Sedlec Ossuary.
To put things in perspective it is important to emphasize the overwhelming demand for burial space and the limited plot.
In addition, over the years, expansion of the living has reduced the amount of space available.
Back in the 13th century, when it was a little monastery, an abbot went to the holy land and brought back earth from Golgotha.
He sprinkled the earth about the cemetery making it a desirable place to be buried.
Word got out across Europe and soon the dead came knocking.
With the Black Death and Hussite wars the graveyard or church garden was more then full.
When a chapel was built an ossuary was included to house the remains dug up to accommodate the building.
Today, it is estimated that the Sedlec Ossuary houses between 40,000 and 70,000 skeletal remains.
In the 18th century, a carpenter was hired by the Schwarzenberg family, made up of nobles and counts, to bring order to the Sedlec Ossuary.
Frantisek Rintz was the woodcarver that was tasked with organizing the bones.
He organized the skeletons with great enthusiasm.
He constructed a Schwarzenberg coat of arms out of bones, but this was tame compared to the other projects.
Rintz created a giant chandelier made up of bones and skulls.
It contains every bone in the human body and has skulls sitting on top of clavicles to catch the dripping wax.
Femurs hang like crystals, and skulls are placed through out.
Above it garlands of skulls and bones hang from the vaulted ceiling.
Chandeliers have a long and vaunted history.
They have often been designed to create awe and wonder.
The Sedlec Ossuary chandelier is at once awesome and horrific.
Source...