Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral
church in Prague
The Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral (Czech: Pravoslavný chrám svatého Cyrila a Metoděje) in Nové Město, Prague, the Czech Republic, is the principal Czech and Slovak Orthodox Church.
History
Early history
According to oral tradition, the site where Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral stands was the site of a small church built by Bořivoj I, Duke of Bohemia, and dedicated by Saint Methodius himself. This link is based historically upon early and continuing reference to the name "Na Zderaze" for the existing church building. In 1091, the Czech lord Zderad was killed during the siege of Brno, and was buried in the earlier church which was near Prague. Zderad's name was then immortalized in the name of the street "Na Zderaze" which is adjacent to the cathedral, thus establishing a connection to this site that was hallowed by St. Methodius.
From 1115, the church of Saints Peter and Paul stood on the site of the present church, around which the Knights of the Cross built the Zderazsky monastery. During the Hussite Wars, the church was largely destroyed, leaving only a part of the choir standing. In 1705, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Prague, Breuner, established a retirement home for priests on the site of the monastery next to which a church was later built.
The present church was built as the Karel Boromejsky Church between 1730 and 1736 to plans by Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer.
“Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral” enters the record as church in Prague. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Saints, Cyril and Methodius can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Saints, Cyril and Methodius provides the most credible route into that argument.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q956163. VIAF identifies the subject as 151749518. Authority coordinates are 50.076, 14.417. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1091, 1115, 1705 and 1730.
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This entry incorporates text from “Saints Cyril and Methodius Cathedral” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.