Kratochvíle

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Kratochvíle is a Renaissance castle with a small castle park in Petrův Dvůr, in the South Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It began as a medieval moated fortress in 1569 and was rebuilt into a hunting lodge between 1583 and 1589 by William of Rosenberg. The building was designed to resemble an Italian villa and was named Kratochvíle. The architect was Baldassare Maggi from Arogno, Ticino. The castle complex forms a rectangle with an entrance wing, fortifications, a moat and a drawbridge, built on marshy ground. The Chapel of Our Lady in the southwest corner was added between 1584 and 1589.

In 1601 Peter Vok of Rosenberg had to sell the castle to Emperor Rudolf II due to debts; the emperor gave it to the Eggenberg family, and in 1719 it passed to the Schwarzenberg family. The layout connects a ground-floor vaulted entrance hall to the first-floor Great Hall, with rooms of different sizes; the ground floor held practical rooms, while the upper floor housed the lord and lady’s private rooms and the grand Great Gold Hall, richly decorated with stucco reliefs and murals based on classical mythology by Antonio Melana. Five Samson paintings were discovered during restoration in the adjoining Small Gold Hall.

In the 19th century the castle was turned into apartments for the Schwarzenberg family, and restoration work occurred in 1950. Today Kratochvíle hosts an exhibition of Czech puppet and animated films, with original works by Jiří Trnka, Hermína Týrlová and Karel Zeman.