Loreto Sanctuary

The Loreto Sanctuary is a Baroque pilgrimage complex in Hradčany, built from 1626 at the initiative of Countess Kateřina Benigna of Lobkowicz and administered to this day by Capuchin monks. Its centrepiece is the Santa Casa — a replica of the Holy House of the Virgin Mary from Nazareth, placed at the centre of a courtyard surrounded by arcaded cloisters and six chapels. The façade and tower were completed by Kilián Ignác Dientzenhofer in 1724. The tower holds a 27-bell carillon cast by Amsterdam bell-maker Claud Fremy in 1683–91, connected to a clock mechanism in 1895; it plays a Marian melody every hour on the hour from 10:00 to 17:00 — audible across the whole of Hradčany. The highlight of the complex is the Loreto Treasury, a collection of liturgical objects from the 16th–18th centuries; its showpiece is the Diamond Monstrance known as the "Prague Sun" — a Baroque goldsmith masterpiece nearly 90 cm tall, decorated with 6,222 diamonds. The Church of the Nativity contains the wax-masked skeletons of two Spanish saints dressed in aristocratic robes, and one chapel displays a painting of the bearded female martyr St. Wilgefortis (Starosta). A quieter and less visited alternative to Prague Castle, typically without queues.