Sloup v Čechách

A 35 m sandstone block turned rock castle by the Ronovci in the 13th century, burned by the Swedes in 1639 and reborn as a grand hermitage — carved rooms and stairways through the whole rock.

The Sloup rock is a one-object history of what people do with sandstone: a free-standing block 35 m high and 100 m long, first carved into a rock castle by the Ronovci in the 13th century, besieged and burned by Swedish troops in 1639, and from 1690 rebuilt by its lord as a pilgrimage site with an unusually grand hermitage — chapels, cells and stairways cut into and onto the stone. The hermits left at the end of the 18th century and the tourists arrived almost immediately; it has been showing visitors its carved interiors since 1827.

The village below keeps pubs and a chateau, and the wooded sandstone country of the Svojkov rocks continues south — worth stringing together rather than visiting the rock alone.