Velehrad Monastery

Velehrad was founded in 1205 as the first Cistercian house in Moravia, and its basilica - Romanesque and early Gothic in origin, rebuilt in baroque after a fire in the 1680s - became the focus of the Cyril and Methodius tradition: the brothers who brought the Slavonic liturgy to Great Moravia in the ninth century are venerated here, though the location of their actual centre is not settled and Velehrad's claim is devotional rather than archaeological. The undercroft, the Lapidarium, preserves the excavated Romanesque foundations and carved fragments. On 7 July 1985, at the eleven-hundredth anniversary of Methodius's death, a crowd of well over a hundred thousand gathered and shouted down the Communist official who addressed them, an event widely read afterwards as an early crack in the regime. John Paul II came in 1990. The village lives on the pilgrimage.

What you actually see

• A baroque basilica - rebuilt after the 1680s fire over Romanesque foundations.
• The Lapidarium undercroft - excavated early fabric and carved fragments.
• The Cyril and Methodius tradition - the devotional centre of it in Moravia.
• The 1985 gathering - remembered as an early sign of the regime's weakness.

When to go

April to October; early July for the pilgrimage. Half a day.

Honest expectations

Services and pilgrimages close the basilica to sightseeing; the July feast fills the village entirely. The undercroft is a separate ticket with limited hours. Velehrad's claim to be the Great Moravian centre is devotional, not proven.

Nearby

Buchlovice and Buchlov are north-west; Uherske Hradiste is east.