NY-Prague/Budapest-DC

The Old Town Hall was established in 1338 with a beautiful Gothic tower with a bay chapel and a unique astronomical clock, the Orloj. An icon of the Czech Republic, a national cultural heritage asset, a symbol of Prague's history and the oldest institution of Czech self-government. Although the clock performs every hour between 8 am and 11 pm, as the twelve apostles appear, and the astrology calendar appears below, the real show is the various clocks within the clock and viewing the various ways the clock tells time.

Here is a somewhat "easy" explanation of these clocks created from this 1410 mechanism. There are three sets of numbers on the dial: Gothic numerals show Old Czech time in the outer black circle, Roman numerals show the current time and Arabic numerals show you Babylonian time in blue.

Colors: Blue is the daylight when the sun is above horizon, Black field is the astronomical night Orange field represents the actual local horizon and dusk/dawn. The center of the whole clock (where all the hands cross) is the Earth and position of Prague on the Northern Hemisphere.

One of the black poles carries a symbol of a golden hand (on the same pole is also a symbol of a sun). The symbol of the sun is moving up and down during the day – according to the real position of the sun in the sky above you: when it’s in the blue field, it’s a daytime, when the sun is in the red field it´s either dawn or dusk, when in the black field it means it´s night. It also shows you what zodiac sign we are in and also a date. The black metal ball is rotating according to the current moon phase.

Inside the colorful dial you can also see another circle – golden one with black background – depicting all 12 zodiac signs. Around each sign you can also see such tiny golden beams, fields (each symbolizes 5 days).
The Roman numerals and the golden hand will show you the current time.

Old Czech time is the type of time used in the Czech lands when the Astronomical Clock was constructed (around 1410). The old Czech time shows you how much daylight is left until the sunset (since sunlight time was always critical to working). It had 24 hours but didn´t start with the midnight, it always started with the sunset. Babylonian time is one of the oldest times in the world and this clock is the only one in the world that can measure it. It´s calculated from the sunrise until the sunset (1 – 12 hours). How to read it? Search for the symbol of the sun and then look at the black Arabic number above it.

The symbol of the sun is on the same pole as the pointing fingers. The sun is going up and down as the sun in the sky. It also sits in the current zodiac sign. For more info, go to Orloj.euEn savoir plus