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Lednice (IPA: [ˈlɛdɲɪtsɛ], German name: Eisgrub) is a village in the Czech Republic. In 1996 it was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List (together with the twin manor of Valtice/Feldsberg) as "an exceptional example of the designed landscape that evolved in the Enlightenment and afterwards under the care of a single family." It contains a palace and the largest park in the country, which covers 200 km².
Since Lednice/Eisgrub first passed into the hands of the House of Liechtenstein in the mid-13th century, its fortunes had been tied inseparably to those of that noble family. The palace of Eisgrub/Lednice began its life as a Renaissance villa; in the 17th century it became a summer residence of the ruling Princes of Liechtenstein. The estate house — designed and furbished by baroque architects Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, Domenico Martinelli, and Anton Johan Ospel — proclaimed rural luxury on the grandest scale. In 1846-58 it was extensively rebuilt in a Neo-Gothic style under the supervision of Georg Wingelmüller.
The surrounding park is laid out in an English garden style and contains a range of Romantic follies by Joseph Hardtmuth, including the artificial ruins of a medieval castle on the bank of the Thaya/Dyje River (1801) and a solitary sixty-metre minaret, reputedly the tallest outside the Muslim world at the time of its construction (1797-1804).
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Czech Republic
