Германов Мěстец: Тарихы мен мәдениеті

Heřmanův Městec (; Hermannstädtel) is a town in Chrudim District in the Pardubice Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 4,900 inhabitants. The historic town centre with the castle complex is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument zone.

Villages of Chotěnice, Konopáč and Radlín are administrative parts of Heřmanův Městec.

Heřmanův Městec is located about west of Chrudim and southwest of Pardubice. It lies mostly in the Svitavy Uplands. The southern part of the municipal territory extends into the Iron Mountains. The highest point is at above sea level.

The first written mention of Heřmanův Městec is from 1325. It was founded around 1280 on a trade route from Prague to Moravia. Due to its location and later due to large Jewish community, the town became the economic centre of the region. Heřmanův Městec was burned down during the Hussite Wars. It was also repeatedly conquered and looted during the Thirty Years' War. The town greatly developed during the rule of counts of Sporck, who acquired it in 1695. The Sporck had built stone houses to prevent the effects of fires, extended the local castle, and reconstructed the church destroyed by fire in 1740. In 1828, Heřmanův Městec was bought by the Kinsky family. The Kinsky family continued to improve the town and had built the hospital or the orphanage, and had extended the castle and the castle park to its current form. and it represents one of the oldest documented Jewish communities in the Chrudim District. A minyan (10 adult Jewish males) was recorded as early as 1570. The location of the town along the road connecting Prague with Moravia brought a great number of merchants into the area. According to oral tradition, the Jewish cemetery in town dates back to the 1430. Usually, when Jews move into an area, one of their first community actions is to purchase land for a cemetery. There is documentation from 1667 that additional land was purchased for the purpose of enlarging the Jewish cemetery. He allowed the Jews to rebuild their synagogue. In 1680, the town was visited by a plague that claimed many lives, leaving a large number of dilapidated houses behind. In 1686, Count Ferdinand Leopold Sporck called upon the Jews from the region to inhabit the abandoned houses. At the turn of the 17th century, the town became the seat of the regional rabbi. In 1870 construction of new synagogue, with the backing of the aristocratic landowner, on the same site as the 1760 building was started. This building was in the Neo Romanesque style by the architect František Schmoranz. The architect had some lofty plans which had to be abandoned because the Catholic clergy feared that the synagogue might outshine the nearby Church of St. Bartholomew. The original design had a tower with a stairway leading to the women's gallery. After design changes, the synagogue provided access to the women's gallery via a covered passageway from the school building next door. A stone hewn image of the Ten Commandants adorned the top of the building. Due to the reduction in size, the building was not really sufficient to support the large crowds which attended worship services especially on holidays. As the Jewish population declined toward the latter part of the 19th century, the building became sufficient.

In 1986, the Town of Heřmanův Městec purchased the synagogue. In the early 1990s, the cemetery, mortuary and caretaker's home were restored. In 1991, the synagogue and the cemetery were declared national cultural monuments. Using plans from 1870, the synagogue building and adjacent rabbi's house were restored in 2001. The synagogue was furnished with replicas of the original benches, and the painting and stained glass windows were restored. The only major architectural change is the size of the bimah (area where the Torah is read). It was enlarged to better serve as a stage in support of its new role as a concert hall. The rabbi's house is now the home of the Cyrany art gallery.

The Church of Saint Bartholomew is a main landmark of the town and whole region. It was built in the late Baroque style in 1756–1761. It has a high tower.

The castle was also built in the late Baroque style. It was created in the 1784 by extensive reconstruction of a fortress. Since 1952, the premises of the castle houses a retirement home. In 1784, the adjacent castle park was established from the former game reserve. It is a large English landscape garden with Zámecký Pond in the middle. The area of the park is protected as a nature monument.