Emmaus Monastery

This guide to Emmaus Monastery in Prague opens on a night in February 1945, when stray Allied bombs meant for Dresden fell on the centuries-old church instead. From there it reaches back to the monastery's founding in 1347 by Emperor Charles the Fourth, who brought Benedictine monks from Croatia to pray in Old Church Slavonic rather than Latin, and to the gospel reading at its consecration that gave the place its name. A small black Madonna statue watched over it all through the smoke.