Church of Saint Michael, Medieval church in Meclov, Czech Republic
The Church of Saint Michael in Meclov is a single-nave Gothic building with a low four-sided porch before its west front, a rectangular nave and a narrower presbytery with an original Gothic rib vault. A tall square tower with buttresses stands over the sacristy on the north side. The tower was raised in 1725 and has a low pyramidal roof; the nave has a saddle roof and the presbytery a hipped roof, both covered with bobrovka tiles.
The church core is Gothic, built before 1384, founded by Dobrohost of Ronšperk. In the presbytery the original Gothic rib vault survives. The building was partly remodelled in Baroque style around the middle of the 18th century, and in 1725 the church tower was raised.
The church belongs to the Roman Catholic parish administered from Poběžovice and is dedicated to the Archangel Michael. Meclov lies on old land routes from the Bohemian interior toward Ronšperk, today's Poběžovice, and across the Český les into Bavaria; settlement here reaches back to the early Middle Ages, attested by burial mounds in the surroundings.
The church stands in the centre of Meclov on a slight rise. The nave is entered from the west through a low four-sided porch with a chamfered stone portal; the tower entrance on the east side is reached by an open outdoor staircase. The tower rises above the sacristy on the north side.
The church is a single-nave building, not a three-aisled one. Its presbytery keeps the original Gothic rib vault, while the nave has a flat ceiling with a wooden gallery on two round columns. The tower, raised in 1725, stands above the sacristy on the north side.
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