Psychiatric Hospital and Abandoned Cemetery Tour
The fantastic Bochnice Psychiatric Hospital is the ideal starting point for a walk through time. As you learn about the institution's history, you can also learn about how psychiatry started in Europe.
Highlights:
Bohnice Psychiatric Hospital
Abandoned Cemetery
Includes:
a guide
Not included:
hotel pick-up and drop-off
Please note: a minimum of two people is required for this tour. Comfortable walking shoes and a bottle of water are recommended. Please arrive at the meeting point 10 minutes before the tour departure time.
More than any other illness, mental illnesses have been the subject of prejudice and even cruel treatment for centuries. During this tour, you will go to the Bochnice Psychiatric Clinic on the edge of Prague's city center. We will give you a unique and detailed look at the institution's history and the methods used to treat patients suffering from mental disorders, which may seem shocking and incomprehensible today. From mystical rituals in the Middle Ages to more modern treatments such as lobotomies, we will take a historical journey into psychiatry.
We will also reflect on the stigmatization of treatments under the influence of the pharmaceutical industry's financial interests, which sometimes only served to increase the harm done to patients and their loved ones. This beautiful walk through the institution's grounds will allow you to learn more about the sad past of many patients who have been stigmatized because of their mental problems. This eerie promenade will also take you to the asylum's famous abandoned cemetery, where many souls seem to rest, but history tells a different story.
