Nerudova Street

The climb to the castle, lined with house signs from before street numbers

Area Malá Strana
Type Neighbourhood
Time needed 30m

Nerudova Street — Photograph: Wolfgang Sauber / CC BY-SA 3.0

Nerudova is a steep cobbled street climbing from Malostranské náměstí to the castle ramparts, and it is a street rather than an attraction — there is no entrance and nothing to book. Its interest is the house signs: carved and painted emblems fixed above the doors to identify buildings before Prague was given street numbers in 1770. It is named after the writer Jan Neruda, who lived here in the nineteenth century, and it takes about ten minutes to walk up at a slow pace.

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Getting there

Trams 12, 15, 20 and 22 stop at Malostranské náměstí, which is the bottom of the street; from Staroměstské náměstí that is roughly fifteen minutes including the walk across Karlův most or a short tram ride from Národní divadlo. Metro line A (green) to Malostranská leaves a five-minute walk south through Valdštejnská and Tomášská to the same square. From the bottom the climb to the top is continuous and gets steeper near the end, where the street bends left into the castle approach; the surface is large rounded cobbles that are genuinely slippery in rain.

What you see

Walk up on the right and read the doorways as you go. The Three Fiddles is one of the better-known signs, a stone relief above a house once occupied by violin makers; others include a red eagle, a golden horseshoe, a white swan, a golden key and a green lobster, each a small sculpted or painted plaque set into the facade well above head height. At No. 47 the sign of the Two Suns marks the building where Jan Neruda lived. Several houses carry baroque portals with heavy stone surrounds, and two embassies occupy palaces on the street, which is why you will see police standing about. Near the top, look back downhill: the view over the red roofs of Malá Strana and across to the Old Town is the one most people remember, and it is better from here than from inside the castle.

What to pair it with

The street runs between Malostranské náměstí and Prague Castle, so it pairs naturally with both. St Nicholas Church at the foot of the hill and Petřín, reached by a short walk south, are the other easy additions.

When to go

Early morning before about nine, or after six in the evening, when the tour groups walking up to the castle have thinned. Midday between ten and four is a slow-moving file of people in both directions and you will struggle to stop and look up. Autumn and winter light picks out the carved signs better than flat summer sun; in winter be careful of ice on the cobbles.

What is hard about it

It is a hard climb — a sustained gradient on uneven cobbles, with no handrail and nowhere flat to rest, and it is unsuitable for wheelchairs and hard going with a pushchair. The signs themselves are small, high up and unlabelled, so without looking them up in advance most visitors walk past the lot of them and remember only the hill. The ground-floor shops are mostly aimed at passing tourists and the cafes on the street charge accordingly.

Common questions

How long do you need on Nerudova?

Twenty to thirty minutes if you are reading the house signs and stopping for the view back down. Ten if you are simply walking up to the castle.

Is there anything to pay or book?

No. It is a public street, open at all hours and free to walk.

Is it easier to walk up or down?

Down is easier on the legs but harder on the knees and worse on wet cobbles. Most people come up from Malá Strana and leave the castle by the Old Castle Steps instead.