Preliminary Program

25 – 29 May 2026

Social Event – Thursday 15.30 – 17.30

Guided tour of historical roof trusses in Cheb

The discovery that the houses of Cheb in the historic city center hide such a treasure came about by chance. When people started talking about whether it would be possible to build apartments in the high attics of Cheb’s burgher houses, the town hall commissioned a building-historical survey. As the experts walked through the individual houses, a path into the past unexpectedly opened up for them. What Cheb has under its roofs is a real unique piece that has been preserved in very good condition. There is no such set of roof trusses in Prague or even in Krumlov.

The building historian explained the uniqueness of the roof trusses by the interplay of several fortunate aspects. Above all, Cheb was a wealthy city in the past. So while in the 14th century, only one-story houses were built in the rest of the country, in Cheb, three-story houses with high roofs and large attics were already growing around the square. From the very beginning, the roofs were covered with burnt tiles to prevent water from leaking in. Cheb was also lucky that the last major fire raged here in 1270. After that, it never burned so much that most of the houses were reduced to ashes. The trusses are also very massive and sturdy. There has been a hypothesis that perhaps the builders of the time knew that the Cheb region was a seismically active area and so adapted the buildings to it.

No less important was the lack of money for the reconstruction of the houses on the square in the 1970s, when the monument was in danger of being destroyed, and last but not least, the fact that the city never sold these houses and, as their owner, allows tours to the public.

The Cheb trusses are a phenomenon whose significance goes beyond the borders of the republic and perhaps even Central Europe. In a small area here, we can find structures that were created in different time periods. There are so many of them that a historical atlas of trusses will be created here based on their passporting. Cheb also has the oldest truss in the Czech Republic, a dendrochronologically dated 1319 structure above the choir of the Franciscan church.

The tour lasts approximately an hour and a half. The tour has a limitation: Children from six years of age can participate, but must always be accompanied by a parent.
The tour is not wheelchair accessible.
The tour is more physically demanding.

Note