The royal town of Olomouc was founded along the Morava River in the first third of the 13th century, however the history of its settlement is much older. The former Premyslides castle and the establishment of the Moravian Episcopate were mentioned for the first time in the middle of the 11th century. The St. Vaclavīs Episcopal Cathedral with the surrounding residential area, a former castle and canon houses rank among a number of ecclesiastical sights. The Bishop Palace with specific composite windows is an outstanding Romanesque monument. It was the building of the canon deanery in Olomouc, where the last menīs member of the Premyslides family, King Vaclav III., was murdered in 1306. The west urban area, which includes the Upper and the Lower Squares, is also a significant suburb. The remarkable St. Moricī Parish Church along with a large town hall, which contains a bow-windowed chapel and a modern calendar-clock, date from the Gothic period. Some of the town palaces and merchants' houses, known as "Pod bohatymi kramy", were built in the Renaissance style. The town was nobly re-built into the baroque style after the thirty years' war. Next to the buildings of the Jesuit Order, an Archiepiscopal Palace and the pilgrimage on the hill of Svaty Kopecek nearby Olomouc, also a unique set of six baroque fountains and pestilential columns were preserved here. A large baroque fortress was replaced with an area of landscaping valuable parks and orchards in the 19th century. Today, Olomouc is famous among others, for the traditional exhibitions of floriculture and horticulture known as Flora, and for the local food speciality known as "olomoucke syrecky" ("Olomoucke cakes of cheese").
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