The Petřvald family (1688-1800)

Candore et vigilantia

The old, powerful Moravian dynasty of Petřvald derived its origin from Petr Meissner from Saxony, probablythe earliest traceable ancestor of the house, who settled in Moravia in the second half of the 14th century.

Thanks to the adroit economic policy and a chain of beneficial marriages, the next generations managed to place the Petřvald family among the richest land-owners. Their fortune and power opened the way for the family members to reach for the positions in high provincial authorities. The most important member of the Petřvald dynasty was probably Jan HanušPetřvald. He was a later „director” of Czech Estate Uprising that unleashed the Thirty Years’ War in 1618. When the Czech protestant estates were tragically defeated by the Catholic Habsburg army in the Battle of White Mountain (1620) all Hanuš’s property was unconditionally confiscated.

The dramatically suspended history of the dynasty went on through conversion of Bernard DivišPetřvald. In 1622 he married Kunhuta of Zástřizl, a well-off heiress to the Buchlov manor. Their son Hanuš-Zikmund, a typical representative of the Moravian baroque aristocracy, was for his merits in provincial government bestowed a title of the Free Lord (Freiherr). Hanuš-Zikmund encouraged the significant reconstruction of the castle Buchlovand had the Chapel of St Barbara built. His son – Jan Dětřich, a lavish aristocrat of the High Baroque, was the founder and the very first owner of the Château Buchlovice