Kampa and Devil's Stream

Kampa grew out of a strip of shoreline that water cut off from Lesser Town. As early as the twelfth century, the Hospitallers laid a mill stream along the Vltava; after the Old Town Weir was built, water entered it above the weir, powered the machinery of three mills, and returned to the river below. The course of Devil's Stream by Grand Priory Mill preserves the boundary of the island created for working with water. Until the eighteenth century, this patch of land was simply called the Island, and the origin of the word “Kampa” remains disputed.

In fifteen ninety-five, the indebted widow Anna Lorencová decided to sell Štěpánov Mill, which stood here, to her creditor—the municipal community of Lesser Town. Lesser Town was then a separate town at the foot of Prague Castle. For Anna, the mill was property with which she could settle her debt. For the community, it was a working water-powered enterprise. The superior of the local Hospitallers, later known as the Order of Malta, tried to stop the transaction. He wanted to keep the mill under the Order's special jurisdiction.

A stream created the value of this property. As early as the twelfth century, the Hospitallers laid out a mill channel along the bank; whether it was entirely dug by people or partly followed a natural channel is not known for certain. Later, Prague residents dammed the Vltava with the Old Town Weir. Above it, the water rose by almost a meter, entered the channel, turned the wheels of three mills, and returned to the river below the weir. This separated a strip of shoreline from Lesser Town and turned it into an island. Until the eighteenth century, it was simply called the Island; the origin of its present name, Kampa, remains disputed.

Anna Lorencová appealed directly to Emperor Rudolf II. Exactly one year later, the sale was permitted. The municipal community acquired the mill, but the plot retained its obligations to Maltese jurisdiction. The owner and the judge of a single property were different.

After the Battle of White Mountain, where the emperor suppressed the uprising of the Czech Estates, the mill was transferred to the Order by special imperial favor. The people of Lesser Town did not give in. In sixteen twenty-nine, armed townspeople seized the building by force, defending their community's purchase. The seizure settled nothing: the legal dispute continued for another eighty-two years. Only in seventeen eleven did the Hospitallers finally obtain the mill.

The Renaissance core of the present Grand Priory Mill was built between fifteen ninety-seven and sixteen hundred, immediately after the municipal community's purchase. The large wooden wheel by the wall is much younger: it was installed in nineteen ninety-two in place of its lost predecessors. It no longer grinds flour, but it stands exactly where the current turned water into income, and because of which Anna Lorencová had to appeal to the emperor.

The name Devil's Stream appeared around eighteen ninety-two. Before that, the channel was called Strouha, meaning a stream, and then the Rosenberg Race, after the owner of the neighboring lands. A city legend links the new name to Aloisie Němcová, a resident of a house on Maltese Square. She supposedly scolded local young men and tried to drive them away. In response, they drew six devils on the house and declared Aloisie herself the seventh. The house was nicknamed “At the Seven Devils,” and the woman “the Devil Woman”; because she went to the stream to wash clothes, the nickname passed to the water. This is a legend: only the later appearance of the name is reliably known. The house survives as Straka Palace, and nothing remains of the drawing, if it existed.