New Town's most famous landmark is Wenceslas Square, which was originally built as a horsemarket and now functions as a center of commerce and tourism.

No doubt in connection with his coronation as king under the Holy Roman Empire in 1346, Charles IV decided to found a new city in Prague.

In addition, the housing problem within the city walls of Prague that had already been apparent under Charles IV's father John of Luxembourg was crying out for a solution.

Many people, mostly poorer Czechs, had settled in suburbs situated at the base of the city walls, and the banks of the Vltava were almost continuously built over.

It was about 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) long from North to South, and 0.8 to 1.2 km (½ to ¾ mile) wide from east to west.

To the West of the Old Town, on the Vltava, the settlement of Poříčí ("Riverside") was already densely built, containing two churches, St. Clement's and St. Peter's, as well as the bishop's court.

An east-facing terrace of land was clearly separated by a pronounced gully, 6 to 8 meters deep, from the plain on the bank of the river.

Here likewise already existed some smaller settlements such as Na Rybníčku or Rybníček ("By the Pond") with a Romanesque rotunda, which was probably originally dedicated to St Stephen.

The importance which was attached to the fortification is, inter alia, evident in the fact that it took only two years to complete, although it was relatively low in comparison with the walls of older Bohemian cities.

After a slight turn to the east between the city gate at Ječná (Barley) Lane and the horse market (now Wenceslas Square), the wall then ran along the St Vitus' Hill brook, whose deeply cut valley maintained a constant distance from the Old Town until it reached the Vltava where the wall turned again, this time to the west.

Stronger towers were situated at the corners of the wall in the south-east and in the north-east at the St Vitus' Hill brook, as well as at the north end by the Vltava.

The planning of the New Town was probably the responsibility of the French master cathedral builder Matthias of Arras, who had been brought to Prague from Avignon by Charles IV in 1342/44.

Charles IV expressly forbid property speculation and granted to all, who wanted to settle, twelve years exemption from taxes.

For example, fishermen, carpenters, raftsmen, tanners, dyers, brickmakers and limeburners were to be found along the Vltava, and around the horse market were located farriers, wagonmakers, coppersmiths and cabinetmakers.

These large economic and national differences resulted in a clear separation of the two cities and were finally also decisive for the disturbances during the Hussite Revolution at the end of the reign of Wenceslas IV.

As early as 1379, it was paved ("strata lapidae") as the first road of the New Town, and thus received its older name Pavement Lane (Czech: Dlážděná ulice).

An old road to Vyšehrad and beyond to southern Bohemia would become the longest traffic route in Prague and the backbone of the upper New Town - today's Spálená, Vyšehradská and Na Slupi streets.

With an area of approximately 550 by 150 meters, this was for a long time the largest square in Europe and in became the administrative and economic center of the New Town.

It served mainly the trade in cattle, fish, wood and coal and its central status was only in recent times ceded to Wencenslas Square.

In the center of the cattle market, in the extension of the Barley Lane, Charles IV had a wooden tower built, where since 1354 the crown jewels and reliquaries were put on display once a year.

From the octagonal central church with attached chapels rose a stone tower, from whose gallery were shown the reliquaries and crown jewels were displayed.

The remaining sides of the cattle market were filled quite briskly after the plan of the square, whereby members of the aristocracy and the royal houses established themselves here.

Similarly, other emperors have sought to create a "Roma Nova"; for example, Charlemagne with Aachen, Otto I with Magdeburg and Heinrich II with Bamberg.

In 1378 a census commissioned by Charles IV found that Prague had 40,000 inhabitants, making it the fourth largest city north of the Alps after Paris, Ghent and Bruges.

Charles IV "... conceived here the largest urban planning project of the Middle Ages, and at the time, its equal could not be found in Europe.

In the mid fourteenth century in Europe there was no other city, in which an enclosed building project was organized and executed on such a scale, over two square kilometers.

In direct proximity to the old parish church of the riverside community Podskalí, St. Cosmas and Damian, in the territory of the Vyšehrad cathedral he settled with the agreement of the Pope Clemens VI on 22 November 1347, an order of Benedictine monks who adhered to the old Slavic liturgy.

The slopes and plateaux east of Na slupi street and south of the Augustinian convent were merely vineyards and extended green spaces.

Václava na Zderaze), King Wenceslas IV had built, starting in 1380, on a promontory overlooking the river, a small Gothic castle, probably with two storeys and vaulted chambers, which also had a five-storey tower and at least two crenellated walls.

The almshouse of St Lazarus Church – both broken up at the turn of the century without previous examination – there was also an old Jewish cemetery, the Jews' Garden (Židovská zahrada).