another clock from Prague

This clock is in the old town square in Prague. As with many of the sights of Prague, this clock both fascinates and disgusts me. It was built in the early 1400's. There are four figures shown on the clock represents four attributes to despise and fear: Vanity, (a man looking at himself in a mirror), Greed ( a Jew holding a moneybag ), Death (the skeleton ), and an Infidel (figure wearing a turban). The beginning of the Jewish Quarter is just steps away from this clock.

You can just see the feet of the two figures for Vanity and Greed in this photo To be honest, at the time i took the photo I was concentrating more on the face and only later found out the significance of the figures.

I'm fascinated by the artistic beauty of the face of this clock as well as the intricacy of it and the various ways it measures time. The inner astronomical clock moves around based on the sun's position during the year. The outer 24 hours measure what we typically think of as hours of the day. The curved lines measure the unequal "hours" that divide the day and night - 12 periods of night and 12 periods of day, where the amount of time in each period varies during the year depending on the length of a day. It shows the path of the sun, of the moon, and many other things that are just at the edge of my comprehension and beyond my understanding.

But what I really don't understand how someone can make something so beautiful, how they can be so advanced and knowledgeable in order to be able to build this, and at the same time be so fearful and hateful of people living just steps away.