Castle in Kazimierz Dolny, Poland (part 2 of 2)

The castle was built in the 14th century during the times of King Casimir the Great, after the Tatars attack on the Lublin region. Its shape is adapted to the terrain. The courtyard was surrounded by high walls where people could take shelter in case of danger. There was a well carved in the middle.

The castle was the seat of the starosty, and its architecture changed over the centuries. There were living quarters on the town side, and a gate on the opposite side. In the place where the viewpoint is now located, a four-sided residential tower was built in the 15th century, blown up in 1809 by the Austrians. In the 16th century, the walls of the residential wing and towers were decorated with attics.

The castle was destroyed during the Swedish Deluge and was never rebuilt.

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Castle in Kazimierz Dolny, Poland (part 1 of 2)

The castle complex in Kazimierz Dolny consists of a round tower and the ruins of the castle. The tower is the oldest building in Kazimierz, built at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries. The defensive tower is 20 meters high, the walls on the ground floor are approximately 10 meters thick, and the entrance to it is 6 meters high. The tower was probably once surrounded by a palisade. It was a place of protection and customs collection for the existing crossing on the Vistula.

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The Royal Castle in Sandomierz, Poland

In the 14th century, founded by King Casimir the Great, a brick Gothic building with a castle wall and a defensive tower, built on an octagonal plan, was erected on the site of the wooden stronghold. Around 1480 the southern tower, the so-called “chicken leg”, was erected, now the oldest surviving part of the castle.

In the 16th century, on the initiative of King Sigismund I the Old, the reconstruction of the Gothic castle into a Renaissance residence began.

During the reign of the next king, Sigismund II Augustus, work on the expansion of the castle continued. They included the construction of the western wing ending with a corner tower and the connection of the northern wall with the gate tower.

During the reign of King John Casimir in 1656, during the “deluge”, the castle was blown up by retreating Swedish troops. The eastern and southern wings were destroyed. Since then, the castle has become a public building: an office, a court and a prison. In 1768 during the Bar Confederation, the castle was destroyed again, this time by the Russian troops quartered there.

After the Third Partition of Poland, the Austrian partitioner used the castle as a court and a prison. In 1844 the remains of the royal castle were rebuilt, giving it strict classicist architectural forms.

At the end of the 19th century, the semicircular prison yard was enclosed with a new wing, the so-called “croissant”, and a building for the prison administration was built into the northern wall. The castle shaped in this way served as a prison until 1959.

In later years, thorough renovation and conservation works were carried out, the administration building and the surrounding courtyard were demolished, and in 1986 the castle was designated as the seat of the District Museum in Sandomierz.

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Castle of the Mazovian Dukes, Ciechanów, Poland (part 2 of 2)

The castle’s greatest period of splendor was the reign of Duke Janusz I, son of Siemowit, who, after the defeat of the Teutonic Knights at Grunwald in 1410, rebuilt Ciechanow Castle as his residence, erecting an imposing residential building, raising the level of the courtyard by 1.5 meters and laying decorative cobblestones.

During the reign of the next dukes, the castle was an important point of administration of the Duchy of Ciechanow, a place of international negotiations and a fortress where the ducal treasury was kept. The castle was rebuilt and adapted to the use of firearms. The main entrance was moved to the west gate, which was fortified with a brick fore-gate and drawbridge.

After the death of Janusz II in 1495, the castle began to decline, and after the incorporation of Mazovia into the Crown in 1526, it completely lost its importance and slowly fell into disrepair under the royal starosts.

In the middle of the 17th century, during the “Swedish Deluge,” the castle was seized by the Swedes and burned, as was Ciechanow. From then on it was a ruin, located outside the city, in vast swampy meadows.

After the Second Partition, in 1803, the Prussians, who ruled much of Mazovia, demolished the buildings inside the castle, building a brewery in Opinogóra out of the bricks they obtained. They left the outer walls, which they were unable to breach.

In the 1960s, the process of rebuilding the castle began, and it eventually became a museum facility, in the nature of a “permanent ruin,” with a small museum exhibition on the towers and in the reconstructed castle cellar of the so-called “Gothic Hall.”

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Castle of the Mazovian Dukes, Ciechanów, Poland (part 1 of 2)

When the construction of the Ciechanów castle began, and it was around 1355, Mazovia, which was a separate duchy, was ruled by Prince Siemowit III from the line of the Mazovian Piasts. In other areas of Poland, the process of unification was coming to an end, after the so-called district breakdown. It was ruled by the last hereditary king, Casimir the Great, also from the Piast line, who "found Poland made of wood and left it made of stone". Polish lands were invaded by armies from neighboring countries, especially the Teutonic Knights (the Knights' Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary) from the north, Czechs from the south and Lithuanians from the east.

The form of the castle - a rectangle measuring 48 x 57 m - with one building at the southern gate (for the crew), two towers from the entrance side and a huge, empty courtyard resembled early medieval Middle Eastern castles - Byzantine castles. It had a similar purpose - it was used to shelter the city's population, along with the most valuable possessions, when threatened by the enemy. The only way to the castle, from the city side, through the swampy backwaters of the Łydynia River, was a wooden bridge, almost 300 m long, easy to dismantle.

The Ciechanów castle was practically impregnable and was never occupied by enemies, although such attempts were made by the Teutonic Knights, as evidenced by two swords and other fragments of the knights' armament found in the castle moat during archaeological research. The castle then (at the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries) served as a defensive border castle, as the border of the Teutonic State ran along the river, just behind the northern wall of the castle.

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Castle of Krakow bishops, Iłża, Poland (part 2)

During the Swedish Deluge, the castle was seriously damaged by the Swedish and Transylvanian armies. The Cracow bishops took care of the reconstruction of the building, but despite the efforts and periodic renovation works (the last one, undertaken in 1782, consisted in replacing the roof), when their property was taken over by the state authorities during the Four-Year Sejm (1789), the residence was in a dilapidated condition.

After the partitions, the Austrians set up a field hospital in the castle, later parties were organized in several well-ordered chambers. During one of them a great fire broke out. The ruins became a source of stone building material for the city. Further damage was the result of shelling and devastation during both world wars - especially the tower (a convenient observation post) suffered. Today - after securing, roofing and lighting - it houses a seasonally open viewpoint. During the ongoing, next phase of conservation, the walls and foundations of the buildings in the outer bailey were uncovered, the courtyard and the entrance road were paved.

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Castle of Krakow bishops, Iłża, Poland (part 1)

The original wooden fortified residence of the clergy was located in the old town, but in the 13th century it was destroyed - probably as a result of subsequent Tatar and Lithuanian invasions. According to Jan Długosz, the brick castle on the neighboring hill (on the eastern side of the city) was supposed to have been built by bishop Jan Grot (bishop of Kraków in the years 1327–1347).

The oldest element of the fortifications was the characteristic round stone tower, intended as the last point of defense (which still exists today). The next phase of expansion was in 14th and 15th centuries, when circumferential stone walls appeared (also in the town), and then the entrance was modified - from then on it led through a long bridge with stone pillars along the western side of the stronghold. In the 16th century (around 1560), under the rule of a well-known patron of science and art, Bishop Filip Padniewski, the castle was transformed into a Renaissance residence, while the internal Gothic buildings (except the tower) were demolished. The defense system of the stronghold was also improved, surrounding the outer bailey with a wall (it became the so-called lower castle), adding bastions and a new entrance. In the 17th century, the fortification of the outer bailey was continued, while the upper castle, then topped with an attic, was expanded and beautified.

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The Royal Castle in Chęciny, Poland (part 2)

In 1465 a dangerous fire broke out in the castle, and from the second half of the 16th century, that is, when Queen Bona moved out, Chęciny Castle began to lose its luster and splendor. Another fire took place in the mid-sixteenth century, and the staroste Stanisław Dębiński, in order to restore the use of the castle, made only the most important renovation works. The destruction of the castle was done in the 17th century. In 1607, during the Zebrzydowski Rebellion, the fortress was burnt down and the armory plundered. The castle was plundered again in 1655 by the Swedes and their ally Prince George Rákóczi in 1657. The stronghold ceased to be the residence of starosts and was abandoned in 1707 after its subsequent devastation by the Swedes.

After these events, the castle was abandoned. The castle cannons fired for the last time in 1787 to the cheers of King Stanislaw August Poniatowski entering the city. Since then, the walls of the medieval stronghold have served the local residents as a source of building materials.

During World War I, the ruins were used by the Russian army. Then, as a result of Austrian artillery fire, the towers were seriously damaged. In the interwar period, minor conservation works were not able to stop the destruction of the castle.

During World War II, a threat to the castle was the exploitation of stone from Góra Zamkowa to obtain building material for roads in the General Government. The exploitation was stopped, which saved the castle walls from collapsing. After World War II, the ruins of the castle are reconstructed (inter alia, in the years 1948 -1949 - towers, 1959 - 1960 - walls).

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The Royal Castle in Chęciny, Poland (part 1)

It was erected on the ridge of a rocky hill (367 meters above sea level) probably at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries, on the initiative of Wenceslaus II, the king of the Czech Republic and Poland.

The first mention of the castle comes from 1306 and concerns the granting of a stronghold by Łokietek to the bishop of Muskata together with eleven surrounding villages. This privilege was revoked and the castle, together with the emerging town, became the center of princely and then royal power. At the beginning, it covered only the present eastern part - two round towers with a wall in the shape of a polygon similar to a rectangle in the terrain matching the relief.

The castle in Chęciny played an important role: the king often visited the castle and congresses of the knights were held in the years 1310, 1318, 1331, 1333. In 1318 - in fear of the Teutonic Knights - the treasury of the Archdiocese of Gniezno was deposited here. Several years later, in June 1331, in Chęciny, the king’s son was appointed governor of Wielkopolska. Equal laws, courts, and coinage were also introduced as an expression of the unification of the country. It was decided to join the war with the Teutonic Knights, and after the congress, the Polish knights moved to Płowce. This event is regarded as the beginning of Polish parliamentarism.

During the reign of Casimir the Great, the castle became the seat of the city starosts and the residence of royal families. The king extended the castle with a residential building on the north side and a forearm, which was later added to the chapel.

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