Monasteries in Poland
Jasna Góra Monastery
The Jasna Góra Monastery is the most famous Polish shrine to the Virgin Mary and the country"s greatest place of pilgrimage – for many its spiritual capital. The image of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa, also known as Our Lady of Częstochowa, to which miraculous powers are attributed, is Jasna Góra"s most precious treasure. The site is one of Poland"s official national Histori ...
Founded: 1382 |
Location:
Częstochowa, Poland
Tyniec Abbey
Tyniec Benedictine abbey was founded by King Casimir the Restorer probably around 1044. Casimir decided to rebuild the newly established Kingdom of Poland, after a Pagan rebellion and a disastrous Czech raid of Duke Bretislaus I (1039). The Benedictines, invited to Tyniec by the King, were tasked with restoring order as well as cementing the position of the State and the Church. First Tyniec Abbot was Aaron, who became th ...
Founded: c. 1044 |
Location:
Kraków, Poland
Trzebnica Abbey
Sanctuary of St. Jadwiga, also Trzebnica Abbey, is a convent for Cistercian nuns founded in 1203. The abbey was established by the Silesian Piast duke Henry I the Bearded and his wife Saint Hedwig of Andechs, confirmed by Pope Innocent III. With Hedwig"s consent, her brother Ekbert of Andechs, then Bishop of Bamberg, chose the first nuns that occupied the convent. The first abbess was Petrussa from Kitzingen Abbey; s ...
Founded: 1203 |
Location:
Trzebnica, Poland
Kalwaria Zebrzydowska Park
Kalwaria Zebrzydowska park is a Mannerist architectural and park landscape complex and pilgrimage park, built in the 17th century as the Counter Reformation in the late 16th century led to prosperity in the creation of Calvaries in Catholic Europe. The park was added in 1999 to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites. This extraordinary testimony of piety and culture was the first of the large-scale Calvaries built in ...
Founded: 1600 |
Location:
Kalwaria Zebrzydowska, Poland
Pelplin Abbey
Pelplin Abbey is a former Cistercian abbey founded in 1258 by Sambor II, Duke of Pomerania. It was a daughter house of the Cistercian Doberan Abbey. It was first sited in Pogódki (Pogutken) near Kościerzyna (Berent) and re-located in 1276 to Pelplin. By decree of the Prussian government of 5 March 1823 it was dissolved. Since 1824 the church, as Pelpin Cathedral, has been the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Diocese of P ...
Founded: 1258 |
Location:
Pelplin, Poland
Lubiaz Abbey
Lubiąż Abbey, also commonly known as Leubus Abbey, is a former Cistercian monastery. The abbey, established in 1175, is one of the largest Christian architectural complexes in the world and is considered a masterpiece of Baroque Silesian architecture. The abbey is situated near a ford across the Oder river, where a Benedictine monastery and church of Saint James may have been established about 1150, but had already bee ...
Founded: 1175 |
Location:
Lubiąż, Poland
Gora Swietej Anny
Góra Świętej Anny or St. Annaberg is the location of the Franciscan monastery with the miraculous statue of St. Anne and the imposing calvary, which is an important destination for Roman Catholic pilgrimage. It has been a strategic location important to both German and Polish nationalists, and in 1921 it was the site of the Battle of Annaberg, commemorated in the Third Reich by the construction of a Thingstà ...
Founded: 16th century |
Location:
Góra Świętej Anny, Poland
Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Krzeszów is a Roman Catholic church and abbey of the Order of Saint Benedict in Krzeszów, Lower Silesian Voivodeship. Built around 1728-1735, it is a notable baroque church in Silesia, with the art of Ferdinand Brokoff (sculptor) and Michael Willmann (painter). It is also one of the shrines to the Virgin Mary, with a 13th old painting. In one of the ...
Founded: 1728-1735 |
Location:
Krzeszów, Poland
Mogila Abbey
Mogiła Abbey is a Cistercian monastery founded in 1222 by the Bishop of Kraków, Iwo Odrowąż. It was the largest and most impressive church in medieval Poland after Wawel Cathedral, and served as the Odrowąż family"s burial place until the 16th century. The monastic community, consisting of the 13 professed monks mandatory for an independent monastery, moved in around 1225, although th ...
Founded: 1222 |
Location:
Kraków, Poland
Camaldolese Hermit Monastery
The Camaldolese monastery in Bielany was established there in the first half of the 17th century, damaged in 1655 during the Polish-Swedish war and rebuilt after a fire in 1814. It consists of hermitages and the Assumption of Mary Church.
Founded: 17th century |
Location:
Bielany, Poland
Sulejów Abbey
Sulejów Abbey was a Cistercian abbey founded in 1176 by the duke Kazimierz II the Just. The town of Sulejów grew up round it. The most notable parts of the abbey are the Romanesque church of Saint Thomas Becket of Canterbury and Romanesque fortifications which stopped the Mongol Hordes in the 13th century. The monastery was dissolved in 1810. After many years of industrial and business use the surviving buildings are n ...
Founded: 1176 |
Location:
Sulejów, Poland
Jedrzejów Abbey
Jędrzejów Abbey is a former Cistercian abbey founded in 1140. The convent, under the lead of Fr. Nicholas, came to these lands in 1114 from the Morimond Abbey in Champagne. The consecration act from 1149 elevated the monastery to a rank of an abbey and king Bolesław IV the Curly gave it a foundation privilege which exempted it from ducal tributes and charges. The ceremony of consecrating the new church an ...
Founded: 1140 |
Location:
Jędrzejów, Poland
St. Jadwiga's Basilica
St. Jadwiga"s Basilica was erected in 1723-1738. The church hosts the Parish of the Holy Cross and St. Jadwiga and is the central element of the there founded Monastery of the Order of Saint Benedict.
Founded: 1723-1738 |
Location:
Legnickie Pole, Poland
Ruins of the Monastery of the Discalced Carmelites
In the village Zagorz on a picturesque hill called Marymont there are the impressive ruins of the monastery of the Discalced Carmelites - one of the most interesting architectural buildings in this part of Poland shrouded in many legends. The ruins of the monastery of Fr. Discalced Carmelites from the eighteenth century. The ruins are situated on a picturesque hill on three sides surrounded by the waters of the Osława R ...
Founded: 1730 |
Location:
Zagórz, Poland
Camaldolese Monastery
Camaldolese monastery was built in 1747-1781 (consecrated in 1791). The monastery has an old Baroque style architecture, its interiors remain somewhat raw. Most of original equipment was damaged. The main altar is quite unique - in Rococo style. Frescos which come from the time of the monastery’s construction are very precious. There are relics of Five Martyr Brothers in the Church.
Founded: 1747-1791 |
Location:
Bieniszew, Poland
Szczyrzyc Abbey
Szczyrzyc Cistercian Abbey was founded in 1234. The founder of the Abbey was Theodor, the palatine of Cracow bearing Griffin, as his coat of arms. It continues to function as a monastery and is one of the Polish Shrines to the Virgin Mary.
Founded: 1234 |
Location:
Szczyrzyc, Poland
Kolbacz Abbey
The Kołbacz Abbey was a Cistercian monastery founded in 1173 with the original Latin name 'Mera Vallis'. The monks were invited into Pomerania by Warcisław II Świętoborzyc, a castellan of Szczecin, as part of an agreement with Valdemar I of Denmark, who had besieged Szczecin and made Warcisław his vassal. The first monks originally arrived from the Danish Esrum Abbey. The foundation was ...
Founded: 1173 |
Location:
Kołbacz, Poland
Featured Historic Landmarks, Sites & Buildings
Photo from Flickr, copyright Mr Phil Price
Historic Site of the week
Caerleon Roman Amphitheatre
Built around AD 90 to entertain the legionaries stationed at the fort of Caerleon (Isca), the impressive amphitheatre was the Roman equivalent of today’s multiplex cinema. Wooden benches provided seating for up to 6,000 spectators, who would gather to watch bloodthirsty displays featuring gladiatorial combat and exotic wild animals.
Long after the Romans left, the amphitheatre took on a new life in Arthurian legend. Geoffrey of Monmouth, the somewhat imaginative 12th-century scholar, wrote in his History of the Kings of Britain that Arthur was crowned in Caerleon and that the ruined amphitheatre was actually the remains of King Arthur’s Round Table.
Today it is the most complete Roman amphitheatre in Britain.