Religious sites in Poland

Holy Trinity Church

The imposing Church of the Holy Trinity was built by Franciscan monks in 1420-1514. In 1480, the Chapel of St Anne was constructed alongside the church. This towering Gothic building, adjoining a former Franciscan monastery (now the National Museum), is among the best preserved buildings in the city.The altar is offset by a lofty whitewashed interior and the wide expanse of floor is cobbled with tombstones, including an e ...

Founded: 1420-1514 | Location: Gdańsk, Poland

Jawor Church of Peace

The Churches of Peace in Jawor and Świdnica, the largest timber-framed religious buildings in Europe, were built in the former Silesia in the mid-17th century, amid the religious strife that followed the Peace of Westphalia. Constrained by the physical and political conditions, the Churches of Peace bear testimony to the quest for religious freedom and are a rare expression of Lutheran ideology in an idiom generally asso ...

Founded: 1655 | Location: Jawor, 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

Plock Cathedral

Płock Cathedral, or the Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Masovia, is an example of Romanesque architecture. The bishopric in Płock was founded about 1075. The first definite reference to the cathedral is in 1102, when Władysław I Herman was buried there. The present Romanesque cathedral was built after 1129 by prince Bolesław III and Bishop Aleksander of Malonne. This was a rebuilding following a fire and took ...

Founded: c. 1129 | Location: Płock, Poland

Saints Peter and Paul Basilica

Saints Peter and Paul Church is a historic brick, Gothic minor basilica. Formerly, the basilica belonged to the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. Since 2002, the church serves as a minor basilica. It is the most prized heritage site of the town and is one of the largest churches in Lower Silesia (with a length of the nave at 76 metres, height of 26 m and a main building width of 26 m). An example of Lower Sile ...

Founded: 14th century | Location: Strzegom, Poland

Cathedral Basilica of the Holy Cross

The Cathedral Basilica of the Holy Cross (Bazylika Katedralna Podwyższenia Krzyża Świętego) was built in the 15th century on the site where before there was a structure of the 11th and 13th centuries. It was rebuilt several times. With towers with a height of 73 meters is the tallest structure in the city. In the temple there is a painting of the Virgin of Opole, brought there permanently in 1702.

Founded: 15th century | Location: Opole, Poland

Archangel Michael Church

The wooden church of the Archangel Michael in Debno is first mentioned in 1335. The present building, the second on the site, dates from the late 15th century. This church has a unique example of medieval decorations. The ceiling and the interior walls are painted using stencils from the 15th and 16th centuries. The decoration contains more than 77 motifs: architectural recalling Gothic forms, animal, human and religious. ...

Founded: 15th century | Location: Dębno, Poland

Church of St. Adalbert

The Church of St. Adalbert or the Church of St. Wojciech in Poznań, was constructed in the 15th century. It was the one of only two Polish churches under the Nazis (1939–1944). The church has a 16th-century wooden belfry.

Founded: 15th century | Location: Poznań, Poland

St. Nicholas' Church

St. Nicholas" Church in Brzeg is a Gothic basilica built between 1370 and 1420 during the reign of Louis I of Brzeg. He built it on the site of a former brick building, mentioned in sources from 1279. In 1523, the town of Brzeg experienced a Reformation. Prince Frederick II introduced the Lutheran religion into the principality. In 1524, the former Franciscan monk Jan of Opava gave his first sermon in th ...

Founded: 1370-1420 | Location: Brzeg, 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

St. John's Church

St. John"s Church is the oldest preserved sacred building in Chojnice. The construction of the temple was started in the 14th century, in the place of the old wooden church. The hall church with three aisles, a separate presbytery and tower presents the Pomeranian Gothic style. It was destroyed many times by fires associated with wars, devastated, robbed and persistently reconstructed. During the the Reformation, the ...

Founded: 14th century | Location: Chojnice, Poland

Church of Virgin Mary

The Church of Virgin Mary is a three-aisle basilica church (the nave is higher than the aisles) with large separated chancel closed by five-side apse. It was erected in the second half of the 14th century and enlarged in 1500s. The church was partially damaged during II World War and rebuilt in 1948. In 2003 the spire and dome of the church tower were reconstructed. More valuable monuments in the temple are pulpit coming ...

Founded: 14th century | Location: Słupsk, Poland

Warsaw Jewish Cemetery

The Warsaw Jewish Cemetery is one of the largest Jewish cemeteries in Europe and in the world. It was established in 1806 and occupies 33 hectares of land. The cemetery contains over 200,000 marked graves, as well as mass graves of victims of the Warsaw Ghetto. Many of these graves and crypts are overgrown, having been abandoned after the German invasion of Poland and subsequent Holocaust. Although the cemetery was closed ...

Founded: 1806 | Location: Warsaw, Poland

Church of the Holy Cross

Parish Church of the Holy Cross is the oldest building in Tczew. The church was built in the 13th century and features a Baroque interior. The high brick tower is the oldest part of the church and its wooden top was destroyed during the fire in 1982. The interior church walls feature old frescoes, the oldest of which dates back to the latter half of the 15th century.

Founded: 13th century | Location: Tczew, Poland

Carmelite Church

The Roman Catholic order of Carmelites came to Przemyśl in 1620. Their church was founded by the duke of Podolia, Michał Krasicki, and constructed in the years 1627-1631 most probably according to the design of Galleazzo Appiani. The interior is explicitly Baroque, including a pulpit with a ship-like shape. In 1772 after the First Partition of Poland the city fell under Austrian rule, which by a decree of Joseph I ...

Founded: 1627-1631 | Location: Przemyśl, Poland

St. Stanislaus Kostka's Church

Post-Dominican Church of Saint Stanislaus Kostka was originally built in the 14th century in Gothic style, with a characteristic octagonal tower. After the dissolution of the order, it was rebuilt into a school and later, till 1945, used by Protestants. The interior dates partially from the 17th century.

Founded: 14th century | Location: Tczew, Poland

Carthusian Church Monastery

Built in 1380, the amazing Gothic church originally featured a simple shingle roof, which was changed into its now notorious coffin-shaped lead sheet iron form in the 1730s. The church and surrounding ensemble of buildings were once home to a small group of Carthusian monks from Bohemia, a peculiar brotherhood who favoured among other eccentricities a Trappist lifestyle and sleeping in coffins. Inside, find a rich collect ...

Founded: 1380 | Location: Kartuzy, Poland

Church of St. John of Jerusalem

The Church of St. John of Jerusalem Outside the Walls was originally built at the end of the 11th century, making it one of the oldest churches within the present boundaries of Poznań. The church is dedicated to St. John of Jerusalem (John the Baptist), the patron saint of the Knights Hospitallers, to whom the church belonged until 1832 (and to whom it has now been restored). A church, dedicated to St. Michael, stoo ...

Founded: 11th century | Location: Poznań, Poland

Collegiate Church

The Gothic collegiate complex built from 1357–1389, with a splendid church, on which Pope John Paul II conferred the title of minor basilica (1989). Undoubtedly, one of the biggest tourist attractions beside the magnificent interior and furnishings of the church is the organ with 49 tones and 3522 pipes. The former capitulary library houses a parish museum, which is open to visitors. It contains the remains of the o ...

Founded: 1357-1389 | Location: Dobre Miasto, Poland

Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Archangel Michael

The Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Archangel Michael in Haczow has original Gothic polychrome decoration from the late 15th century, although the building has been dated to the previous century. At the beginning of the 17th century the church was enclosed by an earthen defensive rampart. Inside a valuable figural wall paintings dating from 1494 can be seen. It is believed that the Haczów church is the bigges ...

Founded: 1388 | Location: Haczów, Poland