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Lublin
Dominican priory and church of Saint Stanislaw

For the early history of the Dominicans in Poland, click here.

A brief history of Lublin.

Lublin was founded in the eleventh century, and played an important role on various occasions. From the diets which assembled there, the so-called union of diets of 1569 came to be of decisive importance to the fortunes of the Polish and Lithuanian kingdom.
King Sigismund (1548-1572) of Poland showed himself strenuously in favour of a closer union between the Polish and the Lithuanians. Their Greek Orthodox nobles had in 1563 by royal decree become possessed of the same rights as the Catholic nobility of Poland, stoutly opposed a closer union between Lithuania and Poland.

Their representatives demanded absolute independence in all home questions, and the maintenance of their own constitution and administration. Only in the case of war were Lithuanians and Poles to meet in diet, while the monarch was not to be common to both, but to be separated from both countries, and to be freely elected.

The Dominican priory and church after 1342

The Dominicans built their priory and church after 1342, founded by King Casimir the Great, dedicated to Saint Stanislaw, bishop of Cracow +1079. The dome is built by the stone-mason Jan Wolff.
 

1. Church of the Blessed Virgin.
2. Church of the conversion of Saint Paul.
3. Church of the Holy Cross 1419.
4. The gate of Cracow 14th century.
5. The old town hall after 1389.
6. The convent of the Jesuits.
7. Church of  Saint John the Baptist, 1592-1604),
    since 1832 the cathedral, dedicated also
    Saint John the Evangelist.
8  The castle-church.
9. Church of the Dominicans, 1342.

Listed by Magister Bogdan Michalak in letter 01.06.1994.

Panorama of Lublin after the engraving by Georg Braun (ca 1542-1622) and Franz Hogenberg (1540-1590) in 'Civitates orbis terrarum'  issued in Köln, 1618. At the right the Dominican church, founded by King Casimir the Great after 1342 and later rebuilt in Renaissance style.

Poland 1993. Postal card.

In this priory the Poles and Lithuanian magnates joined
the diet at Lublin, and  announced their willingness
to acknowledge the union on 27 June, 1569.
On 1 July 1569 the union was solemnly proclaimed.

The church of the priory of the Dominicans in Lublin, rebuilt in
1668. The seal of the Union of Lublin was proclaimed in the
priory on 1 July 1569.

German Occupation of Poland 1942, Mi 93, Sc NB16.
 

The proclamation of the Union of Lublin  in the Dominican priory on 1 July 1569.

Lithuania 1921, Mi 40, Sc 41.

The historical painting by the Polish artist
Jan Matejko (24 June 1838-01 November
1893)
The bishop at the right of the King is
Filip Padniewski Duke Nowina, archbishop of Cracow (+ 12 April 1572).

Poland 1938, Mi 335, Sc 324.

A postal card with at the left a composition
of the churches of Lublin.

On the right the Dominican church.

Poland 1978. Postal card.

NB

The Dominican priory and church after 1697

The original wooden Holy Cross church in Lublin was built outside the town (1419), near the road leading from Lublin to Cracow. It was a small, one-nave building with an ave-bell and arcades around the nave. The building can be seen in Hogenberg's engraving showing a panorama of the town of Lublin.

The brick church was built after 1618 in the renesans lubelski (Lublin Renaissance) style.

In 1697 the Dominicans settled near the church of the Holy Cross.
A quadrangle monastery with an inner courtyard was built next to the church on the north side. The Dominicans had a considerable allowance and a good economic base.
In 1800 the monastery was dissolved and the Austrian army took over the monastery buildings with the intention of turning them into a hospital.
The Dominican buildings were soon extended. In the period between 1800 and 1809 three wings were built that surrounded the inner courtyard. The inner elevations were given three storeys of open arcades.

The architectonic forms used here clearly show a similarity to the theory formulated by the Professor of the Paris L'Ecole Polytechnique - Jean-Nicolas-Louis Durand.
He created an architectonic doctrine that was based on utility and economy of the building. A building with such a big capacity was probably designed to be a hospital, barracks, it could house army headquarters, or perhaps civilian authorities.
During the whole of the 19[t][h] century the buildings were used by the army. At the turn of the 1820s Russians built the wing closing the courtyard on the northern side and soon they walled up the arcades.

From the 1860s probably until World War I the Riazan Infantry Regiment was stationed there.
After Poland regained independence the Świętokrzyskie Barracks (the name came from the invocation of the church) were given to the Catholic University of Lublin. Its authorities renovated the buildings according to the design by the architect Marian Lalewicz who restored their forms of monumental classicism, and in the case of the church he also used baroque motifs.
In the 1970s the attic was adapted for rooms and a new front wing was built according to a design by S. Juchnowicz and K. Juchnowicz.

The church contains valuable frescoes, Renaissance tombstones, sculptures, and paintings among others a painting which illustrates the fire of Lublin in 1719.

Source: via Internet: A summary of the Master's thesis entitled 'The Catholic University of Lublin. An architectonic-historical monograph of the building complex', written under the supervision of Dr Lechoslaw Lameriski (in 2000) in the Institute of History of Art of the CUL and is concerned with the historical part of the building complex of the Catholic University of Lublin that has not been yet scientifically describe.

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