HISTORIC CRACOW

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2312, 20 November 1914, Page 6

HISTORIC CRACOW

ANCIENT CAPITAL OF POLAND NOW AN AUSTRIAN FORTRESS - One must approach Oracow as the Russians now do, from tho vast plain which stretches eastwards, in order to get a proper impression of /what constitutes tlio great- interest of the old Polish capital—the melancholy sunset of its proud and splendid past (writes n correspondent of .the Manchester Guardian s '). It is from the .east, and not; as most tourists do, from the Siles,ian ridges on the north-west, that one sees in their multitude the towers' and turrets, the steeples ond domes of Cracow, and sees them untarnished -by the ■ network of narrow, tortuous, ■■ and dirty streets -which characterise the city that Was the glory of the Polish ,'kingdom when- thp,t kingdom was it-he''rival of •Russia, tho suzerain, of Prussia, the possessor of a miglity sword that counted for a great deal in the fortunes of Europe. T.''or three; centuries Cracow : \vas the residence of the Polish kings. Hero reigned Kasimir—the Great—great - alike in prowess and in encouragement of peaceful arts, the author—this' in the fourteenth century—of the - celebrated v edict of tolerance to the Jews. Here , ' in 1386 was' also celebrated the mar- ■ riage; between : Grand Duke Jagello of •Lithuania and Queen Jadviga of Poland, .which fused the two States into one powerful kingdom. . And here too in .1525 . the. fatal mistake was made by ;: 2\iug Sigismuiidl "of grafting to Al- \ brecint of Brandenburg tho ' Duchy of Prussia in. perpetual lief—that Duehy, •which in course of time grow to ;be the i. Prussia of Frederick the Great,. the gravedigger, of Poland'., ' Cracow, remained the Royal; residence of Poland■ v .till 1600, when Sigismund 111 .took up, his abode in Warsaw. But both he and ■ tall his successors till 1764 continued to , bo crowned at Cracow, and all of 'them i were laid to eternal rest at the Cracow Eatedra—the Cathedral'which, still sur.vives. Legendary Lore. • Legend is active about the beginnings .;. bfthis proud,city. ,Is it "really the. ancient Carodonuin which is mentioned by Ptolemy, as 6ome say? Or was it really founded by that hero of the Slav Sagas Kralius, said to lave .lived in , tho. ninth century of our era and to have. built a "burg'/ on tho, Wawel, the iiill in the_ southern' part' of the city, .as .. others believe? No one can. say; but tho Cracoviaus still point to the Krakus :. Mount south, of the, town as the living . f proof of his existence, and, will add the; ; romantic story of his beautiful daugh- > ter Wanda, who was driven ,by the im- : portunity . of, heri numerous suitors to such despair as .to. throw, herself into tho Vistula not ■ far .. from ; that..very■ ' 1 - spot. :.'Ceftain 'it: is,' however,. that in She eleventh century a.d. . Cracow, on • the cross-roads,-, from' three seas*, and' , (tfour great s rivers, enjoyed already, conBiderablet.prosperity ; and v was" coveted ~as muchy by. ,thoj Bohemians; as bv the Poles'^themselves..-; It was -"already" at Y that- tiine the capital of a great diocese stretching as far as Lublin, and counted ; > among its. bishops a niartyr' iri the person of Stanislaus/: subsequently canon- • ased ■by ;the -Eoman Churdi, vwho had •:'■■■ been slain.,before" the 'altar by;, King ' . Boleslas the Great. v, For nearly three' ; centuries,, during , tlie feudal -period of. ' Polish history it then passed, from hand ....... to-hand, now captured byithe Germans, aiow .sacked"; by. the. Tartars, and again by. the Bohemians, ' It. was the celebrated > Wladislas Lokietek ' (the . Short), the restorer of Polish unity, who finally in . 1311 rescued Cracow and ■ .mado.it the capital of :: his kingdom.

i , Capital Transferred. But; the axis- of/PolishjState life was already shifting'towards the . east,'. and .-.. at \ the, beginning 'of- the seventeenth century Cracow received a mortal blow ■ from (the transference of/the capital to :, Warsaw. ; 'By that' time the .mad period ■• of elective kings:'had ; already been, in . full 'swing, ana Cracow repeatedly fell . the victim of the rival jealousies of the. .' candidates, v' In 1655 Charles Gustav'us -of, Sweden, deceived .in his "hopes for the Polish throne,-came and sacked :. ■ Cracow,-disarming its citizens, expelling • all its clergy and professors, destroying its churches and schools, and- exacting a heavy contribution from the inhabitants. •No -sooner had ! he,' MH6 than the ; 'Transylvanian prince, the famous Georg "'ißakoczy,. crime and completed! the- trork : of' " devastation.'- Again, in 1702; .•'Charles XII-of Sweden, suffering defeat everywhere, wrecked his vengeance upon : Cracow by first plundering and : ; then ; ihurning it. :' His Polish protagonist, King August'll, who also was elector of { 'Saxony,: found nothing better to do than' :• to carry-off the copper roof'of the Royal' ; Palaco to Dresden -under the pretext of . Seeding it for making cannon—a fitting / symbol of the impending-doom.' Russia and Prussia w ere already on Poland's track, and the so-called Confederation • of.tlio Bar, with its chief seat at Crasow was formed in order to offer resistance to the two : preying powers. But Suyaroff took Cracpw by storm'in 1772, and Poland underwent her first partition. .. Tiventy years later Poland was . ; .partitioned; foru : the second time ; and; then the great rising under Kosciuszko brdke out in 1794 with Cracow as. the ' centra of national defence. '.This time it * -was tHo end of ■ Poland. King . Stanislas resigned Ill's crown anil Cra-

cow was taken and pillaged •by the 'Austrians and Prussians, and tlie latter carried off to Berlin the contents of the 'Royal Treasury—five diadems, four sceptres, three'! globes, two golden chains, and the sword of Bolcslas tho . Great, which had girded the loins of ' the Polish kings at ..the Coronation 'cere-mony-for seven centuries..; ; . First-class Austrian Fortress. Cracow now became an Austrian city, hut with the restoration of the Duchy of' Warsaw by Napoleon it was incorporated with iti By the Treaty, of .Vienna, which destroyed the Duchy and sanctioned the threefold .partition of Poland, Cracow, with a small adjacent territory, was constituted a' "free, independent, and - permanently •. neutral" ■ republic under the'"protection of the three Powers." The outcome of this ■"protection" is well known. In 1846 'Austria, attacked and annexed the' republic against the protests of England' and France. Sinco then Cracow has been turned into a first-class fortress, and the royal palacc bccamo a barracks a .military hospital. The University,itself was'at first turned into a Gorman school, but its Polish charac- ■ ter was restored, in 1870. Now the visitor to Cracow sees only the remnants of i hs ancient glory. St. Florian's Gate— perhaps tho finest monument of Gothic architecture in Poland—still marks tho sito of tho aucient waJls. In the old market place—Rynek Glowny,' now recliristened Ringsplatz—still stand St. Mary's Church of tho thirteenth century, with its exquisite high, altar, and tho" old Clothhouse, now containing the national museum. Not far from it ia St. Aiuie'a Church, with tho tomb of < Copernicus, who, though born at Thorn, studied and died, at Cracow.', Above all, there is the Cathedral, the Polish West- . minster, with the tombs of the Sobionkis,,. tlie Kasimirs, the Poniatowskis, and of Ilosciuszko himself, and with atatues'from the great , ohisel of Thorwaldsen. But along with these monuments the visitor will find two belts of fo'rts—oiie thirty, the other twelve miles .in circumference, guarding the approaches to the city against a Russian attack, and barracks and depots ,• without number. . .