CASTLE AND CATHEDRAL IN KWIDZYN, VIEW FROM WEST

HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING

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he old­est Teu­ton­ic for­ti­fi­ca­tion in the area was a wood­en watch­tow­er called Sankt Ma­rien­wer­der or In­su­la San­cte Ma­rie, found­ed in the vicin­i­ty of pre­sent-day No­wa Wieś Kwi­dzyń­ska short­ly af­ter the Teu­ton­ic Knights be­gan their cru­sades against pa­gans in Po­me­za­nia (1233). How­ev­er, these for­ti­fi­ca­tions were not im­pres­sive and al­ready in 1242 the Prus­sian troops de­stroyed them. Not long af­ter­wards, the Teu­ton­ic Knights built a new brick cas­tle named Alt­schlöss­chen, which from then on served as the bish­op's res­i­dence. This rel­a­tive­ly small build­ing with three tow­ers suc­cess­ful­ly re­pelled the at­tacks of the Prus­sians dur­ing the sub­se­quent up­ris­ings in 1263 and 1277. It was de­stroyed on­ly in 1520 by Pol­ish ar­til­le­ry. Soon af­ter, the au­thor­ities or­dered it to be de­mo­lished, and the ma­te­ri­als ob­tained from it were used to re­pair the chap­ter cas­tle and oth­er build­ings in the town. To­day, the ex­is­tence of this cas­tle is con­firmed on­ly by the name of the street run­ning next to the for­mer moat, i.e. Sta­ro­zam­ko­wa Street (the Old Cas­tle Street).

A SPECULATIVE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE BISHOP'S CASTLE, NAMED ALTSCHLÖSSCHEN
ORIGIN: R.SYPEK "ZAMKI I OBIEKTY WAROWNE PAŃSTWA KRZYŻACKIEGO"

CHURCH OF THE HOLY MAIDEN AND JAN EVANGELIST (FORMER KWIDZYN CATHEDRAL) IN THE 1950S AND TODAY

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f­ter the first cathe­dral chap­ter was con­sti­tu­ted in 1284, the ques­tion arose of es­tab­lish­ing a wor­thy seat for them. The small cas­tle of the Po­me­za­ni­an bish­ops (Alt­schlöss­chen) did not ful­fil these func­tions ad­e­quate­ly, and so still at the end of the 13th cen­tu­ry the con­struc­tion of a sec­ond, much larg­er cas­tle be­gan. It was sit­u­at­ed in the north­ern part of the town, on the high bank of the Vis­tu­la val­ley. It was built up in stages. Prob­a­bly around 1340 the east­ern wing, the old­est of the four cas­tle wings, al­ready ex­ist­ed. Al­though the ar­chi­tect of the new fort­ress and its cre­ator re­main un­known, writ­ten sources from 1342 men­tion a cer­tain broth­er Ru­per­tus, who was to act as a mu­ro­rum ma­gi­ster, i.e. a mas­ter ma­son while con­struct­ing the Kwi­dzyn Cathe­dral. So per­haps the same Ru­per­tus di­rect­ed the work on the cas­tle, be­ing af­ter all part of a large cas­tle-cathe­dral com­plex.

RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CASTLE AND CATHEDRAL FROM AROUND 1390 ACCORDING TO
"DIE BAU- UND KUNSTDENKMALER DES KREISES MARIENWERDER OSTLICH DER WEICHSEL", 1898

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he oth­er cas­tle wings and the tow­er were prob­a­bly built in 1340-55, when Bish­op Ar­nold ruled the dio­cese. In the sec­ond half of the 14th cen­tu­ry, the cas­tle and cathe­dral were joined, which was cer­tain­ly dic­tat­ed by de­fen­sive rea­sons and the con­ve­nience of the can­ons, but prob­a­bly al­so had an ide­o­log­i­cal sig­nif­i­cance as a sym­bol­ic link be­tween sec­u­lar and spir­i­tu­al au­thor­i­ty. In the 80s of the same cen­tu­ry, a huge la­trine tow­er with an ar­cad­ed porch rose from the west, and a well tow­er and a spa­cious farm­yard were in­cor­po­rat­ed in­to the cas­tle area. Then a unique ar­chi­tec­tural com­plex with two cas­tles (bish­op's and chap­ter's), a cathe­dral and a town was formed in Kwi­dzyn. The north­ern (new­er) cas­tle served from then on as the seat of the Po­meza­ni­an chap­ter, be­ing a re­gion­al re­li­gious and po­lit­i­cal-ad­min­is­tra­tive cen­ter.

LOCATION PLAN OF THE TOWN AT THE END OF THE XIV CENTURY:
1. BISHOPS' CASTLE, 2. CHAPTER CASTLE, 3. CATHEDRAL, 4. FARMYARD, 5. MARKET SQUARE, 6. TOWN WALLS

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n Septem­ber 19, 1410 the troops of Pol­ish king Wła­dy­sław II Ja­gieł­ło en­tered the cas­tle on their way back from un­suc­cess­ful ex­pe­di­tion to Mal­bork. This time the "vis­it" had a cer­e­mo­ni­al char­ac­ter, as Ja­gieł­ło was treat­ed as a guest by the chap­ter. Dur­ing his brief stay in Kwi­dzyn, he vis­it­ed, among oth­ers, the cell of Blessed Do­ro­thy of Mąt­wy, an as­cetic and mys­tic, who had or­dered to be walled up in the cathe­dral, where she died in 1394. The Poles re­turned to Kwi­dzyn four years lat­er, this time for war pur­pos­es. They cap­tured the town then and burned it down, but did not at­tempt to con­quer the cas­tle due to lack of nec­es­sary equip­ment. Af­ter the out­break of an­ti-Teu­ton­ic up­ris­ing in 1454, Bish­op Kas­par Lin­ke (d. 1463) first sup­port­ed the Prus­sian Union, but as a re­sult of the de­feat of Pol­ish forces at the Bat­tle of Choj­ni­ce, he changed his po­lit­i­cal ori­en­ta­tion, plac­ing the cas­tle un­der Teu­ton­ic Knights' com­mand. From then on, un­til the end of the war, the Or­der car­ried out of­fen­sive cam­paigns from here, tak­ing part in re­tal­ia­to­ry and plun­der­ing ex­pe­di­tions to Chełm­no Land (1455) and Do­brzyń Land (1458). The cas­tle was al­so used to block­ade and con­trol nav­i­ga­tion on the Vis­tu­la and land routes in­to Prus­sia.

MEDIEVAL TOWN WALLS, IN THE BACKGROUND WE CAN SEE THE WESTERN WING OF THE CASTLE AND THE DANSKER

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n Septem­ber 1460 the Pol­ish army com­mand­ed by An­drzej Pusz­karz, bur­grave from Świecie, in­vad­ed Kwi­dzyn. The Poles cap­tured both cas­tles and the cathe­dral, in which the sur­vivors of the Teu­ton­ic Knights were hid­ing, and which suf­fered heav­i­ly dur­ing the at­tempt to re­cap­ture it. How­ev­er, they did not de­cide to gar­ri­son the gained strong­holds and af­ter plun­der­ing the town, they left. Based on the To­ruń Peace Treaty from 1466, Kwi­dzyn, as well as the epis­co­pal do­min­ion, was grant­ed to the Teu­ton­ic Knights, while the Po­meza­ni­an bish­opric came un­der the ad­min­is­tra­tion of Polish Bish­op Win­cen­ty Go­sław­ski. Af­ter his death in 1478 the Or­der want­ed to im­pose its can­di­date for the of­fice, which led to the in­ter­ven­tion of Pol­ish troops re­mem­bered by his­to­ry as the War of the Priests. Most prob­a­bly, at that time, as a re­sult of the shel­ling, the cas­tle tow­ers and the cathe­dral walls were dam­aged, al­so the vault of the crypt col­lapsed. Bish­op Jan IV von Las­sen soon un­der­took to re­paire the dam­age, ex­cept for the cas­tle tow­ers, which were de­mol­ished.

TOWN PANORAMA FROM 1595 BY C. HENNEBERGER

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ur­ing the last Pol­ish-Teu­ton­ic war in 1520, Pol­ish ar­til­le­ry se­ri­ous­ly dam­aged the cathe­dral chapel of Blessed Do­ro­thy and the struc­ture of the chap­ter cas­tle, and de­stroyed the old bish­op's cas­tle. The last Teu­ton­ic bish­op of Po­meza­nia was Er­hard von Queis (d. 1529), who three years lat­er abol­ished the Catho­lic bish­opric. Due to the very poor con­di­tion of the old cas­tle, his Pro­tes­tant suc­ces­sor Pau­lus Sper­a­tus moved the seat of the bish­ops to the chap­ter cas­tle, where he re­paired at his own ex­pense the dam­age caused by the shel­ling (us­ing one hun­dred thou­sand bricks ob­tained from the old cas­tle), and changed the dec­o­ra­tion of the cathe­dral to a more mod­est one, in ac­cor­dance with the strict doc­trine of the new faith. When the bish­op died in 1551, the cas­tle build­ing passed in­to the hands of Duke Al­brecht von Ho­hen­zol­lern (d. 1568) and was lat­er adapt­ed for hous­ing of­fi­cers and of­fi­cials of the ducal ad­min­is­tra­tion. In 1586, a mem­ber of the town coun­cil, An­to­nius Trost, erect­ed a late-Ro­ma­ne­sque nar­thex from Got­land lime­stone in the south ais­le of the cathe­dral, next to the main en­trance. The build­ing ma­te­ri­al he ob­tained from the ru­ined old Bish­op's cas­tle.

XVI-CENTURY NARTHEX BUILT OF STONE OBTAINED FROM THE BISHOP'S CASTLE

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n 1658 the cas­tle was shelled by Swedish ar­tillery for ten days, but it man­aged to with­stand the siege de­spite be­ing severe­ly dam­aged. Af­ter re­con­struc­tion it be­came the seat of Prus­sian ad­min­is­tra­tion, al­so served as a roy­al res­i­dence and an im­por­tant junc­tion on the postal route from König­s­berg to Ber­lin. It was here that in 1709 King Frie­drich I of Prus­sia (d. 1713) met with Rus­sian Tsar Peter the Great (d. 1725). The rul­ers stayed at the cas­tle for o­ver a week, and their pres­ence was ac­com­pa­nied by po­lit­i­cal meet­ings be­tween high of­fi­cials of both coun­tries.

THE CASTLE IN A. BOOT'S ENGRAVING OF 1627

PANORAMA OF THE TOWN, 1700

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oon af­ter these events, the cas­tle be­gan to lose its im­por­tance, and its stature de­clined to that of a provin­cial of­fice. In 1728, the south wing of the cas­tle be­came a grain ware­house for the mil­i­tary gar­ri­son, and short­ly there­after work­ers de­mol­ished part of the clois­ters. Fur­ther dev­as­ta­tion of the cas­tle was done by the Rus­sians sta­tion­ing in Kwi­dzyn in the years 1758-62. From that time comes the so-called Fer­mor's Palace, built in the for­mer farm­yard area for Víl­lim Víl­li­mo­vich Fer­mor (d. 1771), gen­er­al-in-chief of the Im­pe­ri­al Rus­sian Army and com­man­der of the troops oc­cu­py­ing the town dur­ing the Sev­en Years' War. A year af­ter his death, the court of­fice moved in­to the cas­tle, which, de­spite some ad­min­is­tra­tive changes, op­er­at­ed here un­til 1935. To this pur­pose, some works were car­ried out, which con­sist­ed, among oth­er things, in mak­ing a new di­vi­sion of the in­te­ri­ors, build­ing a new stair­case, and adapt­ing the cas­tle court­yard in­to a prison.

FERMOR'S PALACE BUILT IN THE FORMER FARMYARD

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f­ter 1798 the south­ern and east­ern wings were de­mol­ished and the ma­te­ri­als thus ob­tained were used to erect the Kwi­dzyn Land Court build­ing, al­so known as the Palace of Jus­tice. The cost of dis­man­tling these parts of the strong­hold far ex­ceed­ed the cost of buy­ing new bricks, and per­haps this fact saved the for­mer chap­ter cas­tle from to­tal de­struc­tion. In the pre­served wings in the first half of the 19th cen­tu­ry the town au­thor­i­ties or­ga­nized, among oth­ers, an in­sti­tu­tion for the blind and a craft school. In this pe­ri­od, the well tow­er was re­built and the up­per floors of the north­ern wing were adapt­ed for new prison cells. There were al­so plans to build a new storey for ad­min­is­tra­tion pur­pos­es, but this idea did not gain ac­cep­tance and was aban­doned.

LITHOGRAPH BY EDUARD PIEZSCH, 1839

WOODCUT FROM THE SECOND HALF OF THE XIXTH CENTURY

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e­spite the fact that al­ready in the ear­ly 19th cen­tu­ry the cas­tle was con­sid­ered a mon­u­ment of Ger­man ar­chi­tec­ture, the lack of funds for cur­rent main­te­nance caused it to fall in­to in­creas­ing ne­glect. It was not un­til 1854 that King Fried­rich Wil­helm IV (d. 1861), at the re­quest of the di­rec­tor of the court named Wet­zke, or­dered to take mea­sures aimed at sav­ing this his­toric build­ing. To this end, work be­gan that in the first stage (1854-62) in­clud­ed the en­large­ment of win­dow open­ings, the con­struc­tion of a new stair­case and the res­tora­tion of the west­ern and north­ern clois­ters. Af­ter 1873, the gables of the cor­ner tow­ers were re-erect­ed, the la­trine tow­er re­ceived a new roof, and the ex­te­ri­or fa­cades got dec­o­ra­tive Goth­ic mo­tifs. Some of the cas­tle rooms ob­tained new vaults and ar­chi­tec­tural de­tails tak­en from the de­mol­ished wings. The to­tal cost of these works ex­ceed­ed 40 thou­sand thalers.

THE CASTLE ON THE PHOTOS FROM THE END OF THE XIXTH CENTURY (ABOVE) AND FROM THE 1930S

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n the in­ter­war pe­ri­od a small Heimat­mu­se­um West­preus­sen op­er­at­ed in the cas­tle. From 1937 un­til the end of World War II, Hit­ler­ju­gend HJ-Ost­land­führer­schul was al­so lo­cat­ed here. Dur­ing the of­fen­sive of the Red Army in Jan­uary 1945, the cas­tle-cathe­dral com­plex, un­like the Old Town, did not suf­fer se­ri­ous dam­age, al­though the So­vi­ets de­mol­ished its in­te­ri­ors and stole equip­ment. In 1949, the build­ing went un­der the ad­min­is­tra­tion of the Min­istry of Cul­ture and Art, and a year lat­er the Pol­ish mu­se­um opened here. Since 1973 the mu­se­um in Kwi­dzyn is a branch of the Cas­tle Mu­se­um in Mal­bork.

THIS IS HOW THE PERSPECTIVE ON THE CASTLE-CATHEDRAL COMPLEX FROM THE SOUTH CHANGED AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY
ON THE PICTURES FROM THE TOP: 1915 - WESTERN FRONTAGE OF THE MARKET SQUARE, 2015 - HOLE IN THE GROUND (TENEMENT HOUSES WERE DEMOLISHED AFTER THE WAR), 2021 - NEW TENEMENT HOUSES IN THE WESTERN FRONTAGE

HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING

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he Goth­ic cas­tle was built of brick, on a plan sim­i­lar to a square with di­men­sions of about 49x50 me­ters. It con­sist­ed of four wings en­clos­ing a rect­an­gu­lar court­yard, with in­ter­nal side di­men­sions of about 12x16 me­ters, and with sto­ried gal­leries. The south-east and south-west wings were prob­a­bly four storeys high, while the oth­ers were five storeys high, all with base­ments. The old­est of them (no longer ex­tant) - the south-east wing, called no­va cur­ia no­stra in Teu­ton­ic Knights' times - housed the in­fir­mary on the sec­ond floor, and the provost's apart­ment, to which a small room ad­joined, iden­ti­fied to­day as the chap­ter's ar­chive and trea­sury. The rep­re­sen­ta­tive func­tions in the cas­tle were per­formed by the south-west wing, al­so not pre­served. Its sec­ond storey was oc­cu­pied by two large cham­bers: a four-bay chap­ter­house and a five-bay sum­mer re­fec­to­ry il­lu­mi­nat­ed by huge win­dows. Both of these halls were cov­ered with a cross-ribbed vault sup­port­ed by gran­ite columns with carved cap­i­tals.

VIEW OF THE CASTLE FROM THE SOUTHEAST

RECONSTRUCTED CLOISTERS IN THE COURTYARD, IN THE BACKGROUND WE CAN SEE
THE TRACES OF THE DEMOLISHED SOUTHEASTERN WING

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he en­trance to the cas­tle court­yard led from the north-east­ern side through a gate, above which there was a chapel cov­ered with a four-armed stel­lar vault. Next to it, a win­ter re­fec­to­ry was sit­u­at­ed. The walls and vaults of these cham­bers were rich­ly dec­o­rat­ed with paint­ings; the rooms al­so had floor heat­ing. The sec­ond storey of the north-west wing housed dor­mi­to­ries, which were first or­gan­ised in one huge hall and from the 15th cen­tu­ry con­sist­ed of in­di­vid­u­al cells. This is al­so where the pas­sage to the dansker led. The ground floor and cel­lars were used for house­hold pur­pos­es: there were stoves for heat­ing the cham­bers, two kitchens, a bak­ery, store­hous­es, pantries, guard cham­bers and a prison. The up­per floors of the cas­tle housed a li­brary, liv­ing quar­ters for the cler­gy, and quar­ters for stu­dents of the cathe­dral school. On the top floor, in the thick­ness of the out­er wall, there were porch­es with loop­holes en­abling the fir­ing of both the front of the cas­tle and its court­yard. There were al­so gra­naries, and pos­si­bly weapon stores.

PLAN OF THE SECOND FLOOR, PRESENT STATE: 1. TREASURY, 2. PROVOST'S CHAMBER, 3. CHAPEL, 4. WINTER REFECTORY,
5. DORMITORIES, 6. MAIN GATE, 7. DANSKER, 8. WELL TOWER, 9. MAIN TOWER

NORTH-EAST WING WITH THE MAIN GATE AND WELL TOWER

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he cas­tle had three slen­der cor­ner tur­rets and a mas­sive 59-me­ter-high bell tow­er. This tow­er was o­ver 20 me­ters high­er than the cas­tle build­ings and its crenel­lat­ed top served not on­ly as an ob­ser­va­tion point but al­so as a plat­form for send­ing light sig­nals to the cas­tles in Nowe and Gniew. In the sec­ond half of the four­teenth cen­tu­ry, a mas­sive san­i­tary tow­er, called dan­sker, was built about 60 me­ters from the north­west wing, and con­nect­ed to it by a huge Goth­ic porch sup­port­ed by five high ar­cades. In the Mid­dle Ages a stream flowed un­der the san­i­tary tow­er, car­ry­ing away the waste. In the 19th cen­tu­ry, the tow­er housed prison cells, and a prison yard func­tioned un­der its ar­cades. Pris­on­ers were led to their cells by ex­ter­nal stairs, built so as not to have to lead the con­victs through the ad­min­is­tra­tive part of the cas­tle.

XIXTH-CENTURY EXTERNAL STAIRS USED FOR TRANSPORTING PRISONERS TO CELLS LOCATED IN THE DANSKER

DANSKER IN KWIDZYN, REPORTEDLY THE LARGEST LATRINE IN THE WORLD

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n the sec­ond half of the 14th cen­tu­ry, a well tow­er, called aqua­duc­tos, was erect­ed. This build­ing, as its name sug­gests, housed a well sup­ply­ing wa­ter to the cas­tle's staff (un­til the end of the 18th cen­tu­ry), it al­so per­formed for­ti­fi­ca­tion func­tions by flank­ing the draw­bridge cross­ing. The cas­tle was de­fend­ed from the west by a low cur­tain wall and a high es­carp­ment, and from the north by a cur­tain wall and a wide moat, be­hind which a farm yard ex­tend­ed. Farm build­ings (sta­bles, barns, coach hous­es, pigsties), dwellings for ser­vants and brawlers were placed there. The on­ly way of com­mu­ni­ca­tion be­tween the farm yard and the out­side world con­sti­tut­ed a bridge con­nect­ing it with the cas­tle, which proves that the area be­longed strict­ly to the chap­ter.

AT THE FOOT OF THE WELL TOWER

VIEW FROM THE FORMER FARM YARD TO THE WELL AND LATRINE TOWERS

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e­tween 1330 and 1380 a mas­sive church was erect­ed east of the cas­tle, which re­ceived the rank of cathe­dral in the ear­ly 15th cen­tu­ry. Its con­struc­tion be­gan on the chan­cel (south­east) side and con­tin­ued un­til it was con­nect­ed to the north­east wing of the cas­tle. It is a three-nave build­ing, con­sist­ing of a two-storey choir and an elon­gat­ed five-bay hall, with the main nave cov­ered by an eight-armed stel­lar vault and the side naves - by tri­par­tite vaults. On the south-west side of the tem­ple stands a mon­u­men­tal bell tow­er, which years ago al­so served as a cas­tle tow­er. Two small­er oc­tag­o­nal tur­rets flank the chan­cel and serve to com­mu­ni­cate with the at­tic and de­fen­sive porch­es rout­ed around the cathe­dral in its top floor.

PLAN OF THE CASTLE AND THE CATHEDRAL: 1. PRESERVED WINGS OF THE CASTLE, 2. DANSKER, 3. WELL TOWER, 4. MAIN TOWER,
5. MAIN NAVE OF THE CATHEDRAL, 6. CHANCEL, 7. OCTAGONAL TURRETS, 8. XVI-CENTURY NARTHEX

VIEW OF THE CASTLE AND CATHEDRAL COMPLEX FROM THE NORTH-EAST,
EARLY 20TH CENTURY DRAWING (THE CASTLE WITH NO CORNER TURRETS)

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hen in 1526 the Catholic bish­opric of Po­me­za­nia was liq­ui­dat­ed, the church lost its pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tive rank, and its in­te­ri­or was de­prived of most of its pre­vi­ous dec­o­ra­tions. Changes were al­so made in the spa­tial ar­range­ment of the tem­ple, sep­a­rat­ing its in­te­ri­or with a wall in­to prayer spaces des­ig­nat­ed for the Ger­man (in the main nave), Pol­ish (in the chan­cel) and Czech com­mu­ni­ty (in the west­ern nave). In lat­er years, the church re­ceived a nar­thex at the main en­trance, built of Got­land sand­stone, prob­a­bly ob­tained from the de­mol­ished bish­op's cas­tle (1586), and a buri­al chapel of Ot­to Frie­drich von Grö­ben, the fa­mous cor­sair, voy­ager and gen­er­al of the Pol­ish army (d. 1728). In 1807, dur­ing the Na­po­le­on­ic Wars, the church served as a food ware­house and an ex­er­cise hall, which led to its dev­as­ta­tion. The thor­ough mod­ern­iza­tion was not car­ried out here un­til the 1860s, as part of a large-scale re-goth­i­ciza­tion of the en­tire cas­tle-cathe­dral com­plex. Af­ter World War II the tem­ple be­longed to the Fran­cis­cans, and since 1993 it has been ad­min­is­tered by dio­ce­san priests.

VIEW OF THE FORMER CATHEDRAL FROM THE CHANCEL SIDE

HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING

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he for­mer cathe­dral, two wings of the cas­tle with cor­ner tur­rets, bell tow­er, well tow­er and san­i­tary tow­er have been pre­served in good con­di­tion to the pre­sent day. The Goth­ic clois­ters have sur­vived on­ly frag­men­tar­i­ly, and what we see now is large­ly the re­sult of 19th-cen­tu­ry re­con­struc­tion, al­though orig­i­nal me­dieval de­tails can be found with­in their walls. The cas­tle in Kwi­dzyn is cur­rent­ly one of the most im­pres­sive ex­am­ples of for­ti­fied Goth­ic ar­chi­tec­ture in north­ern Poland, and its unique char­ac­ter re­sults not on­ly from its very good con­ser­va­tion sta­tus, but al­so, or per­haps above all, from the ex­cep­tion­al­ly rare com­bi­na­tion of a strong­hold and a huge tem­ple in­to one or­gan­ism.

PRESERVED CASTLE WINGS WITH CLOISTERS (WHICH ARE RECONSTRUCTED)

ON THE SITE OF THE SOUTHWEST WING THERE ARE TWO HEAVY BELGIAN CANNONS FROM 1861 AND 1863, WHICH WERE TAKEN DURING THE FRENCH-PRUSSIAN WAR AND THEN PLACED HERE AS A SYMBOL OF PRUSSIAN MILITARY SUPERIORITY

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he cas­tle is home to a branch of the Cas­tle Mu­se­um in Mal­bork, which pre­sents his­tor­i­cal mem­o­ra­bil­ia of the town and re­gion, as well as ob­jects of cul­tur­al and nat­u­ral her­itage re­lat­ed to Po­wi­śle. It in­cludes five sec­tions: arts and crafts, ar­chae­ol­o­gy, ethnog­ra­phy, his­to­ry, and na­ture. The Goth­ic cel­lars of the strong­hold house an arche­o­log­i­cal ex­hi­bi­tion, pre­sent­ing sim­ple tools from the Ne­olith­ic pe­ri­od, as well as ar­ti­cles of dai­ly use found dur­ing the ex­ca­va­tions, car­ried out on the site of town­hous­es de­stroyed dur­ing the war. Here we can al­so see the tor­ture and pun­ish­ment equip­ment com­ing from the tor­ture cham­ber that once op­er­at­ed in the town hall. Par­tic­u­lar­ly note­wor­thy is the orig­i­nal 18th cen­tu­ry tor­ture chest, which was used as part of the scenery in the leg­endary pol­ish film Krzy­ża­cy (Teu­ton­ic Knights) by Alek­san­der Ford (1960).

IN THE GOTHIC CASTLE CELLARS

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hen we go up to the sec­ond floor and through the cov­ered porch we reach the well tow­er, which cen­turies ago pro­tect­ed the well from which good qual­i­ty drink­ing wa­ter was sup­plied to the cas­tle. In the 19th cen­tu­ry, the well was bricked up and from then on the in­te­ri­or of the tow­er served as prison cells and (af­ter 1945) as mu­se­um of­fices. Now it is emp­ty, but un­doubt­ed­ly worth see­ing. Next we go to the dor­mi­to­ry, the largest cham­ber in the cas­tle, which af­ter the 19th cen­tu­ry re­con­struc­tion used to be a rep­re­sen­ta­tive as­sem­bly hall, and in the 1930s and 1940s served as a re­fec­to­ry for the Hi­tler­ju­gend school. Cur­rent­ly, tem­po­rary ex­hi­bi­tions are or­ga­nized here.

AT THE CASTLE WELL

DORMITORY

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n the west wall of the dor­mi­to­ry there is the en­trance to the dan­sker, hu­mor­ous­ly called the largest la­trine in the world. The cross-ribbed vault, the open­ing for the waste dis­pos­al and the stor­age room have been pre­served in the san­i­tary tow­er. Its long, five-ar­cad­ed porch hous­es an ethno­graph­ic ex­hi­bi­tion of the art and ma­te­ri­al cul­ture of the Low­er Vis­tu­la land, most­ly tak­en o­ver from the Ger­man Hei­mat­mu­se­um West­preus­sen, or ac­quired from set­tlers com­ing to this re­gion from oth­er parts of Poland and from the East­ern Bor­der­lands. This ex­hi­bi­tion is com­ple­ment­ed by a col­lec­tion of old fish­ing equip­ment lo­cat­ed in the tow­er.

ETHNOGRAPHIC EXHIBITION IN THE PORCH LEADING TO DANSKER

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he clois­ters have been al­most en­tire­ly re­con­struct­ed. On­ly frag­ments of 14th cen­tu­ry flo­ral dec­o­ra­tion and mul­ti­coloured poly­chrome have been pre­served here. They lead to the for­mer win­ter din­ing room called the win­ter re­fec­to­ry, cov­ered with a Goth­ic vault sup­port­ed by one col­umn. Cur­rent­ly, this cham­ber hous­es an ex­hi­bi­tion of paint­ings and hand­crafts.

CLOISTERS AT THE CASTLE IN KWIDZYN

WINTER REFECTORY

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d­ja­cent to the win­ter re­fec­to­ry is a two-bay chapel cov­ered with an orig­i­nal stel­lar vault, where Goth­ic paint­ings and frag­ments of ar­chi­tec­tural or­na­men­ta­tion have been pre­served. From here we move on to a spa­cious cham­ber, which prob­a­bly housed the apart­ment of the prov­ost (chair­man of the chap­ter). The apart­ment was con­nect­ed to a small room where the trea­sury and the ar­chive were prob­a­bly lo­cat­ed. To­day, the for­mer dwel­ling of the prov­ost is used as a space for ex­hi­bi­tions on the his­to­ry of Kwi­dzyn and its in­hab­i­tants.

PROVOST'S APARTMENT

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he premis­es of the third floor of the cas­tle are de­void of dec­o­ra­tions and el­e­ments char­ac­ter­is­tic of Me­dieval ar­chi­tec­ture, and their Goth­ic past is on­ly ev­i­denced by the mas­quer­ade win­dows. This storey is oc­cu­pied en­tire­ly by an ex­hi­bi­tion ti­tled Na­ture of North­ern Poland, which in­cludes the col­lec­tion of na­tive fau­na and flo­ra, con­sist­ing of o­ver 1500 ex­hibits. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, this may be a sad ex­pe­ri­ence for some peo­ple, as the ex­hib­it con­sists most­ly of stuffed an­i­mals, al­though the authors of the ex­po­si­tion un­doubt­ed­ly put a lot of ef­fort in­to care­ful­ly prepar­ing and sound­ing out scenery that re­flects the nat­u­ral habi­tats of these cre­atures. The na­ture ex­hi­bi­tion is com­ple­ment­ed by botan­i­cal col­lec­tions, a col­lec­tion of in­sects, and a very in­ter­est­ing pa­le­on­to­log­i­cal pre­sen­ta­tion with the re­mains of a mam­moth, an au­rochs, a Green­land whale, and even a fos­sili­zed ha­dro­saur egg.

NATURE OF NORTHERN POLAND

Tick­ets are re­quired for en­try to the cas­tle. It is pos­si­ble to rent au­dio guides.

It takes about 1.5 hours to vis­it all ex­hi­bi­tions.

There is per­mis­sion to pho­to­graph the in­te­ri­or.

How­ev­er, there is no per­mis­sion to bring an­i­mals in­to the cas­tle.

Sit­u­a­tion of the cas­tle on the edge of the ur­ban com­plex is favourable for sky pho­tog­ra­phy. We have a lot of space on the west side and part­ly on the south side, be­cause there is on­ly a field and green ar­eas there.

A POTENTIALLY GRUESOME SCENE WITH A COCK AND AN AXE

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t is al­so worth vis­it­ing the for­mer cathe­dral of the Pomeza­ni­an chap­ter (to­day the church of the Blessed Vir­gin Mary and John the Evan­ge­list), which hides in its in­te­ri­or the Goth­ic paint­ings from the ear­ly six­teenth cen­tu­ry de­pict­ing life-size fig­ures of 17 Pomeza­ni­an bish­ops and three mas­ters of the Teu­ton­ic Or­der buried here. At the en­trance to the tem­ple, there are tomb­stones of bish­ops, parish priests and knights, as well as the on­ly me­dieval mo­sa­ic paint­ing in Poland, dat­ed 1380, de­pict­ing the mar­tyr­dom of St. John the Evan­ge­list (ac­cord­ing to tra­di­tion, he was boiled in oil) and Bish­op John I Mönch kneel­ing next to him. In ad­di­tion, the church fur­nish­ings in­clude a mag­nif­i­cent oak bish­op's throne from 1504, Re­nais­sance epi­taphs, the buri­al chapel of Ot­to Friedrich von Grö­ben, and col­or­ful Baroque Evan­gel­i­cal con­fes­sion­als.

THE MAIN NAVE AND ONE OF THE SIDE NAVES OF THE CHURCH (THE FORMER CATHEDRAL)

GETTING THERE

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he cas­tle is lo­cat­ed slight­ly north of the old Mar­ket Square, on Ka­te­dral­na Street. If you trav­el by train, when leav­ing the train sta­tion you should head west on Chopin Street and then north on Tar­go­wa Street. The walk to the cas­tle takes about 15 min­utes.

A few dozen me­ters north of the cas­tle there is a large park­ing lot on Ka­te­dral­na Street, op­po­site the Fer­mo­na Palace (free, 2022).

In 2015, it was pos­si­ble to bring bi­cy­cles in­to the cas­tle court­yard.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. L. Adamczewski: Grób mistrzów krzyżackich, Głos Wielkopolski 15.03.2008
2. J. Bieszk: Zamki państwa krzyżackiego w Polsce, Bellona
3. M. Garniec, M. Jackiewicz-Garniec: Zamki państwa krzyżackiego w dawnych Prusach, studio Arta 2009
4. M. Grupa, T. Kozłowski: Katedra w Kwidzynie – tajemnica krypt, Kwidzyńskie Centrum Kultury 2009
5. L. Kajzer, J. Salm, S. Kołodziejski: Leksykon zamków w Polsce, Arkady 2001
6. Praca zbiorowa: Zamek i katedra w Kwidzynie, Foto Liner
7. M. Prarat, K. Zimna-Kawecka: Konserwatorskie i społeczne aspek­ty ochro­ny ru­in zam­ków na te­re­nie pań­stwa za­ko­nu krzy­żac­kie­go w Pru­sach do po­ło­wy XX w.
8. R. Sypek: Zamki i obiekty warowne Państwa Krzyżackiego, Agencja CB 2000
9. A. Wagner: Murowane budowle obronne w Polsce X-XVIIw., Bellona 2019
10.P. Zaniewski: Szlakami zamków krzyżackich, MUZA S.A. 2005

Castles nearby:
Gniew - the Teutonic castle from the 13th/14th century, 21 km
Prabuty - relics of the Pomezanian bishops' castle from the 13th century, 21 km
Sztum - the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 25 km
Nowe - relics of the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 28 km
Rogoźno - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 13th/14th century, 32 km
Grudziądz - relics of the Teutonic castle from the 13th century, 36 km
Malbork - the castle of the Grand Masters of the Teutonic Knights from the 13th/14th century, 39 km
Pokrzywno - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 13th century, 43 km
Dzierzgoń - relics of the Teutonic castle from the 13th century, 46 km
Przezmark - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 49 km
Radzyń Chełmiński - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 13th century, 50 km

text: 2022
photographs: 2015, 2021
© Jacek Bednarek