There is surely no trip more Cracovian than a walk along the Royal Route! Why have we prepared this trail as part of the “Become a Visitor in Your Own City. Explore Kraków” campaign for local residents?
For us Cracovians, the greenery of Planty Garden Ring, the hustle and bustle of the Main Market Square and the charm of Kanonicza Street are familiar and heart-warming. However, by giving a description of this route we want to show that our city can be explored indefinitely and its treasures are boundless! Join us on a journey down the Royal Route or Via Regia. For many centuries, the Royal Route was used by monarchs after victorious battles, bishops taking office, foreign dignitaries, and funeral processions of eminent Poles. The historic route, leading from Matejko Square along Floriańska Street, the Main Market Square, Grodzka and Kanonicza streets to finally reach Wawel Hill, is lined by some of our city’s most famous buildings and monuments.
We start at Matejko Square where our eyes are instantly drawn to the Grunwald Monument, erected in 1910 from the funds of the pianist, composer and politician Ignacy Jan Paderewski. While there, take a peek into the Church of St Florian, guarding the old road to Warsaw (commemorated in the name of Warszawska Street leading from the square). The first temple at the site was erected in the 12th century to keep the relics of the martyr; legend has it that the saint waved his hand from his tomb in Rome to encourage the pope to send his relics to distant Poland.
From there you can see the Barbican – a masterpiece of the mediaeval art of fortification, built in the late 15th century to defend the city from expected Wallachian and Turkish incursion. Fortunately the assailants never showed up, and the building has been standing strong for over five hundred years. The Barbican last defended Kraków in the 18th century during the Bar Confederation – its soldiers fought to stave off Russian forces until at last they ran out of ammunition. The brave tanner Marcin Oracewicz loaded his rifle with a button from his coat and shot the Russian commander right between the eyes. The Russian forces panicked, and so the button fired at the Barbican saved Kraków from certain invasion.
Let’s walk to St Florian’s Gate – one of the former seven city gates – and look at the remnants of the city walls with three turrets remaining of the original 47. St Florian’s Gate came close to also being demolished! In the early 20th century, when an electric tram network was being built in Kraków, one of the lines was to lead through the gate, but it turned out that there was not enough clearance for a tram carriage. Progress is progress, though, so the gate was set to be razed to the ground. Fortunately the mediaeval relic was saved at the last minute when someone came up with the idea to simply deepen the pavement. That solved the clearance problem and the tramline went ahead.
We now enter one of Kraków’s most famous thoroughfares: Floriańska Street. It features on maps of Kraków dating back as far as 1257, while its name – first found in documents from the early 14th century – has remained unchanged for over seven centuries. The street has witnessed myriad events over the centuries: the great painter Jan Matejko was born and died at one of the tenement houses lining it (the building is now a branch of the National Museum in Krakow), Jan Apolinary Michalik opened his famous Jama Michalika café here in the late 19th century, and the largest Museum of Pharmacy in Poland is located at another building, with a wine cellar to boot… Although they have been renovated countless times, many of the tenement houses date back at least to the Renaissance; some bear coats of arms which had been used in lieu of numbers, displaying symbols such as bells, a lamb, a squirrel, an angel, the Virgin Mary and the Eye of Providence.
Floriańska brings us out onto the Main Market Square, the largest city square in mediaeval Europe designed at the intersection of ancient trade routes around the city’s new charter in the 13th century. This centre was designed to satisfy all the basic needs of the population connected to the functioning of the city (the Town Hall being the seat of the authorities), trade and economic life (Sukiennice market), the spiritual dimension (with St Mary’s being the parish church and cemeteries: on site of the present-day Mariacki Square and surrounding the Church of St Adalbert), and finally serving out justice (with a pillory, branding station and the rostrum for the executioner). You can learn more about life in the city at the exhibition Following the Traces of European Identity of Kraków (Underground Rynek – branch of the Museum of Krakow).
The vast square is lined with tenement houses and aristocratic residences such as the Szara and Hetmańska tenement houses and the Pod Baranami, Spiski and Krzysztofory palaces; it evokes legends such as the enchanted pigeons; it hosts ancient customs such as the Lajkonik, the enthronement of the Fowler King and the nativity scene competition; it commemorates notable events such as the Prussian homage and the oath taken by Tadeusz Kościuszko. And that’s not all: there is the Basilica of St Mary with the stunning altar designed and made by Veit Stoss and the hejnał bugle call resounding from the taller tower, the Renaissance Sukiennice (Cloth Hall) market which has been trading non-stop from hundreds of years, the Town Hall Tower marking the spot of the former abode of the city authorities, the Church of St Adalbert commemorating the place where its patron delivered sermons over a thousand years ago…
Let’s pause here for a moment – why does the tiny Romanesque church stand right there on the Main Square? The fact is that it predates the beautiful square by a long time. When the Square was being designed in the 13th century, urban planners simply preserved existing buildings and important routes.
This also applied to Grodzka Street which we are now entering. The angle it leaves the Main Market Square at disrupts the ordered checkerboard layout of streets of the Old Town. It is testament of the age and significance of the thoroughfare which marks the original layout of Kraków. As Floriańska, Grodzka Street is lined with tenement houses bearing animal-themed coats of arms: a golden elephant, a rhinoceros and a lion – Kraków’s oldest dating back to the 14th century.
The intersection of Grodzka and Poselska streets marks the 14th-century boundary of Kraków. Beyond the earth and timber rampart once stretched Okół – a borough of the Wawel Hill and the oldest local settlement, densely filled with wooden houses as early as in the mid-9th century. The imposing Romanesque Church of St Andrew, acting as a stronghold as well as a place of worship, was erected in the 11th century. According to Jan Długosz, the fortified building with its thick stone walls and arrow slits for bowyers provided shelter for city dwellers during the Tatar incursion in 1241. It has been used by the Order of Poor Clares since the 14th century.
Nearby, in the late 16th century, work started on the Church of Sts Peter and Paul; rumour has it that it is the smallest of Kraków’s churches, in fact too small to hold even the apostles, forcing them to stand outside… Originally built for the Jesuits, the construction was unlucky: its first architect suddenly upped and left for Italy, and his follower died before finishing work on the walls which had already started crumbling. It was finally completed by Giovanni Trevano, the royal architect of King Sigismund III Vasa. The construction was not easy, but resulted in the first church in Poland built in the Baroque style.
Another notable location along the way is the Św. Marii Magdaleny Square in front of the former Jesuit church. Since the Middle Ages, it was the site of a church of the same name; it and an outline of the building are all that now remains of it. It’s certainly not an unusual feature in Kraków’s Old Town: many of its squares – Wszystkich Świętych, Szczepański, Świętego Ducha – were created following the demolition of former church buildings.
We are almost at the end of our route: we enter Kanonicza Street, one of Kraków’s oldest and most picturesque streets. It owes its name to the canons of Kraków Cathedral who build their manors there in the 14th century; the original Gothic constructions were later redeveloped into splendid Renaissance residences. The courtyards are lined with beautiful cloisters and loggias, and the buildings still bear graceful decorations and portals – Cracovian clergy clearly didn’t take the commandment to live modestly too seriously… The most imposing building at Kanonicza is the Bishop Erazm Ciołek Palace (today it is a branch of the National Museum in Krakow). Its closest competitor was Deacon’s House – from the late 16th century being a Mannerist residence entered via a portal with the “welcoming” inscription Procul este profani (Be gone, ye uninitiated; today the site of the Archdiocesan Museum). In the 15th century, Canon Jan Długosz, Poland’s most notable mediaeval historian, lived at the tenement house right at the foot of Wawel Hill. Before then the site was the royal bathhouse; according to popular gossip, courtiers of Queen Jadwiga spied on her future bridegroom Władysław Jagiełło to check that the “Lithuanian bear” wasn’t covered in fur!
And we’re just a few steps away from the Royal Castle. We followed the entire Via Regia in the footsteps of Poland’s monarchs, and we’ll be sure to return. There is still so much more to discover! (bs)
This and other trips around Kraków can be found on www.krakow.travel.
