Subtitle:

Officials and personnel of the castle of Gniezno Archbishops at Łowicz (14th century–1531)

Contributor:

Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Historii im. Tadeusza Manteuffla.

Publisher:

Instytut Historii PAN

Place of publishing:

Warszawa

Description:

295 p. : ill. colour ; 24 cm ; Maps ; Annex: Urzędnicy i personel zamku arcybiskupów gnieźnieńskich w Łowiczu do 1531 r ; Bibliography s. 252-273. Indexes. ; Summary in English.

Abstract:

The castle at Łowicz was built in a town being the centre of archbishops’ estates which made part of the archbishops endowment as early as 1136. The development of the town and the settlement in its neighbourhood resulted from activities of successive ordinaries: Jakub Świnka, Janisław and Jarosław Bogoria Skotnicki. In consequence of the economic policy of the archbishops followed around the town, which was chartered before 1298 or even ca. 1286, in 1359 the archbishop’ estates near Łowicz had already 114 places of settlement, and by the early sixteenth century the number grew to almost 130. The castle at Łowicz was one of five castles belonging to Gniezno archbishops, for they had strongholds at Uniejów, Opatówek, and Kamień Krajeński, and in the fifteenth century bought a castle at Wenecja near Żnin. We do not know when exactly the construction of the castle complex was finished, but it appears as a castrum in a document from 1359. The year of 1355 referred to in the scholarly and popular science literature on the subject does not find confirmation in sources. Most probably, the complex was a genetic continuation of the archbishops’ mansio mentioned in 1242 and domus referred to in 1339. The dimension of the first one, square in plan, were 33×34×31×31 m. In time, the castle was extended. In the early sixteenth century it was made of two parts: the upper castle (arx superior), combining representative and residential functions, and the lower castle which probably developed out of the outer ward (castrum inferior), and was serving as the auxiliary service area. Apart from the castle at Uniejów, Łowicz castle was most important for the archbishops. The administration of the Łowicz estates did not lie solely in the hands of the castle officials, who in large part only executed decisions made by the archbishop and the Gniezno Chapter. The archbishop cooperated with the Chapter which influenced decisions of the ordinary and supervised his actions towards the so-called table lands (Polish: dobra stołowe, Latin: mensa archiepiscopalis). The participation of the Chapter members in the administration of the archbishops’ estates was most important during the periods of vacancy in the archiepiscopal see. At such times, canons took over the management of individual demesnes, thus becoming administrative officials. This prerogative is presumably of an old origin; and although the first references to it date to the 1380s, it is well evidenced as late as in the fifteenth century. One crucial aspect of the relationship between archbishops and the Chapter was the practice of entrusting the management over the castles to the lay administration. From time to time the Chapter had to remind that the ordinary should hand over the strongholds and demesnes only to ecclesiastics. This sparked off disputes between the canons and archbishops, such as one of the most heated under Archbishop Władysław of Oporów in the mid-fifteenth century. It was probably at that time that the administrative dualism developed, and both the members of the Cathedral Chapter and the laypersons designated by the archbishops were appointed to the offices of Łowicz starosta (and occasionally also of Uniejów – but this requires further study). The first post was known as principal starosta (capitaneus principalis), the latter simply as starosta (capitaneus). It seems that the management system in the fourteenth century differed from that of the fifteenth and sixteenth century.

Format:

application/pdf

Resource Identifier:

oai:rcin.org.pl:69071 ; 978-83-65880-01-7

Source:

IH PAN, call no. II.14179 ; IH PAN, call no. II.14178 Podr. ; IH PAN, call no. II.14180 SHG Poznań ; click here to follow the link

Language:

pol

Language of abstract:

eng

Rights:

Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license

Terms of use:

Copyright-protected material. [CC BY-ND 4.0] May be used within the scope specified in Creative Commons Attribution BY-ND 4.0 license, full text available at: ; -

Digitizing institution:

Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences

Original in:

Library of the Institute of History PAS

Access:

Open