Byczyna

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Byczyna
Byczyna coat of arms
Byczyna (Poland)
Byczyna
Byczyna
Basic data
State : Poland
Voivodeship : Opole
Powiat : Kluczborski
Gmina : Byczyna
Area : 5.79  km²
Geographic location : 51 ° 7 ′  N , 18 ° 18 ′  E Coordinates: 51 ° 7 ′ 0 ″  N , 18 ° 18 ′ 0 ″  E
Residents : 3652 (December 31, 2016)
Postal code : 46-220
Telephone code : (+48) 77
License plate : OKL
Economy and Transport
Street : DK 11 Byczyna - Olesno
Ext. 487 Kołobrzeg - Bytom
Rail route : Kluczbork – Poznań railway line
Next international airport : Katowice



Byczyna [ bɨˈʧɨna ] ( German Pitschen ) is a town in the powiat Kluczborski of the Opole Voivodeship in Poland . It is the seat of the town-and-country municipality of the same name with almost 9500 inhabitants.

geography

Geographical location

Byczyna is located in the northwestern part of Upper Silesia in the Kreuzburger Land in the Oels- Kreuzburger arable plain. The city is located around 16 kilometers north of the district town of Kluczbork ( Kreuzburg OS ) and 63 kilometers northeast of the voivodeship capital Opole . Approx. 4 kilometers north of Byczyna is the border with the Łódź Voivodeship .

The supra-regional road Droga krajowa 11 and the provincial road Droga wojewódzka 487 run through the village . Wołczyn is located on the Kluczbork – Poznań railway line with the Byczyna stop .

Neighboring places

Neighboring places are Jaśkowice ( Jaschkowitz ) in the north, Borek ( Borek ) and Sierosławice ( Schiroslawitz ) in the northeast, Gosław ( Goslau ) and Paruszowice ( Baumgarten ) in the southeast, Biskupice ( Bischdorf ) and Sarnów ( Sarnau ) in the south, Kochlowice ( Kochelsdorf ) and Polanowice ( Polanowitz ) in the southwest and Miechowa ( Omechau ) and Ciecierzyn ( Neudorf ) in the northwest.

history

The Polish Gate with part of the old city wall
The Battle of Pitschen - painting from 1862
View over the city with the Protestant city church 2012
town hall

"Byscina" was first mentioned in 1228 in a document from Duke Henry I of Silesia . However, from grave finds it can be concluded that there was a Slavic settlement here as early as the 12th century . In 1268 the Breslau bishop awarded the existing and future tithe from the Pitschen district to the Breslau cathedral chapter . It is believed that at this time was made colonization by Germans and Pitschen German law has been implemented. The city was laid out on a hill and received a regular road network on an oval ground plan. It was surrounded by a wall in which the "German Gate" was in the west and the "Polish Gate" in the east. The town hall was built on the rectangular ring.

Pitschen initially belonged to the Opole region ( Silesia Opoliensis ). When this was incorporated into the Duchy of Ratibor in 1202 , Pitschen fell to the Duchy of Silesia ( which did not include the Opole region at that time ) and, after its division in 1248/51, to the Duchy of Wroclaw . In 1294 Pitschen fell together with the entire northeast of the Duchy of Breslau to the Duchy of Glogau and when it was divided in 1312 to the new Duchy of Oels . In 1323 it finally came to the Duchy of Brieg , the Duke Boleslaw III. 1329 together with the Duchy of Liegnitz as a fiefdom to his brother-in-law, the Bohemian King John of Luxembourg , and thus made Bohemia subject to the Crown . The transition to Bohemia was sealed with the Treaty of Trenčín in 1335 . Pitschen was subsequently pledged several times by the dukes of Brieger:

Due to its proximity to the border with Greater Poland , which was only four kilometers away, Pitschen had to suffer frequent Polish raids and looting. During the Hussite Wars it was taken by the Hussite leader Dobeslaus Puchala, who had his base in Kreuzburg.

Under Duke Friedrich II , the Reformation was introduced in Pitschen in 1544, as in the entire Duchy of Brieg . In 1588 Maximilian III was elected King of Poland after a double election in the Battle of Pitschen . on behalf of King Sigismund III. Wasa beaten by Chancellor Jan Zamoyski . During the Thirty Years War it was ravaged by Danish, Swedish and Polish troops as well as the imperial army and destroyed in 1627 and 1637. In 1655 a major fire destroyed large parts of the city. After another fire in 1757, it was rebuilt using brick construction.

With the death of the Duke Georg Wilhelm I , with the Silesian Piast dynasty extinct in the male line, fell Pitschen 1675 along with the duchies of Brieg, Legnica and Wohlau by escheat to the Crown of Bohemia, which since 1526 Habsburg occupied. The Counter-Reformation was carried out in a targeted manner under the Bohemian rulers . In 1707 the measures had to be reversed due to the Altranstadt Convention . However, it also meant that the city had to build a church for the Catholics in 1767.

After the First Silesian War , Pitschen, like almost all of Silesia, fell to Prussia . After the reorganization of Prussia, it belonged to the Kreuzburg OS district since 1815 , which was incorporated into the Opole administrative district in 1820 .

In addition to the craftsmen, linen weaving and brewing were of economic importance. At the annual fairs, which benefited from the proximity to the Polish border, mainly flax, honey, wax and cattle were traded. For the year 1727 the "Pitschnische Scheffel" is documented as a measure of capacity. In 1875 Pitschen received a railway connection on the route from Kreuzburg to Posen .

The increase in population was moderate: 1787 became 1313; 1825: 1593; 1905: 2306; 1939: 3021 and 1961: 2206 inhabitants. In 1910, 82% of the population were German. In the referendum in Upper Silesia on March 20, 1921, 97% of them were in favor of remaining with Germany. With the fall of East Upper Silesia in 1922, Pitschen lost part of its economic ties.

Pitschen also had a Jewish population. Around 1850 there were 105 Jews in Pitschen. After the First World War during the struggle for Upper Silesia, many Jews left Pitschen, so that in 1926 there were only 40 Jews in the city. The Jews spoke out in favor of Upper Silesia remaining with Germany. The prayer house (small synagogue) built in 1882 has been preserved and is now privately owned. There is no evidence of its earlier history on the house. After 1932/33 Jews emigrated, so that there were only 18 Jews left in the city in 1936 and no Jews in 1939. The Pitschen Jewish cemetery has also been preserved. It is located outside the city limits (approximately 3 km from the city). It is located on a picturesque hill about 400 m from the road (near a railroad crossing) not far from the village of Biskupice.

Due to the proximity of the Polish border, Pitschen was involved in the war on the first day of World War II ; In advance, SS units had simulated a provocative attack by Polish troops on the Pitschen forest house. The Red Army reached Pitschen on January 19, 1945. On May 8, 1945, Pitschen fell to Poland as a result of the Second World War and was renamed Byczyna . At the end of the war, more than 200 civilians were shot, including the railway workers and people who were no longer able to get a place on the refugee train. In 1945/46 the German population was largely expelled. Some of the newly settled residents were displaced from eastern Poland .

traffic

There are stops on the Kluczbork – Poznań railway line in Byczyna and the localities of Biskupice and Kostów .

Attractions

Holy Trinity Church
St. Hedwig's Chapel
"German Tower" on the city wall
Development on the ring

Holy Trinity Church

The Roman Catholic Parish Church of the Holy Trinity (Polish: Kościół Świętej Trójcy i Najświętszej Maryi Panny Różańcowej ) was built in 1767 as a baroque hall church. The church has a three-bay nave with a choir closed on three sides . On the west side there is a retracted bell tower with an onion dome. Inside the church has a late baroque main altar with an oval trinity painting. There are also two rococo-style side altars in the church and a baroque-classicist pulpit from the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. a baroque baptismal font and a late classicist organ from the first half of the 19th century.

Evangelical Church of St. Peter

The Evangelical Church of St. Petrus (until 1945 St. Nicholas , Polish Kościół Ewangelicko-Augsburski św. Mikołaja w Byczynie ) is a brick church that was built in the 14th century in the Gothic style. A church in the same place was first mentioned in 1283. From 1556 the church became Protestant. Between 1694 and 1707 the church served again as a Catholic church. The church was renovated from 1790 to 1791. Between 1886 and 1888 the church was regotified. In 1962 and 2003 the church roof was renewed. On a memorial plaque in the church that was inaugurated on May 9, 2004, the names of the Pitschen people who were killed at the end of the war in 1945 can be found, including the Pitschen pastor Karl Wradzidlo.

The three-nave, three-bay church has a rectangular choir, a ribbed vault in the nave and a neo-Gothic interior. On the north side is the old barrel-vaulted sacristy, in the south the new sacristy. The square west tower has a crown and a hipped roof in the neo-Gothic style. Most of the neo-Gothic interior comes from the renovation phase of 1886–1888. There is also a preserved Gothic crucifix from the first half of the 16th century.

St. Hedwig's Chapel

The cemetery chapel St. Hedwig (Polish Kaplica cmentarna św. Jadwigi ) was built in the 14th century as a hall church in the Gothic style. The church was first mentioned in 1383. The three-bay church has a flat ceiling inside and a barrel-vaulted sacristy on the north side. In the west is the vestibule with a groined vault. The west gable was built around 1600.

town hall

The town hall was built in 1757 in the Baroque-Classicism style and is located in the inner block of the ring. In 1766 the town hall was destroyed by fire and rebuilt according to a design by the architect Johann Martin Pohlmann. In 1889 the building was renovated. During the fighting for Pitschen in 1945, the town hall was partially destroyed and rebuilt between 1963 and 1967.

The two-storey building has a rectangular floor plan and a tower on the western side. The east facade is decorated with a volute gable . On the north facade is a Renaissance portal from the first half of the 16th century. The west tower has a Gothic ground floor and a spire in the classicism style .

More Attractions

  • The city ​​wall dates from the 15th / 16th centuries. Century. It is made of brick. Two gate towers have been preserved, the German and Polish towers and the sand tower.
  • Town houses on the ring
  • Gothic granary at ul. Wąska

Personalities

sons and daughters of the town

Personalities who have worked on site

local community

The town-and-country community (gmina miejsko-wiejska) Byczyna is divided into a number of villages with school boards in addition to the town of the same name.

literature

Web links

Commons : Byczyna  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Pitschen in der Topographia Bohemiae, Moraviae et Silesiae  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Georg Gunter: Last Laurel , 1974, p. 127
  2. ↑ a b c d e Dehio Handbook of Art Monuments in Poland. Silesia. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich et al. 2005, ISBN 3-422-03109-X , pp. 195–197
  3. ^ Franz Scholz: Suffering and Dying Silesian Priests 1945/46 , p. 78.