Collegium Nobilium (Warsaw)

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The Collegium Nobilium after the 1786 renovations by Stanisław Zawadzki on a watercolor by Zygmunt Vogel. In the foreground on the left the Baroque facade of the Humanski Palace
Today's classicist facade on Miodowa , in the background the modern building of the Warsaw Court of Appeal can be seen
Entrance to the Theater Academy in 2011
The fourth floor above the central projection with a crowning figure cartouche

The building with the name Collegium Nobilium is a palatial building complex on Ulica Miodowa 22/24 in the Warsaw inner city district . From 1754 to 1806 it housed a Piarist boarding school - a forerunner of Warsaw University . The school known as Collegium Nobilium made a significant contribution to the enlightenment in Poland; many important personalities of the time emerged from it. Today the Aleksander Zelwerowicz Theater Academy is located in the former school building .

history

The knight academy , to which the sons of magnates and wealthy aristocrats of Poland were sent, was run as a piarist Konvikt . Stanisław Konarski was the initiator of the establishment of this school, which was initially - from 1740 - in the Humański Palace on Ulica Długa under the name Collegium Novum ; from autumn 1741 it received its new name. Konarski had only one student in the first year of school, but by 1742 he was teaching twenty boys.

New building

From 1743 to 1754 a spacious school and boarding school building was built according to a design by Giacomo Fontana . In 1743 the foundation stone was laid in the presence of many officials and senators of the crown. The financing of the building caused problems in the initial phase. It was only after Konarski had published a brochure in Polish and French in 1744 with an appeal for donations that the magnates received donations to the extent that the building could continue. Among the most generous donors were Marshal Franciszek Bieliński , Hetman Jan Klemens Branicki , Izabela Lubomirska , Zofia Krasińska-Tarłowa (the wife of the Voivod of Lublin ), the Voivod of Sandomierz , Jan Tarło and Cardinal Jan Lipski.

The building was built on an elongated, rectangular floor plan along the Miodowa . It ranged from the Humanski Palace, which was previously used as a school building, on the Długa , to parts of the Ukrainian-Greek Catholic monastery complex of the Order of the Basilians of St. Josaphat (Polish: Cerkiew i monaster Zaśnięcia Najświętszej Marii Panny ). The school was thus located diagonally behind the (today's) field cathedral of the Polish army, which is also located on the Długa .

A centrally located, three-story core building is framed by two two-story wings. The core building has an enormous central projectile above its triangular gable with a fourth floor and two side projections. The facade was made in the late baroque style. At the opening ceremony on September 24, 1754, the Senate, high officials of the Crown, the Primate and several bishops took part.

The boarding school was designed for 60 students. Their teachers and other staff also lived in the building. In addition to the bedrooms, classrooms (which included a chemistry room) and apartments, there were various common areas such as a recreation room, a library, a museum, a theater and a sports hall. In the outbuildings there were stores, stables (with spaces for 16 horses), coach houses, the kitchen, a brewery and a bakery (with two ovens).

In addition to Konarski, the priest Augustyn Orłowski (1731–1794) pioneered the development of the school. He was a confidante of the founder and headed the institution as rector from 1754 to 1759 and from 1761 to 1768. Under Orłowski the library was equipped with an extensive collection of books and the chemistry laboratory and the sports hall equipped with the most modern equipment. He also created a summer holiday resort outside Warsaw, which he named “Jolibord” - a name from which the name Żoliborz , which is still used today for the Warsaw district, was to emerge.

The building was redesigned from 1785 to 1786 according to a design by Stanisław Zawadzki according to contemporary tastes. It received a classical facade. The appearance of the school in its late baroque furnishings as a border decoration is recorded on the map of 1762 by Pierre Ricaud de Tirregaille and with a classical facade on a watercolor by Zygmunt Vogel (see picture above right).

In 1807 the school in Miodowa was closed because the Napoleonic army briefly set up a hospital in the building. The headquarters of the Collegium Nobilium were moved to the school's summer residence in Żoliborz - in what was then Jurydyka Szymanowska - where training continued under restricted conditions until 1832. After the failed November Uprising , the school was finally closed by the Russian authorities.

Teaching

The training at the school lasted eight years, it took place in five stages, three of which ran over two years each. After graduation, the students were able to deepen their knowledge of astronomy, physics or biology for a further two years. The Nazarenes College in Rome and the Collège des Quatre Nations in Paris served as models . According to Konarski, the task of the school was to educate a new generation of Poles to rebuild the Polish state. The future elite should be made acquainted with modern knowledge of the Enlightenment and the sciences. Memorization should be replaced with understanding-based learning. Specially developed textbooks were used.

The curriculum was broader than in other schools of the time. Less emphasis was placed on learning Latin and Greek than on imparting knowledge of natural sciences, mathematics, philosophy and modern languages ​​as well as Polish. In addition to the scholastics , modern philosophers such as Francis Bacon , René Descartes , John Locke and Baruch de Spinoza were included in the curriculum. In addition, introductions to the subjects of history, law and economics were given. In addition to the expansion of the educational horizon, a focus was placed on a clear and precise expression and a culture of debate based on the example of the ancient principles of Cicero rhetoric .

The school continued to focus on employing well-trained teaching staff and using modern educational methods. As a result of these efforts, the later establishment of the four-year Sejm and the adoption of the constitution of May 3, 1791, should be mentioned above the substantial participation of graduates . The experiences at the Collegium Nobilium introduced corresponding reforms at other schools of the Piarists.

The Jesuits and the Krakow Academy initially rejected the new teaching methods at the Collegium Nobilium . In 1762, Czacki, advised by Jesuits, raised serious accusations against religious education in schools in his work Skarga ubogiej szlachty na konwikty . In the medium term, however, they could not ignore the successful training at the Collegium Nobilium .

An essential part of the school building was the theater hall, which was used as the first room of the new school. This theater was less for amusement and was an important element of Konarski's reform plan. Above all, the repertoire of French classical music was shown and conveyed here. Konarski also wrote pieces that were performed here - such as the "Tragedia Epaminondy".

Well-known professors

Well-known graduates

Use of the building in the 19th century

After the Napoleonic hospital was abandoned, the building was mainly used for military purposes until 1831. Among other things, the application school for artillery and engineers (Polish: Szkoła Aplikacyjna Artylerii i Inżynierów ) had its seat here from 1820 onwards . It was opened on December 1, 1820 by its first commanding officer, Colonel Jożef Sowiński. The facility had previously been structurally adapted to its new function by the architect Wilhelm Heinrich Minter . As early as 1814, part of the building was also home to the newly founded Warsaw Charity Society (Polish: Warszawskie Towarzystwo Dobroczynności ), which was created on the initiative of Zofia Czartoryska-Zamoyskas, the owner of the Blue Palace .

In the years 1832 and 1833, Antonio Corazzi , Henryk Marconi and Anicet Czacki (1794-1840) carried out extensive renovations of the building. Now the Supreme Chamber of Accounts (Polish: Najwyższa Izba Obrachunkowa ), which had its seat here until 1845, moved in. As the next user, the court of appeal , the land registry, other courts and various notaries' offices moved into the property in the 1840s .

After some of the authorities (land registry and others) were moved to Pac Palace in 1876 and others (Court of Appeal) later to Badeni Palace , offices of the Warsaw Governor General were set up in the former Collegium Nobilium . These remained here until the withdrawal of the Russian troops in 1915. From then until the outbreak of war in 1939, offices of various other institutions and companies were located in the house.

World War II and post-war period

The building burned several times during World War II . It was particularly hard hit during the fierce fighting of the Warsaw Uprising here . With the exception of the central projection, it was destroyed at the end of the war.

From 1945 to 1955 it was rebuilt under the direction of the architects Wojciech Onitzch, Marian Sulikowski and Andrzej Uniejewski. The object was given to the State Theater School ( Panstwowa Wyższa Szkoła Teatralna ) named after the actor Aleksander Zelwerowicz . The university is still here today.

References and comments

  1. ↑ a b c d e acc. Adolph Sarg, The Piarist Schools in Former Poland and their Reform by Konarski, Konarski's Effectiveness and Services to the Polish School System , A Contribution to the History of the Polish School System (Dissertation), Marburg 1864, p. 21 ff.
  2. ↑ a b c d e acc. Aldona Bartczakowa, Collegium Nobilium (see bibliography)
  3. ↑ Planty Fabryki Collegij Nobilium Varsaviae, Scholarum, Piarum, Anno 1744
  4. ↑ Jan Aleksander Lipski (1690-1746) was a Polish cardinal and bishop of Krakow and a day of the White Eagle Order
  5. ↑ a b according to Joachim Tauber and Ralph Tuchtenhagen, Vilnius. Little history of the city. Education , ISBN 978-3-412-20204-0 , Böhlau, Cologne 2008, p. 119
  6. ↑ The works written by Konarski De emendandis eloquaentiae viitis (1741) and De arte bene cogitandi at artem dicendi bene necessaria (1767) were of particular importance
  7. ↑ a b according to Grażyna Królikiewicz, The literature of the Enlightenment , Important centers and forms of cultural life. The educational reform. The Collegium Nobilium in: Wacław Walecki (Ed.), Polish Literature. Approaches , ISBN 978-3-86815-529-7 , 2nd edition, Igel-Verlag, Hamburg 2011, p. 85 ff.
  8. ↑ according to Eduard Winter, Early Enlightenment , Volume 6 of: Contributions to the History of Religious and Scientific Thought , p. 257 , Akademie-Verlag, 1966
  9. ↑ Aleksander Zelwerowicz (1877–1955) was a Polish actor, director, teacher and theater director

literature

  • Aldona Bartczakowa, Collegium Nobilium , from the series: Zabytki Warszawy , Panstwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, Warsaw 1971 (in Polish)
  • Julius A. Chroscicki and Andrzej Rottermund, Architectural Atlas of Warsaw , 1st edition, Arkady, Warsaw 1978, p. 171
  • Discover Małgorzata Danecka, Thorsten Hoppe, Warsaw. Tours through the Polish capital , Trescher Verlag, ISBN 978-3-89794-116-8 , Berlin 2008, p. 123
  • Janina Rukowska, Travel Guide Warsaw and Surroundings , 3rd edition, ISBN 83-217-2380-2 , Sport i Turystyka, Warsaw 1982, p. 52

Web links

Commons : Collegium Nobilium  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 52 ° 14 '54.3 "  N , 21 ° 0' 25.9"  E