Walewice - town in the commune Bielawy, in Lowicz poviat, in voivodeship of Lodzwhose position is jokingly described as "between Friday and Saturday," which is true. Closer, though smaller, is the old town Saturdayand a village a bit further Friday, known to lie in the geometric center Polish.
During the times of the Kingdom of Poland, there was the Walewice commune.
In the years 1975–1998 the town was administratively part of the Skierniewice Province.
Geographic coordinates: 52 ° 06′13 ″ N 19 ° 40′03 ″ E
History
Walewice was mentioned in 1316, although earlier there was a settlement here, traces of which still exist today. The settlement existed at the so-called "Via magna antiqua" - the former branch of the amber route.
At the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, the owner of Walewice was Anastazy Walewski, chamberlain of King Stanisław August Poniatowski who, with his first wife Magdalena, née Tyzenhauz, built here in the years 1773-1783 on the river A screeching classicist palace. Its designer and builder was Hilary Szpilowski and it is one of the few remaining palaces built according to the principles of Palladio.
The second wife of chamberlain Anastazy Walewski was Maria, née Łączyńska, a woman of extraordinary beauty, a well-known figure of the Napoleonic era, godmother of Zygmunt Krasiński. On May 4, 1810, Aleksander Colonna-Walewski was born in Walewice, the natural son of Napoleon I, a statesman during the times of Napoleon III (later ambassador France in Great Britain and in the years 1855-1860 Minister of Foreign Affairs of Napoleon III and then Minister of Culture and Art of France), who died in 1868 in Strasbourg.
In the mid-nineteenth century, the palace and its property passed into the hands of the Grabiński family of the Pomian coat of arms, who were its owners until 1945, when they were expropriated under the decree on land reform.
At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Grabiński family modernized and rebuilt the palace, established a stud of half-bred horses (Anglo-Arabians), developed a caracul breeding farm, a huge fish farm (on over 100 ha of ponds), a potato meal and starch factory.
The last owners of Walewice were the papal chamberlain Stanisław Bohdan Grabiński with his wife Jadwiga nee Potocki, and after his death in 1930, their minor children: Stanisław Wojciech, Maria, Władysław, Róża and Jan Grabiński.
In the interwar period, Walewice was one of the best developed land estates in central Poland.
In 1945, part of the property was parceled out and land was given to the local peasants, the remaining area was nationalized. From 1952, Walewice became the seat of a large complex of state-owned farms. The horse stud, existing before World War II, was nationalized and significantly expanded. Thoroughbred horses are bred here, largely for export.
Historical monuments
The Walewice residence consists of a palace, park and farm buildings.
- Palace - brick, located on a high slope of the Mroga valley, it consists of the main body and two side pavilions connected with it by galleries that break at right angles. The main body is one-story, on a rectangular plan. In the front elevation there is a four-column Ionian portico topped with a triangular pediment; in the tympanum a cartouche with the Pomian coat of arms. The creator of the palace, architect Hilary Szpilowski (1753–1827) was a student of Stanisław Zawadzki (1743–1806), one of the first Poles-architects educated with the support of King Stanisław August, who had his own concept of the classicist style. Hilary Szpilowski overtook the Royal Łazienki by designing the columned portico of the palace in Walewice. He repeated it in other buildings and became a pioneer of the new style.
There are two deep avant-corps in the garden elevation, and between them there is a terrace with stairs on the ground floor. Inside the palace there is a staircase with broken stairs, divided on the ground floor by a Tuscan colonnade. In the rooms, there are fragments of classicist decorations: a marble fireplace on the ground floor, parquet floors, doors, paneling, wooden mirror frames. Side pavilions built on a square plan, one-story, covered with a tented roof. In one of the rooms there is a classical stone fireplace. One-bay one-story galleries: the southern gallery is pierced on both sides by arcaded, glazed openings, in the northern one, openings are replaced by blind windows. To this day, the palace houses some equipment and furniture from the last owners.
Currently, the palace in Walewice houses the management of the Horse Stud and a 300-hectare fish farm. You can visit the palace and its vaulted vaults, organize horse and carriage rides, organize conventions and conferences.
- Park founded in 1886 according to the design of W. Kronenberg on the area of 13.2 ha. It covers an old stand, has a beautiful composition and a large water surface of two Mroga beds and a pond. In the park, antique stone sculptures "Diana on the hunt", "Apollo with a lyre", and at the bridge of Mars and Venus. In spring, under the still bare tree tops in the park, there is a colorful carpet of white, pink and red Kokorycz, a rare plant of shady deciduous forests. Noteworthy trees: Japanese grouse, white spruce group, red-leaved beech and tulip tree. Natural monument - a pedunculate oak at the western wall of the palace with a short, squat trunk and a wide crown, 6 m in circumference. Mute swans, gray herons, black-headed gulls, wild geese, sometimes a black stork and a cormorant and wild swans.
A 250 m long linden and hornbeam alley leads from the road to the residence. Between the entrance gate and the front of the palace there is a regular part of the park: the entrance avenue, rectangular lawns surrounded by lines of privet and a round lawn in front of the palace, with a flower bed in the middle and four beautiful columned oaks arranged symmetrically around the perimeter. - Economic buildings from the end of the 18th century., without stylish features, rebuilt: a residential building, a granary with a vaulted cellar and a warehouse on the Moga river.
Battle during World War II
- On the night of September 9-10, 1939, heavy fights for the village of Walewice, the farm, the manor and the palace were fought by the Wielkopolska Cavalry Brigade of the Army "Poznań". This fight was part of the battle over Bzura. During the fight, the commander of the 1st squadron of the 17th Greater Poland Lancers Regiment, Captain Michał Gutowski, distinguished himself. Reserve lieutenant Aleksander Lossow-Niemojowski was seriously wounded.
- On the 30th anniversary of the battle, an impressive stone with a commemorative plaque was unveiled in honor of the fallen (in the forest on the left side of the road in front of the village).
- Near the palace and horse farm there is a cemetery of fallen Polish cavalrymen, along with a monument commemorating this fight.
Monuments in the register
According to the register of monuments KOBiDZ (NID), the following objects are entered on the list of monuments:
- palace complex, 18th-19th century
- palace with pavilions and galleries, 1783, register number: 119-VII-28 from January 18, 1962 and 119 from August 24, 1967
- park, registration number: 617 from August 24, 1967
See also
- Walewice Horse Stud (http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadnina_Koni_Walewice)
- Walewice commune (http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gmina_Walewice)
Walewice area
- At the parish cemetery in nearby Bielawy, there is also the quarters of those killed in the defensive war of 1939, as well as the neo-Gothic tomb chapel of the Grabiński family
- In Brzezinka, on the road from Walewice to Bielawy, there is a partially leveled conical settlement
- There is also an extremely interesting inanimate nature reserve "Walewice", with an area of 1.65 ha. In the former gravel pit, on the slope of the Mroga valley, an interesting and extremely rich complex of fossil forms and sediments was discovered during the period when northern Poland was covered with a glacier, and the vicinity of Walewice was in the arctic climate zone
- A few kilometers further, the Bzura River flows in a wide valley of extensive landscaped meadows.
External links
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