St. Jadwiga's Church in Brzeg, Poland, is a

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

castle church built in the fourteenth-century. The

brick A brick is a type of block used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a block composed of dried clay, but is now also used informally to denote other chemically cured cons ...

-built chapel, adjoined to the south-western portion of Brzeg Castle was built in the former location of a collegiate church of St Hedwig built between 1368 and 1369. In 1741, the chapel was destroyed due to Prussian bombardment, with only the presbytery having had survived. After its reconstruction in 1783-1784, the chapel served as the

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be consid ...

for the Silesian Piasts (after 1945, 22 sarcophagi were found in the

crypt A crypt (from Latin ''crypta'' "vault") is a stone chamber beneath the floor of a church or other building. It typically contains coffins, sarcophagi, or religious relics. Originally, crypts were typically found below the main apse of a chur ...

). The chapel suffered damage during World War II, and was re

consecrate Consecration is the solemn dedication to a special purpose or service. The word ''consecration'' literally means "association with the sacred". Persons, places, or things can be consecrated, and the term is used in various ways by different grou ...

d as a church in 1989. Presently, the sarcophagi are located in the adjoined Silesian Piasts Brzeg Castle Museum.

References

{{coord, 50.5148, N, 17.2758, E, source:wikidata, display=title Basilica churches in Poland Brzeg County Brzeg

See also

References