Swobnica (formerly german: Wildenbruch in Pommern) is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

in the administrative district of

Gmina Banie __NOTOC__ Gmina Banie is a rural gmina (administrative district) in Gryfino County, West Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-western Poland. Its seat is the village of Banie, which lies approximately south-east of Gryfino and south of the regional ...

, within

Gryfino County __NOTOC__ Gryfino County ( pl, powiat gryfiński) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in West Pomeranian Voivodeship, north-western Poland, on the German border. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result o ...

West Pomeranian Voivodeship The West Pomeranian Voivodeship, also known as the West Pomerania Province, is a voivodeship (province) in northwestern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Szczecin. Its area equals 22 892.48 km² (8,838.84 sq mi), and in 2021, it was i ...

, in north-western Poland.

Geography

The village lies approximately south-west of

Banie Banie (formerly ) is a village in Gryfino County, West Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-western Poland. It is the seat of the gmina (administrative district) called Gmina Banie. It lies approximately south-east of Gryfino and south of the regi ...

, south of

Gryfino Gryfino (german: Greifenhagen; nds, Gripenhagen; Kashubian: ''Gripiewò'') is a town in Pomerania, northwestern Poland, with 21,393 inhabitants (2017). It is also the capital of Gryfino County in West Pomeranian Voivodeship (since 1999), previo ...

, and south of the regional capital

Szczecin Szczecin (, , german: Stettin ; sv, Stettin ; Latin: ''Sedinum'' or ''Stetinum'') is the capital and largest city of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in northwestern Poland. Located near the Baltic Sea and the German border, it is a major s ...

. The village has an approximate population of 700.

History

First mentioned in a 1345 deed, the settlement became the seat of a commandry of the

Knights Hospitaller The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military ord ...

, expelled from nearby Rörchen (Rurka) in 1377, on the invitation of the

Pomeranian dukes This is a list of the duchies and dukes of Pomerania. Dukes of the Slavic Pomeranian tribes (All Pomerania) The lands of Pomerania were firstly ruled by local tribes, who settled in Pomerania around the 10th and 11th centuries. Non-dynastic ...

. After the

protestant Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...

, the Wildenbruch estates were held by the noble

House of Putbus The House of Putbus, Pedebuz or Podebusk was a German noble family of high nobility Traditional rank amongst European royalty, peers, and nobility is rooted in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Although they vary over time and among ge ...

. Upon the

Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (80 ...

and the 1648

Peace of Westphalia The Peace of Westphalia (german: Westfälischer Friede, ) is the collective name for two peace treaties signed in October 1648 in the Westphalian cities of Osnabrück and Münster. They ended the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) and brought pea ...

, the area became part of

Swedish Pomerania Swedish Pomerania ( sv, Svenska Pommern; german: Schwedisch-Pommern) was a dominion under the Swedish Crown from 1630 to 1815 on what is now the Baltic coast of Germany and Poland. Following the Polish War and the Thirty Years' War, Sweden held ...

The

secularised In sociology, secularization (or secularisation) is the transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward non-religious values and secular institutions. The ''secularization thesis'' expresses the ...

commandry was ceded to the

Hohenzollern The House of Hohenzollern (, also , german: Haus Hohenzollern, , ro, Casa de Hohenzollern) is a German royal (and from 1871 to 1918, imperial) dynasty whose members were variously princes, electors, kings and emperors of Hohenzollern, Brandenb ...

electorate of

Brandenburg Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a states of Germany, state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an ar ...

by the 1679

Peace of Saint-Germain The Peace of Saint-Germain-en-Laye was signed on 8 August 1570 by Charles IX of France, Gaspard II de Coligny and Jeanne d'Albret, and ended the 1568 to 1570 Third Civil War, part of the French Wars of Religion. The Peace went much further tha ...

. Wildenbruch was purchased by Princess

Sophia Dorothea of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg Sophia means "wisdom" in Greek. It may refer to: *Sophia (wisdom) *Sophia (Gnosticism) * Sophia (given name) Places *Niulakita or Sophia, an island of Tuvalu *Sophia, Georgetown, a ward of Georgetown, Guyana *Sophia, North Carolina, an unincorpo ...

(1636–1689), the second wife of the "Great Elector" Frederick William, who united it with her Brandenburg estates of

Schwedt Schwedt (or Schwedt/Oder; ) is a town in Brandenburg, in northeastern Germany. With the official status of a '' Große kreisangehörige Stadt'' (major district town), it is the largest town of the Uckermark district, located near the river Oder, ...

and

Vierraden Vierraden was the name of a small town in the northeast of the German state of Brandenburg. On October 26, 2003, it was incorporated into the city of Schwedt (Oder), which is about 3 kilometers to the south. Until the incorporation, Vierraden was ...

to provide for her descendants of the

Brandenburg-Schwedt Brandenburg-Schwedt was a secundogeniture of the Hohenzollern margraves of Brandenburg, established by Prince Philip William who took his residence at Schwedt Castle in 1689. By appanage, they administered the manors of Schwedt and Vierraden on ...

secundogeniture. She had the Wildenbruch fortress rebuilt in a

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

style. Wildenbruch was bequested to Dorothea's first-born son Margrave Philip William (1669–1711) and her grandson Frederick William (1700–1771), who died at the castle. The last of the Brandenburg-Schwedt owners was his younger brother Frederick Henry (1709–1788), Wildenbruch fell back to the royal Hohenzollern main line. The last Schwedt heiress Elisabeth Louise (1739–1820) had married her uncle

Prince Augustus Ferdinand of Prussia en, Augustus Ferdinand , house =House of Hohenzollern , father =Frederick William I of Prussia , mother =Sophia Dorothea of Hanover , birth_date = , birth_place =Berlin, Kingdom of Prussia , death_date = , death_place =Berlin, Kingdom of Pr ...

in 1755; their son Prince Louis Ferdinand gave the title of ''von Wildenbruch'' to his illegitimate son Ludwig. Confirmed by King

Frederick William III Frederick William III (german: Friedrich Wilhelm III.; 3 August 1770 – 7 June 1840) was King of Prussia from 16 November 1797 until his death in 1840. He was concurrently Elector of Brandenburg in the Holy Roman Empire until 6 August 1806, wh ...

in 1810, the title was bequested to Ludwig's son, the author

Ernst von Wildenbruch Ernst von Wildenbruch (3 February 184515 January 1909) was a German poet and dramatist. Biography Wildenbruch was born at Beirut in Lebanon, the son of the Prussian consul-general, Ludwig von Wildenbruch, who was himself an illegitimate son of ...

and his descendants. Wildenbruch was incorporated into the Prussian Province of Pomerania. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the area passed to the

Republic of Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

and the remaining German population was expelled (see

History of Pomerania The history of Pomerania starts shortly before 1000 AD with ongoing conquests by newly arrived Polans rulers. Before that, the area was recorded nearly 2000 years ago as Germania, and in modern-day times Pomerania is split between Germany and Pol ...

). Though declared a national monument, the former Hohenzollern castle decayed. Recently, some efforts were made towards its preservation.

Notable people

Waldemar Krzystek Waldemar Krzystek (born 23 November 1953) is a Polish film director and screenwriter. His film '' Ostatni prom'' was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival. His 2008 cold war romance ''Little Moscow'' (''Ma� ...

(born 1953) a Polish film director and screenwriter

References

External links

Wildenbruch Castle
{{Authority control Villages in Gryfino County