The Kraków Barbican () is a barbican – a fortified outpost once connected to the city walls. It is a historic gateway leading into the Old Town of Kraków,

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. The barbican is one of the few remaining relics of the complex network of fortifications and defensive barriers that once encircled the royal city of

Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...

in the south of Poland.Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2002–2009
The Sites on the UNESCO List.
Krakow, a
Poland.gov.pl
Jane Perlez

in the

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, July 18, 1993. It currently serves as a tourist attraction and venue for a variety of exhibitions.Mieczyslaw Kasprzyk

in "Krakow" from the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

Today the Barbican is under the jurisdiction of The Historical Museum of the City of Kraków. Tourists may tour its interior with its displays outlining the historical development of fortifications in Kraków.Museum's History at the Museum's Home page

History

The Gothic-style barbican, built around 1498, is one of only three such fortified outposts still surviving in Europe, and the best preserved. It is a moated cylindrical brick structure with an inner courtyard 24.4 meters in diameter, and seven turrets. Its 3-meter-thick walls hold 130 embrasures. The barbican was originally linked to the city walls by a covered passageway that led through St. Florian's Gate and served as a checkpoint for all who entered the city.This article incorporates information available at the Polish Wikipedia, including English text a
Verbia – Guided tours of Krakow
The Poles built the barbican fearing an attack by the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

after the defeat of King John I Albert at the

Battle of the Cosmin Forest The Battle of the Cosmin Forest (1497) (; ) was fought between the Moldavian Prince, Ștefan cel Mare (''Stephen the Great''), and King John I of Poland (''John I Albert'') of the Kingdom of Poland (1385–1569), Kingdom of Poland. The battle t ...

and on his way to Poland in

Bukovina Bukovina or ; ; ; ; , ; see also other languages. is a historical region at the crossroads of Central and Eastern Europe. It is located on the northern slopes of the central Eastern Carpathians and the adjoining plains, today divided betwe ...

where 5,000 Polish soldiers were killed by the Turks. After these successive defeats, the Tatars and Ottomans, with the aid of their vassal Stephen of Moldavia, invaded the southeastern corners of Poland. This took place in the spring of 1498: after crossing the

Dniester The Dniester ( ) is a transboundary river in Eastern Europe. It runs first through Ukraine and then through Moldova (from which it more or less separates the breakaway territory of Transnistria), finally discharging into the Black Sea on Uk ...

, the invaders ransacked Red Ruthenia and Podolia, capturing as much as a hundred thousand people and reaching as far as Przeworsk. The walls of Kraków were strengthened and additional fortifications such as the Barbican were built to defend the city in case the Ottomans reached it during the 1485–1503 Polish–Ottoman War. The Barbican participated in the defense of Kraków in 1587 against the Siege of Kraków (1587) by Maximilian III, Archduke of Austria, in the Siege of Kraków (1655) and the Siege of Kraków (1657), and Russian troops during the Polish–Russian War of 1792. The building was threatened with demolition early in the 19th century. However, in 1817 two senators of the Free City of Kraków, Feliks Radwanski and Jan Librowski, convinced the Senate to preserve the Barbican and other parts of the old fortifications.

Design

The Barbican was originally a large, circular tower with an interior open space with a diameter of . It was built of brick and stone and stood four stories tall. It had seven watch towers. The walls were about at their base and at the top. The Barbican's exterior gate, the Kleparz Gate, was protected by a large, semi-circular moat wide and deep.

Features

Considered a masterpiece of medieval military engineering, the circular fortress of the Kraków's ''Barbakan'' was added to the city's fortifications along the coronation route in the late 15th century, based on Arabic rather than European defensive strategy. On its eastern wall, a tablet commemorates the feat of a Kraków burgher, Marcin Oracewicz, who, during the Bar Confederation, defended the town against the Russians and shot their Colonel Panin, according to a legend, using a czamara button instead of a bullet.Beata Moore
Cracow: City of Treasures
112 pages. Published by Frances Lincoln, Kraków – City portrait
at Compress VerlagsgesmbH, Wien, Österreich

Gallery

BASA-1771K-1-1163-29-Krakow, Poland.jpeg, Kraków Barbican in the 1930s Krakau - Barbakan.jpg, Gate to the former fortified passage facing St. Florian's Gate to the south Kraków 149.jpg, Kraków Barbican modern entrance KR067.jpg, Barbican's defensive walls and the connecting bridge from before their 19th century dismantlement

Notes

Bibliography

* Marek Żukow-Karczewski
''The Barbican (Barbakan)'', "KRAKÓW" Magazyn Kulturalny, Special Edition (English-language version), "KRAKÓW" Magazine, Kraków, 1991, p. 58-59.

External links

How to get there?

information about and photographs of Kraków's Barbican {{DEFAULTSORT:Krakow Barbican Buildings and structures completed in 1498 Barbican Barbicans Tourist attractions in Kraków