Warsaw [antikvár]

The oldest part of Warsaw, the Old Town, is situated on the high, west bank of the Vistula. From the opposite east bank of the Vistula, a picturesque view extends over the grey, wide river. In front, are the proud buildings of the Royal Castle and patrician terraced-houses dominated by the russet bulk of St. John's cathedral and the slim tower of the Jesuit church. In the morning, the sun's rays fall straight on the diversity and heterogeneity of those buildings. In the evening, only a sharp outline of steep roofs and high towers can be seen against the background of the bright sky. Such a view has always attracted artists. Already in the sixteenth century it was depicted on xylographs and engravings, and frequently painted and sketched. The first panorama which shows Warsaw from the river side was painted by Christian Melich, a Dutch painter, who was active on the court of King Zygmunt III in the second decade of the seventeenth century. In 1656 this view was sketched by Erik Jonsen Dahl-berg, a Swedish artist, and in 1770 Bernardo Bel-lotto-Canaletto, a court painter of King Stani-slaw August, painted the most extended and beautiful panorama of Warsaw. The view of Warsaw emerging from the waters of the Vistula was also depicted by many painters of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and today, it is a recurring subject for artistic photographers. The high and steep west bank of the Vistula, the so-called Warsaw Slope, is the only topographical feature in the flat area around which Warsaw has been expanding for more than seven hundred years. This slope, formerly intersected by numerous streams and ravines, which helped crossing the river, was a perfect place for the development of settlements. Already in the tenth century, there were several hamlets in the area of today's greater Warsaw, the biggest of which, Kamion, developed in the eleventh century on the eastern bank of the river, next to the ford. In the proximity to this ford, on the west bank of the Vistula, another early settlement, Solec, developed in the twelfth century and in the first half of the thirteenth century. Its inhabitants were involved in trade and craftsmanship. Not far away from Solec in an area suitable for defence, Mazovian princes, ruling over the district of Czersk, erected a medieval town, which was called Jazdów. This castle together with the village of Solec constituted a typical example of an early Slavonic city settlement consisting of a fortified prince's residence, a borough and a fair, which was probably located in Solec. The first reference to the castle of Jazdów comes from the chronicles of 1262. We also know that the castle was destroyed in 1281 during a family feud between Mazovian princes. Remnants of a ramparta a moat and fragments of wooden buildings from the thirteenth century have recently been discovered in Lazienki Park in Ujazdów, a new name for the old castle of Jazdów. After its destruction in 1281 the castle of Jazdów was never rebuilt. Probably at the end of the thirteenth century, a new castle was erected several kilometers north of Jazdów in the area of today's Royal Castle. The location on a high slope intersected by the Kamionka river (today's tunnel of the W-Z Highway) was advantageous from a military point of view. Most historians assume that next to the castle an adjoining borough, was built for the servants. We do not know which of the Mazovian princes founded the strong hold which became Warsaw. It could have been Konrad II, or his brother Boleslaw II, as he became the ruler of the whole Mazovian district in 1294. At the turn of the thirteenth century the borough was adapted to a typical medieval chequer pattern with a rectangular square in the middle and two streets extending from each corner. This new settlement, which in fact was already shaped into a regular city, had a favourable location from a military point of view: it was protected by the Vistula and a high slope from the east; by the Dunaj river-bed from the north ; by the walls and the moat, and from the west by a stream which ran along today's St. John's church from the south. The castle, situated on the tip of the slope next to the Kamionka river, was also an important part of the defence system. The first written references to Warsaw, come from the second and third decades of the fourteenth century. In 1339 a Papal trial took place in Warsaw. It was aimed at arbitrating the conflict