*** CASTLE IN RADZIKI DUŻE ***

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RADZIKI DUŻE

the ruins of knight's castle

CASTLE RUIN IN RADZIKI DUŻE, VIEW FROM THE SOUTHWEST

HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING


T

he cas­tle in Ra­dzi­ki was prob­a­bly built in 1380-84 on the ini­tia­tive of the castel­lan An­drzej Ogoń­czyk (d. ca. 1395), or - ac­cord­ing to old­er his­tor­i­cal stud­ies - on­ly af­ter 1413, when Ja­kusz Ogoń­czyk (d. 1435) in­her­it­ed from his fa­ther Mi­ko­łaj of Kut­no a vil­lage with the ad­ja­cent prop­er­ty. This small fort­ress was in the hands of the fam­i­ly un­til the mid­dle of the 16th cen­tu­ry, but al­ready a hun­dred years ear­li­er it had been de­stroyed by the Teu­ton­ic Knights dur­ing the Thir­teen Years' War. It was re­built in sec­ond half of the 15th cen­tu­ry. Around 1510 Mi­ko­łaj Ra­dzi­kow­ski (d. 1520), grand­son of Ja­kusz, mod­ernised the cas­tle and gave it a Re­nais­sance look. When in 1525 Jan Ra­dzi­kow­ski, the last male rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the fam­i­ly, died child­less, the es­tate was in­her­it­ed by his sis­ter Mał­go­rza­ta, wife of Piotr Plec­ki from Dą­bro­wa. In 1540, as a re­sult of the di­vi­sion of the Ra­dzi­ki es­tate, the cas­tle be­came the prop­er­ty of Ra­dzi­ki Du­że with two manors and a for­est. In 1564, the son of Piotr and Mał­go­rza­ta, Sta­ni­sław Plec­ki, was al­ready the own­er of Ra­dzi­ki, and af­ter him - Bar­ba­ra, pre­sum­ably the on­ly child of Sta­ni­sław, who mar­ried Wa­len­ty Ku­czyń­s­ki and brought him a vil­lage with the lo­cal es­tate as a dowry.



REMAINS OF THE SOUTHWESTERN WALL

A

t the turn of the 16th and 17th cen­turies the own­er of Ra­dzi­ki was the Ro­licz Tar­now­ski fam­i­ly from Ku­ja­wy. The cas­tle, de­stroyed dur­ing the Pol­ish-Swedish wars, lost its res­i­den­cy sta­tus, and circa 1770 it was aban­doned and fell in­to ru­in. At that time it be­longed to Fran­ci­szek and Ka­zi­mierz (d. 1845) Prze­ci­szew­scy. At the turn of the 18th and 19th cen­turies the bricks from cas­tle walls were used to build the clas­sicis­tic manor house erect­ed right next to the ru­ins. In 1839 the in­debt­ed es­tate was pur­chased by Fran­ci­szek Sa­le­zy Dmo­chow­ski (d. 1871), the au­thor of book The Moth­er's Curse, in which he de­scribed the his­to­ry of the cas­tle and its in­hab­i­tants. Af­ter Dmo­chow­scy, the manor house was tak­en o­ver by the Sie­miąt­kow­ski fam­i­ly and af­ter the Sec­ond World War it be­came the prop­er­ty of the lo­cal gov­ern­ment, which placed a school there. The re­mains of the me­dieval strong­hold were pre­served in the 1950s as a per­ma­nent ru­in.



A VIEW OF THE RUINS FROM THE WEST

BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE RUINS


HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING


T

he cas­tle in Radzi­ki, al­though at the be­gin­ning of its ex­is­tence it was the most im­pres­sive no­ble nest in the whole Do­brzyń Land, rep­re­sent­ed a sim­ple type of a knight­ly for­ti­fied set­tle­ment, where the house was sur­round­ed by a wall, and one cur­tain was al­so a wall of the build­ing. It was erect­ed on a square plan with a side of about 29 me­ters, in the low­er parts made of stones and above of bricks. The cas­tle oc­cu­pied an area of 830 square me­ters, sur­round­ed by a wall with a two-storey res­i­den­tial house with three rooms on each floor, and wood­en res­i­den­tial and util­i­ty build­ings stand­ing along the wall from the court­yard side. The en­trance to the cas­tle led through a gate­way lo­cat­ed in the south-west­ern wall, and the ac­cess to it was pro­tect­ed by a draw­bridge and a moat ir­ri­gat­ed from a near­by pond.




PLAN OF THE RUINS IN RADZIKI DUŻE

RECONSTRUCTION OF THE CASTLE FROM THE XV CENTURY ACCORDING TO M. ARSZYŃSKI AND J. SALM


HISTORY OF THE CASTLE

DESCRIPTION OF THE CASTLE

SIGHTSEEING


T

o this day, an ex­ter­nal walls of the cas­tle has sur­vived, 5 to 8 me­ters high, with the re­mains of shoot­ing holes, ar­chi­tec­tural de­tails and win­dows, but on­ly three of these win­dows have me­dieval ori­gins (the oth­ers were made in the 19th and 20th cen­turies). There are no in­ter­nal di­vi­sions of the apart­ment house, and the on­ly me­men­toes left are the mod­est relics of the vaults in the cel­lars that are no longer ac­ces­si­ble. A few dozen me­ters west of the cas­tle stands a beau­ti­ful­ly ren­o­vat­ed clas­si­cist manor house of the Prze­ci­szew­scy, to­day the seat of the pri­ma­ry school named af­ter fa­mous Pol­ish trav­el­er To­ny Ha­lik.



ONCE THE PRZECISZEWSCY'S MANOR HOUSE, AND NOW A SCHOOL



The ru­in is lo­cat­ed on the school area, but ac­cess to it, even on hol­i­days, should not be re­strict­ed.


You can visit it together with your dog.


It would be a good idea to ask the school mana­gement for per­mis­sion to fly.... un­less we are going to do it when the school is closed. No legal res­tric­tions.




CASTLE RUIN IN RADZIKI DUŻE


GETTING THERE


R

adzi­ki Duże is a vil­lage sit­u­at­ed halfway be­tween Gol­ub and Brod­ni­ca towns, from where there is a bus ser­vice. The ru­in stands in the east­ern part of the vil­lage, on a hill near the church.



There is a large, un­paved car park at the south­ern en­trance to the school area.


Free access to the ruins by bike.





BIBLIOGRAPHY


1. F. S. Dmochowski: Przekleństwo matki. Opowiadanie..., Verbum 2004
2. B. Guerquin: Zamki w Polsce, Arkady 1984
3. L. Kajzer, J. Salm, S. Kołodziejski: Leksykon zamków w Polsce, Arkady 2001
4. L. Kajzer: Małe czy duże, czyli o tzw. zamkach rycerskich na Niżu Polskim
5. T. Olszacki, A. Różański: Zamek w Gołańczy, Gołaniecki Ośrodek Kultury 2015


AS CAN BE SEEN FROM THE ATTACHED PHOTOGRAPH,
THE DIRECT SURROUNDINGS OF THE RUINS ARE NOT AS PICTURESQUE AS THEY MIGHT SEEM


Castles nearby:
Brodnica - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 16 km
Golub-Dobrzyń - the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 18 km
Sadłowo - relics of the knights' castle from the 14th century, 22 km
Kowalewo Pomorskie - relics of the Teutonic castle from the 13th century, 29 km
Wąbrzeźno - relics of the castle of the bishop of Chełmno from the 14th century, 30 km
Kurzętnik - ruins of the Teutonic castle from the 14th century, 39 km




ALSO WORTH SEEING:



Situated about 150 me­ters north-west of the ca­stle, the Go­thic church of St. Ca­the­ri­ne, built pro­ba­bly at the sa­me ti­me as the for­ti­fied seat of the Ogoń­czyk fa­mi­ly. It is ma­de of bricks, erec­ted on a re­ctan­gu­lar plan with a sa­cris­ty on the north si­de and a porch on the south si­de, en­ri­ched with neo-Go­thic ac­cents added du­ring the ni­ne­teenth-cen­tu­ry re­no­va­tion. The most va­lu­able equip­ment of this small tem­ple is a paint­ing of Our La­dy and Child ma­de at the be­gin­ning of the 17th cen­tu­ry, as well as a bap­tis­mal font from 1776 and a 14th cen­tu­ry Go­thic cru­ci­fix. A neo-Go­thic bell to­wer stands next to the church.


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text: 2019
photographs: 2019
© Jacek Bednarek