Page 164 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Krakow

162  KR AK OW AREA B Y AREA

rKalwaria
Zebrzydowska
30 km (19 miles) sw of Krakow.
@ from Main Coach Station.
£ from Krakow’s Main Railway
Station, change at Krakow-Płaszów.
Bernardine Church: Open 6am–
7pm daily.
Calavaries, or Ways of the
Cross, were introduced in
the 16th century and were
built throughout Europe to
commemorate the Passion
and Death of Christ. The land-
scaping of Calvary grounds
had to imitate the topography
of Jerusalem. They consisted
of structures commemorating
the “tragedy of Salvation” and
imitations of holy sites con-
nected to the Virgin Mary.
Poland’s first Calvary was
built by Mikołaj Zebrzydowski
from 1600 onwards. He located
the chapels representing the
Stations of the Cross along
Christ’s route to Golgotha
on the Żary Hill near his
residence in Zebrzydowice.
Mystery plays enacting
Christ’s Passion are staged in
Kalwaria during Holy Week.
The Church of the Presentation of the Virgin Mary in Wadowice The “funeral of the Virgin”
takes place on the feast of
wWadowice survival of an assassination the Assumption. Crowds of
attempt on 13 May 1981. pilgrims arrive to venerate the
40 km (25 miles) southwest of Krakow.
@ from Krakow’s Main Coach Station. Designed by Ewa Węcławowicz- miraculous icon of the Mother
Family House of John Paul II: Tel 033 Gyurkovich and Jacek of God, whose cult in the
823 2662. Open daily. May–Sep: Gyurkovich, the walls of its Bernardine Church goes back
9am–7pm; Nov–Mar: 9am– 2:30pm; nave seem to give way under to the 17th century. Kalwaria
Apr & Oct: 9am–6pm. the power of light, symbolizing is one of the main religious
the triumph of good over evil. centres in Lesser Poland.
Wadowice was first recorded The town has had a chequered
in 1327, but the town came to history, especially in the last
international attention in 1978 century. While under German
when Karol Wojtyła, born here occupation during World War II,
on 18 May 1920, was elected it was renamed Frauenstadt and
Pope. Almost immediately the the entire Jewish population
town became a place of mass was either executed on the
pilgrimage and the local sites spot or sent to nearby
associated with the Pope include Auschwitz (see below).
the Baroque Church of the Wadowice has since been
Presentation of the Virgin Mary growing as a tourist centre,
in Market Square, where he was replacing the local industries,
baptised, and his family home, which collapsed in the newly
which now houses a museum free-market economy during
dedicated to the pontiff. the 1990s.
Another site associated with
John Paul II is the monumental
votive Church of St Peter the eAuschwitz
Arch-shepherd which was built (Oświęcim) The Baroque façade of the early
on the outskirts of Wadowice 17th-century Bernardine Church in
in thanksgiving for the Pope’s See pp164–7. Kalwaria Zebrzydowska