Krakowska Kapituła Katedralna wobec insurekcji kościuszkowskiej .......... 289

THE KRAKOW CATHEDRAL CHAPTER IN THE FACE OF THE KOŚCIUSZKO UPRISING

In 1990, a book entitled Sukmana i krzyż [The Sukman and the Cross] was published in Lublin. It is a study of the history of the Kościuszko Uprising, edited by Professor J. Ziółek. He is also the author of an article entitled ’The Clergy in the Kościuszko Uprising’. Four years later, in 1994, the Polish Historical Society organised an academic conference for the 200th anniversary of the Kościuszko Uprising. In the team of authors, Rev. Prof. Jan Kracik took up the more detailed topic of the Kraków clergy in relation to the Uprising. The volume in honour of Professor Mieczysław Rokosz, who was the president of the Tadeusz Kościuszko Mound Committee in Krakow for thirty years, prompted me to address the topic in even more detail, namely the participation of the Wawel Cathedral Chapter in the Kościuszko Uprising. Father Hugo Kołłątaj, canon of the Krakow Cathedral Chapter, is considered one of the closest (if not the closest) associates of Tadeusz Kościuszko in the uprising. In the insurrection, he was responsible for finances, heading the Treasury Department of the Supreme National Council. For years, he had been in conflict with the Chapter, of which he was a member. It was Kołłątaj who authored the proclamation ’To the Polish Clergy’ announced on 24 March 1794, signed by Kościuszko, in which he called on the clergy to open the church treasuries and sacristies and make sacrifices for the needs of the uprising.
The article discusses the circumstances and course of the seizure of gold and silver objects from the treasury of the Wawel Cathedral, its chalices and monstrances, reliquaries, candlesticks and votive offerings. A separate section is devoted to a discussion of the use of the buildings and estates of the Chapter in the various stages of the uprising, up to the entry of the Prussians into Krakow.