The Piasts in Cieszyn - more information
The town of Cieszyn developed from a borough at the foot of the Cieszyn castle, which at the beginning of the 13th century came under German Law of Lwówek Śląski. The name Cieszyn appears in documents for the first time in 1155. After the autonomous Duchy of Cieszyn had been established around 1290 the town continued to grow. The documents of the Cieszyn Duchy’s founder, Mieszko I, refer to “our Cieszyn townspeople”, which proves that Cieszyn was subordinate to the Cieszyn Princes.
The town centre was initially located on the site of the present Plac Teatralny. A parish church was built there primarily to serve the townspeople, unlike the St. Nicholas Rotunda in the castle. The first Cieszyn rector, Paweł, was mentioned in 1332, but the church must have existed earlier. The name of a schoolmaster is also mentioned in the same year, suggesting the presence of a school. In the second half of the 13th century a Dominican monastery was founded outside the town walls which later became the final resting place of the Cieszyn Piasts. In order to support the monastery the Dominicans were given the village of Mnisztwo by the Prince. A Franciscan monastery – actually of the Observants – was founded in Cieszyn in 1475 in Freistadt Suburb by the River Bobrówka. The political organisation of the town was finally established in 1374 when Magdeburg Law was introduced and in 1416 when Prince Bolko I granted the burghers numerous privileges. In addition the town purchased the right to mint coins from the Cieszyn Princes in 1438. Many coins minted in Cieszyn in the 15th century are exhibited in the Museum of Cieszyn Silesia.
The historic centre of Cieszyn was finally established at the end of the 15th century. Prince Kazimierz II gave the townspeople two buildings by the market place, until that moment located outside the town, with the aim of creating a new town hall. In this way, in 1496, the present town square was founded with a number of roads leading away from it. Kazimierz, who was known for developing the towns in his possession, built walls around Cieszyn. Access to the town was gained through three town gates; the Freistadt Gate, the Water Gate and the Upper Gate. Apart from the townspeople some properties in town were also owned by the Prince and the Cieszyn nobility. This fact caused protests from the townspeople because the noblemen were not inclined to pay town taxes nor bear other costs. Beyond the town wall suburbs began to develop, but their citizens were subordinate to the Prince and not the town authorities, and did not possess full civic rights. In the first half of the 16th century Cieszyn together with its suburbs had an area of 677 ha, of which around 15 ha were situated within the town walls. In total there were 262 houses and close to 2000 inhabitants. The first water supply system, providing the town with water from the nearby Gilczara grange had already been built by the end of the 16th century.
A substantial majority of Cieszyn’s medieval population were craftsmen, although they additionally supported themselves by keeping smallholdings and livestock. Every owner of a house in the town also owned a garden and some land outside the town. The town gained more land from the Prince in 1496 in the region which later became the village of Pastwiska. In the Middle Ages the town possessed Ligotka Alodialna; bought the village of Krasna in 1519 and several fishponds near Strumień. Fish farming was at that time one of the most profitable commercial activities, large quantities of fish were sold in Kraków, for example. From 1472 Cieszyn also owned Boguszowice and all profits from the village went on running the hospital located in Freistadt Suburb, which also served as a poorhouse. A chapel was later established there and finally St. George’s church. From its very beginnings Cieszyn was closely associated with the surrounding villages, especially Bobrek, where a grange belonging to the town was located and where Cieszyn townspeople progressively bought property. At the beginning of the 15th century the first guilds, i.e. associations of craftsmen practising the same or similar occupations started being mentioned. As everywhere else the first ones were bakers, butchers and shoemakers, and then others. From the end of the 15th century the guilds regulated their work and rights in the form of written statutes approved by the Prince.
An important branch of the economy was also the making and sale of alcoholic beverages, particularly beer. A privilege of 1416 granted the townspeople a monopoly on the sale of beer and in 1467 the Prince granted the town with the right to produce “March beer”. In the following year, individual townspeople starting brewing beer one after the other, according to a strictly regulated order which others had then to buy from them. Owners of 155 houses in the town possessed this right. In 1565 the town set up a separate town brewery in Stary Targ, but the system of brewing beer in turn was maintained. Until the 19th century it was the best source of income for townspeople so they would act against anyone trying to sell any other beer. In 1523 Cieszyn townspeople were given the monopoly of selling beer within a radius of one mile from the town. This order was not complied with by noblemen in possession of outlying villages because some of them had been granted the right to brew beer on their properties by Cieszyn Princes. A similar monopoly concerning the making and sale of wine was granted to the town of Cieszyn. This right was usually leased out.
A less important role was played by services and trade in spite of the favourable location of the town on the crossroads of routes between the Bohemian and Austrian lands with Kraków; and Wrocław with Hungary. The 16th century marked the peak of prosperity when a partnership of two merchants, Jakub Fugger from Augsburg and Jan Thurzo from Kraków, established the Copper Road leading from Slovakia through Jabłonków and Cieszyn. Large quantities of copper ore were transported along the route to Wrocław and Germany, and a trading-post was set up in Cieszyn with a company employee supervising the transport. It ceased to function midway through the 16th century after the occupation of Hungary by the Turks.
This was the period when Prince Wacław III Adam converted to Lutheranism and established it as the dominant religion of the Duchy of Cieszyn. The majority of the townspeople followed his order. Catholic priests were dismissed, as were the Dominicans and Franciscans, and their property was confiscated by the Prince who transferred part of it to the town and individual townspeople. In 1578 the Prince issued a Church Order regulating the organisation of the Lutheran Church in the Duchy of Cieszyn and other religious matters. Services were conducted in Polish in the parish church, while in the Dominican church in German. Prince Wacław Adam also looked after the Cieszyn school, whose rector Wawrzyniec Blumius – working there at the beginning of the 17th century – was well respected. In 1585 the Church of the Holy Trinity was built on the site of the previous wooden church by the cemetery where victims of an epidemic had been buried. The land for the cemetery and the church was donated by Princess Katarzyna Sydonia.
Prince Adam Wacław initially continued his father’s policies when in 1598 he signed a document for Cieszyn townspeople in which he commanded them to follow exclusively the Lutheran Church for all times. But by 1609 he had already converted to Catholicism and expected the same from the townspeople. All Cieszyn’s churches, with the exception of the church of the Holy Trinity, were given back to the Catholics; the Dominicans returned to the town and were also given back their property. Following the outbreak of the Thirty Years’ War, in 1619 the Lutherans again took over all the churches and the rule of the town. In 1624 Prince Frederick William punished the town authorities and forced the Lutherans to give the churches back to the Catholics. The Lutherans took over the rule of the town once again in 1626, but for a very short time and finally all they were left with was the church of the Holy Trinity. In 1629 Princess Elizabeth Lucretia issued a religious statute which prohibited non-Catholics from occupying any municipal positions or becoming members of guilds. Many Lutherans left the town, among them Jerzy Trzanowski, the Slavic Luther, thanks to whom the name of his home town later became well-known in the whole of Central Europe.
The last Cieszyn Princess from the Piast line did not involve herself particularly with converting the Cieszyn townspeople to Catholicism. Her position was not strong enough, she was too deeply in debt, also owing money to the town, and the war being waged was destroying her lands even further. Cieszyn, too, did not remain untouched by the war, when in 1622 it was taken over and sacked by the army of Margrave Johann Georg Hohenzollern and in 1627 by Count Mansfeld. They both fought for the Lutherans, but were mainly interested in contributions from civilians. The behaviour of the Imperial army, while in theory defending the Cieszyn Princess, was little different. In 1632 Cieszyn was occupied and sacked by a detachment of the Polish army commanded by Colonel Jarocki, and in 1645 by the Swedish army which also occupied the castle. In 1647 the castle was besieged by the Imperial army for a few weeks which resulted in the ruination of the castle. Several buildings in the town were also destroyed.
At that time Cieszyn also suffered greatly from fires (e.g. in 1552 and 1603) and epidemics which struck the town in 1570, 1585 and 1598. It is said that 1,500 Cieszyn citizens died during the biggest epidemic in 1623. In this light, the economic situation of the previously prosperous town completely collapsed. The town lost most of its lands and at the end of the 16th century the fish ponds near Strumień were pledged to the Cieszyn Princes. The town fell into debt and had to sell part of its property. Princess Elizabeth Lucretia’s debts also grew, which also fell on the Cieszyn townspeople since they had to agree to guarantee her loans. In order to gain some cash she 1626 she leased the right to collect toll in Cieszyn to three Moravian Jews. This position had been held in Cieszyn since 1631 by Jacob Singer from Ivančice near Brno, who was granted a privilege to purchase a house in the town and the right to work, including the right to trade. That was the beginning of the permanent Jewish presence in Cieszyn.
The Princess spent the last years of her life in four houses on the town square. In 1653, on the death of Elizabeth Lucretia, the Cieszyn line of the Piasts died out. This event marked the end of the Piasts in Cieszyn. The Duchy was taken over by the Habsburgs, in their position as the Kings of Bohemia. Nonetheless Cieszyn townspeople had already starting asking them to confirm granted privileges.
J. Spyra, tłum D.French