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Churches & monasteries
Braniewo
St. Catherine's Basilica in Braniewo (bra-NYEH-vo) is a monumental Gothic hall church with a 63 m tower, blown up in 1945 and rebuilt from ruins between 1979 and 1986. Today it is a minor basilica and a Fatima shrine, and its brick tower i…
Churches & monasteries
Bydgoszcz
The Basilica of St. Vincent de Paul in Bydgoszcz is a monumental neoclassical rotunda modeled on the Pantheon in Rome, standing on Ossolińskich Avenue just north of the city center. Vincentian priests began building it in 1924 as a votive…
Churches & monasteries
Strzegom
This Gothic church is about 80 metres long, built of local granite and basalt, and its tower still holds a bell cast in 1318 – one of the oldest working church bells in Poland. The Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Strzegom was built by…
Churches & monasteries
Bolesławiec
A slender 55-metre tower and a brick-and-white gable patterned with lozenges are Bolesławiec's landmark, visible from many streets in the Old Town. Inside the 15th-century Gothic hall lies a completely different world: Baroque altars, gild…
Churches & monasteries
Koronowo
At 72 metres long, the brick basilica above the Brda river has shaped Koronowo's skyline for more than seven centuries. It was raised by Cistercian monks who moved their abbey here from nearby Byszewo at the end of the 13th century, and it…
Churches & monasteries
Stara Wieś
Right next to Brzozów stands a late-baroque basilica with twin towers that looks as if it had been moved from a big city. Built by the Pauline Fathers and run by the Jesuits since the 19th century, it is one of the most important Marian sh…
Churches & monasteries
Leżajsk
The Basilica of the Annunciation in Leżajsk (say "LEH-zhysk") is the church of a fortified Bernardine (Franciscan) monastery in southeastern Poland and one of the region's most important Marian shrines. Built in the early 17th century on t…
Churches & monasteries
Kraków
The John Paul II Centre "Do Not Be Afraid!" in Kraków is a pilgrimage and cultural complex in the Łagiewniki district (say "wah-gyev-NEE-kee"), built around the octagonal Sanctuary of St. John Paul II, a museum devoted to the Polish pope a…
Churches & monasteries
Chotyniec
The Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in Chotyniec (say "ho-TIN-yets") is a Greek Catholic wooden tserkva – an Eastern-rite church – built in 1615 near the A4 motorway and the Ukrainian border, between Radymno and Przemyśl in sou…
Churches & monasteries
Bielsk Podlaski
Beneath the chancel of this wooden church lies its founder, who died more than five hundred years ago. In the 15th century Princess Wassa founded a church at Bielsk castle, and when the church was moved from Castle Hill into the town in 15…
Churches & monasteries
Owczary
The Church of the Protection of the Mother of God in Owczary (say "ov-CHAH-ri") is one of the oldest Lemko tserkvas – wooden churches of the Eastern rite – in Poland, built in 1653 in a quiet valley of the Low Beskids near Gorlice. Since 2…
Churches & monasteries
Kruszyniany
Kruszyniany is known for its wooden mosque and Tatar mizar (Muslim cemetery), but the village has been home to several faiths for centuries. On its northern edge, on the road to Łosiniany, St Anne's Orthodox church with its onion dome stan…
Churches & monasteries
Powroźnik
St. James's Church in Powroźnik (say "pov-ROZH-neek") is a former Lemko tserkva – an Eastern-rite wooden church – regarded as the oldest wooden tserkva in the Polish Carpathians. It stands just outside the spa towns of Krynica-Zdrój and Mu…
Churches & monasteries
Bytów
This small church on a hill in Bytów has changed denomination more often than most churches in Pomerania. It began as a burgomaster's private chapel, became a Protestant church where sermons were preached in Kashubian, and since the 1980s…
Churches & monasteries
Ryboły
With its white brick walls and green domes, the Orthodox church in Ryboły carries a history that predates the 1596 Union of Brest. The present building was consecrated on 22 May 1879, but inside it keeps a much older treasure: the 17th-cen…
Churches & monasteries
Tylicz
This dark red wooden church with three onion domes has stood in Tylicz's cemetery since 1743. It is a Lemko church with an unusual layout – two side chapels off the nave, a feature found elsewhere in the region only at Milik. Inside is an…
Churches & monasteries
Brunary
St. Michael the Archangel's Church in Brunary Wyżne (say "broo-NAH-ri VIZH-neh") is an 18th-century former Lemko Greek Catholic tserkva – a wooden church of the Eastern rite – in the Low Beskids of southern Poland, now the Roman Catholic p…
Churches & monasteries
Bielsk Podlaski
Set into the foundation of the south wall of this blue wooden church is a boulder carved with the date AD 1789 — the foundation stone of the present building. St Michael the Archangel Orthodox Church, known as the Old Sobor, stands at ul.…
Churches & monasteries
Kleszczele
The oldest building in Kleszczele was not built as a church. It is a former wooden bell tower from the 18th century that outlived the church it was built for and became a chapel itself. Poland's National Heritage Board describes it as one…
Churches & monasteries
Kwiatoń
St. Paraskeva's Church in Kwiatoń (say "KFYAH-tone") is a former Lemko Greek Catholic tserkva – a wooden church of the Eastern rite – in the Low Beskids of southern Poland. Experts regard it as the model example, and arguably the most beau…
Churches & monasteries
Radruż
St. Paraskeva's Church in Radruż (say "RAH-droosh") is one of the oldest and best-preserved wooden tserkvas – Eastern-rite churches – in Poland: a late-Gothic timber church from the end of the 16th century on an oval hill in the Eastern Ro…
Churches & monasteries
Siemiatycze
On a rise above the Muchawiec stream, behind a stone wall with an ornate gate, stands a church with seven domes. This is the oldest Orthodox parish in Siemiatycze, dating back to the 15th century, while the present brick church was built i…
Churches & monasteries
Bystre
Three metal-clad domes with false lanterns rise above a Bieszczady meadow, well away from the main roads. The church of St Michael the Archangel in Bystre, in the Czarna district of the Bieszczady Mountains, was built in 1901–1902 and fell…
Churches & monasteries
Sanok
In Dobra (formerly Dobra Szlachecka) on the San River, in the Sanok municipality, a walled complex of two sacred buildings survives: a wooden tserkva from 1879 and an older gate tserkva in a tower. Poland's National Heritage Board describe…