Moraczewo Windmills

Three wooden post mills on a gentle hill beside the Poznań–Gniezno road look as if they had always stood here – in fact, each one came from a different village. The Moraczewo Windmills are an outdoor site of the Museum of the First Piasts at Lednica, about 1.5 km from the main open-air museum in Dziekanowice. The oldest mill dates from 1821, and a barn and an arcaded cottage stand alongside.

Where the mills came from

The museum gives the exact origin of each building. The oldest post mill was moved from Sędziwojewo near Września (1821), the second from Sołeczno, also in the Września area (1844), and the youngest from Swadzim near Tarnowo Podgórne (1896). The museum took over the land around Lednogóra and Moraczewo in 1988–1992 and set up five ethnographic buildings here, including the three windmills. All three have a timber frame clad with boards – typical of post mills in Greater Poland (Wielkopolska).

Two farm buildings complete the group: a barn from Dąbrówka Kościelna dated 1801 – timber-framed, with a drive-through threshing floor – and a cottage from Gębarzewo from 1827, partly brick and partly log-built, with a five-post arcade under the gable.

The hill by the stronghold

It is no accident that the windmills stand here. Near the village are the ramparts of an early Piast stronghold – today 6–10 metres high, and originally perhaps as much as 17 metres. The first fort was built around the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries, and archaeologists found two hall-type buildings here that are unknown elsewhere in Greater Poland. From the ramparts you get a view of the mills against the fields.

What to look for

A post mill turned as a whole on a single massive post so the sails could face the wind – each mill has a long tail pole the miller used to swing the structure round. Compare the three: they differ in height, roof shape and porches, although they were built only 75 years apart. At the Gębarzewo cottage, count the arcade posts – there are five, and the projecting gable forms a covered porch in front of the entrance.

Tripto tip

The site is fenced and does not operate as a regularly open museum – you view the windmills from outside, through the fence or from the roadside. A stop takes 15–20 minutes, and the mills look their best at sunset. If you want to see inside a windmill, head to the Greater Poland Ethnographic Park in Dziekanowice, home to, among others, the Gryżyna post mill with the oldest dated structural timber in Poland (1585). Nearby, stop at the lone windmill in Rybitwy and at Ostrów Lednicki.