Krakow: An Ecobiography [1 ed.] 9780822987499, 9780822946137

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KRAKOW

HISTORY OF THE URBAN ENVIRONMENT Martin V. Melosi and Joel A. Tarr, Editors

KRAKOW AN ECOBIOGRAPHY Edited by Adam Izdebski and Rafał Szmytka

University of Pittsburgh Press

The publication of this book received financial support from the National Science Centre, Krakow, Poland, within the project # 2015/19/B/ HS3/01762. The book is a revised version of Ekobiografia Krakowa (Krakow: Znak, 2018), translated by Tim Brombley. Published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 15260 Copyright © 2021, University of Pittsburgh Press All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Printed on acid-free paper 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Cataloging-in-Publication data is available from the Library of Congress ISBN 13: 978-0-8229-4613-7 ISBN 10: 0-8229-4613-0 Cover art: Shutterstock; Adobe Stock Images Cover design: Joel W. Coggins

To the scholars of Krakow’s past

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION Environmental History and Krakow 3 Adam Izdebski and Rafał Szmytka CHAPTER 1 The Climate History of Krakow 22 Konrad Wnęk, Adam Izdebski, and Leszek Kowanetz CHAPTER 2 Krakow and Its Rivers 43 Andrzej Chwalba, with a contribution by Konrad Wnęk CHAPTER 3 Plants in the Lives of Medieval Cracovians 68 Aldona Mueller-Bieniek CHAPTER 4 A City Is Not an Island: Early Modern Krakow and Natural Resources   88 Piotr Miodunka CHAPTER 5 Pollution in Early Modern Krakow 108 Rafał Szmytka

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CHAPTER 6 Industrialization: The Environmental End of Old Krakow? 132 Ewelina Szpak CHAPTER 7 The History of Krakow Smog 147 Adam Izdebski and Konrad Wnęk CHAPTER 8 The Power of Myth: The Imagined Nature of Krakow 161 Małgorzata Praczyk Notes 177 Bibliography 199 List of Contributors  215 Index 217

KRAKOW

INTRODUCTION ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

Adam Izdebski and Rafał Szmytka

Environmental history swept into town out of the blue, riding the wave of the 1960s ecological revolution. In contrast to many other academic fields, it did not arise to answer questions posed by researchers, but in response to burning social needs. Although studies on humanity’s relationship with nature already had quite a long tradition, especially in Europe, environmental history introduced a significant novelty. As with other new research directions such as oral history or the history of women, it undertook to introduce new heroes to mainstream history. These were heroes who in the sources traditionally used by historians are usually silent, who do not have a voice of their own, and yet who participated in creating human history in a way that was at times utterly decisive. Environmental historians aimed not only to expand our knowledge of the past, but above all to make contemporary societies aware of the sources of current ecological problems. Even the birth of the term environmental history is telling. It was not coined as the name of a new journal or to represent a research program. It was not even the title of a book. Environmental history first appeared, in 1970, as the name of classes being taught by the US historian Roderick Nash at the University of California in Santa Barbara. It was intended to signal to students that a different perspective on human history was possible—one that would allow us to connect the past to the most pressing challenges of the present. In other 3

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words, adding the adjective environmental was designed to “green” history in the eyes and minds of students—to draw attention to the nature-bound dimension of social change. Only after a few years of teaching experience did research programs and the first books appear. At the root of this research field, therefore, lies a strong desire to do history in a way that will help people of today face the challenges of life amid a nature completely dominated by humans—life in a new era called the Anthropocene.

THE ANTHROPOCENE is a new geological epoch whose characteristic feature is that the main force shaping animate and inanimate nature on Earth is humanity. Whether the Anthropocene has already arrived and, if so, when it started are debatable. A subcommission of the International Commission on Stratigraphy, led by geologists, points to 1950, on account of nuclear bomb tests, the post–World War II surge in energy consumption from fossil fuels, and the emergence of plastics; the effects of all these phenomena are already visible in sediment layers. Some historians and archaeologists, meanwhile, claim that the Anthropocene dates from antiquity, the Neolithic revolution (the beginnings of cities and agriculture), or even from earlier breakthroughs deep in the history of humanity that resulted in people transforming nature on a new scale. The debate continues, and regardless of how it ends, one fact is important: humanity’s influence on nature is so powerful that it is no longer possible to separate the natural world from the cultural world.

This book grew out of a similar desire. As the first publication in Poland to be entirely devoted to environmental history,1 we chose to write about Krakow because we wanted to be of service to Krakow and Cracovians and because Krakow boasts a wonderful, centuries-long history that has been well-documented and thoroughly researched. Even the city’s geographical location is special. The exceptional natural conditions—its location in a deep, narrow, marshy river valley, with mountains to the south and with a particular microclimate—have presented every era with its own challenge in maintaining such a significant urban center in this specific place.2 But do Krakow’s modern ecological problems really have a centuries-old lineage? Looking back to the past, we want to facilitate an understanding of the current situation both for Krakow’s inhabitants and for the city authorities

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

assessing the scale of the problem. Our research indicates that this quite special problem also requires exceptional and courageous actions to help finally meet the challenges that previous generations were unable to handle. Has life in Krakow always involved being exposed to high levels of pollution in the air, water, and soil? What were the relationships between Krakow and the surrounding region’s environment—did it exist in isolation or was it part of some greater whole? Were there periods when Cracovians had easier access to “clean” nature than today? How long has smog been an integral part of Krakow winters? Does it still have to be? Are the ecological problems here lost causes from time immemorial? The roots of environmental history are undoubtedly American, but it has branched out considerably.3 Historians from other European countries— Austria, Denmark, Germany, and Great Britain—have taken the research techniques developed for American environmental history to the European context, yielding works that present a new understanding of the key processes of socioeconomic change in Europe during the past two millennia.4 This brings us to the Polish experience of making geographical and environmental phenomena the focus of historical research. At first glance, this type of interest should arrive in Poland through Polish historians’ strong connections with the Annales school; nevertheless, these contacts related instead to other key subjects in the field of history, such as economic history, historical demography, and the history of mentality (see, for instance, the works of Andrzej Wyczański, Karol Modzelewski, Krzysztof Zamorski, and Henryk Samsonowicz).5 Meanwhile, interest in the environmental dimension of Polish history was already being demonstrated by historians of the interwar period, led by the founder of the Lviv school of economic history Franciszek Bujak. One might even call him the first Polish environmental historian, since during his studies at the Jagiellonian University he was already drawing attention to the fact that other disciplines, including environmental sciences, are also historical sciences. Bujak wrote, “All these are essentially historical sciences [geology, physical geography, botany and zoology, biology and embryology], as they not only examine the state of the earth’s crust, its surface and organic life, describe, analyze, classify, and search for patterns and interdependences, but they also try to learn the exact ways in which events occurred, from the earliest times to the present.”6 He was an advocate of interdisciplinary research using various research methods and wrote his doctoral thesis on geographical developments in Poland in the Middle Ages. In 1908 he published the book Galicja (the name of the Austrian province, today’s Southeast Poland), which

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gave prominence to environmental topics, including the location and physical conditions of the land, natural resources, soils, agricultural production, livestock farming, horticulture, land development, dairy farming, forestry, and so on. In this book, Bujak described the situation of his own times, but was eager to avail himself of historical data; at the same time he had a fierce ecological drive—he noticed the great desolation that the overexploitative forest economy of the late Austrian Empire was causing—and these ideas were very similar to those that guided the American pioneers of environmental history. Convinced of the important role natural disasters played in the course of history—which he termed “elemental disasters” (crop failures, famines, and epidemics but also the devastation of war)—Bujak mobilized a large group of students to systematically collect information about such events in the history of Poland. The program to collect and analyze data on elemental disasters was complemented with records of price changes for various goods, which served as the basis for investigating the interactions between the forces of nature and human economy. Bujak planned to use the collected source material primarily to answer questions about why economic duality emerged in Europe, but it also allowed him to hypothesize that natural factors contributed to the ultimate failure of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the face of powerful neighbors in the eighteenth century, the great trauma of Poland’s history (i.e., the so-called Partitions of Poland, that is the complete dissolution of the Commonwealth in 1795 and the annexation of its lands by its neighbors, Russia, Prussia, and Austria; Poland and Lithuania were only to reemerge as independent states several generations later, in 1918).7 Apart from Bujak and his students, since prewar times a strong current of historical geography in Poland had been inspired by a German conception of the tasks involved in this discipline. It was precisely this awareness of the spatial dimension of human history that directed Polish historians’ attention to phenomena related to the friction points between societal living and the natural world, such as deforestation and hunting.8 In addition, in the postwar period, a substantial amount of research into the history of technology has been inspired by the Annales school’s focus on everyday life and in particular the Marxist focus on the history of material culture (for which field the Academy of Sciences in Warsaw created a separate institute). Historians active at this institute studied the technologies used for the exploitation of natural resources in the past and the history of urban infrastructure. In the context of Krakow, this has led to minute and often groundbreaking studies on the city’s water-provisioning system, which serves as the basis for several chapters in this book.9

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

Nature–City–Man The city is an environment that, like a lens, brings into focus all the social and natural processes that fascinate environmental historians. That is why we are convinced that looking at Krakow—a city with a unique history and a particularly difficult ecological situation—will allow us to show how much an environmental perspective can bring to the understanding of our country’s history and the challenges presented by our heritage of the past. The first works on the environmental aspect of the history of cities, both in Europe and America, emphasized the problem of pollution that accumulates in the city and that the city produces, or, more broadly, the impact of industrialization on city residents’ living conditions and surroundings. As with most of the themes taken up by environmental history, historians’ interest in this subject resulted from the needs of the moment. In the 1970s and 1980s, postwar programs to reverse the disastrous effects of twentieth-century industry on the environment were just beginning to bear fruit. The issues of how these problems had been dealt with in the past and when pollution had begun to be perceived as a problem became increasingly pressing. Urban environmental historical research had a pattern of development that paralleled environmental history in general. Research was being conducted on both sides of the Atlantic, but from the very beginning American scholars saw the issue of cities as one of many topics within the broader enterprise of writing history in a new way that incorporated the environmental aspect. Meanwhile, in Europe, such issues were initially addressed in a different context, as an aspect of the history of cities—a research subject that on our continent (and in our country) has its own rich traditions. The first works of American historians were also conceived of more narrowly, focusing on the inception of sanitary infrastructure in the cities of North America at the turn of the twentieth century. Attempts were made to reconstruct the process of building sewerage and waste disposal systems and to learn the reasons that such investments were then being decided on. This way of framing an issue is obviously characteristic of environmental history: changes visible on the outside and the transformation of the environment and natural infrastructure are the starting point for studying the associated social structure, beliefs, and legal regulations related to the natural world. At the same time, American works show how the introduction of specific technical solutions determined successive treatments that were actually designed merely to offset the effects of earlier activities. The result was a phenomenon that could be called the creation of a “secondary nature”: cities created a new cycle of matter and

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energy in nature, both within the cities and farther afield. Whereas premodern cities had often been “black holes” devouring natural resources from the immediate or more distant environment (and literally devouring human lives, since mortality was much higher in cities than in villages), industrial cities quickly forced relations between society and the environment to change in a completely new way, or at least on an unprecedented scale. Geosystems and ecosystems were created without which the long-term existence of these cities would have been impossible.10 Historians from Europe, meanwhile, approached the issue of pollution and waste in a more holistic way that focused on studying the sources and scale of the problem in major European industrial centers.11 In the study of the history of air pollution, British historians are the supreme leaders. The classic theme is of course London fog and smog, which plagued the inhabitants of this European metropolis throughout the nineteenth century and much of the twentieth.12 However, numerous works have also been written on another great industrial city of nineteenth-century England, Manchester, a large center of the textile industry. There, air pollution was perhaps an even greater problem than in London. British historians have treated the subject of pollution very seriously, further developing their research to address air pollution as a cultural phenomenon on the scale of the entire country.13 Of course, Europeans have focused on more than just air pollution. The transformation of the natural environment of entire regions for the needs of industry and communication has also been comprehensively studied—in the Thames valley in the south of England, in the Ruhr basin in Germany, or in the region of Île-de-France surrounding Paris.14 This topic is also clearly present in our book: one might ultimately conclude that living in a polluted environment is the single most characteristic feature of experiencing life in a city. Two chapters deal with this topic head-on. The text by Ewelina Szpak shows how the relatively late and forced industrialization of Krakow and the surrounding area during the Stalinist period made pollution one of the most burning (sometimes literally!) of the many ecological problems that Cracovians faced. Rafał Szmytka takes up the same issues, but delves further into the past. He looks at the issue of pollution in early modern times, during Krakow’s glory days when it was the capital of the largest European political entity, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It turns out that the city’s inhabitants of the time were already experiencing very high levels of pollution, often somewhat unwittingly. Finally, some of the findings of Szpak and Szmytka are further investigated in the chapter devoted to the famous Krakow smog (by Adam Izdebski and Konrad Wnęk), which focuses on the

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

(paleo)climatic context and scattered evidence of the smog and its perception in the early modern and nineteenth-century city. Looking back over how urban waste has been disposed of over the past few centuries has gradually inspired a broader perspective on how the city is connected to its natural surroundings. Researchers began to see the city as the hub of a vast network of flows of plants, animals, organic matter, minerals, and, ultimately, various forms of energy (flowing water, wood, charcoal, coal, and the like). The metaphor that best represents this problem is the idea of urban ​​ metabolism: together with its region, a city is seen as a living organism that constantly absorbs and expels matter. And what the city excretes, the region again absorbs and processes further; in other words, we have recycling, which developed significantly in the nineteenth century. This issue has been very well investigated in the case of Paris; Sabine Barles has shown in numerous works why trading and processing waste—in industry and agriculture—was an important part of the economy and life of the city throughout the nineteenth century. The situation only changed around the mid-twentieth century, when the scale of waste production, technological changes in industry, and the Paris agglomeration’s size combined to obstruct and reduce the attractiveness of the old recycling channels.15 Fundamental differences in the historical development of cities in America and Europe have caused American historians to address this issue differently. Above all, Americans focus on the phenomenon of urban sprawl, that is, cities spreading into suburbs and more widely into entire regions. As a result, the typical urban landscape penetrates rural areas (themselves obviously equally a product of man). Nature ceases to be productive, and its visual and cultural attractiveness is now what matters. Anyone who has been to the United States understands the fascination of local environmental historians with the phenomenon of the expansion of the perfectly tended lawn across huge tracts of North America (which has huge ecological and financial costs). Of course, change in the way the landscape is used and shaped in areas around cities (which go from rural to suburban) brings with it deep social conflicts between the new and old inhabitants of particular places.16 Another important way of perceiving the city’s relations with nature in the American tradition is in terms of the rapidity of industrialization and the growth of capitalism on that side of the Atlantic. This helped American historians to grasp the essence of these processes, because they occurred at a rate that exacerbated their defining features. A groundbreaking work by William Cronon concerns nineteenth-century Chicago. Nature’s Metropolis shows that in a few short decades new means of communication (the telegraph and the

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railroad) and the new markets afforded by fast-growing cities transformed— or rather united—landscapes across huge areas of America’s Midwest. Cronon focuses on the commodification of nature: grain and wood, but also the very forests and fields themselves, become commodities subject to decisions made in some remote city—decisions now dissociated from the needs of people living in the countryside. Integration into market mechanisms strips these people of their personal connection with their own natural environment: they become cogs in the great, para-industrial machine. Modern capitalism brings the countryside and the city together into one organic whole.17 The chapter by Piotr Miodunka is likewise devoted to Krakow’s connections with its region. Analyzing the areas that supply key raw materials and food to the city, the author shows that since its infancy as a city Krakow has been dependent on areas even dozens of kilometers away. Moreover, the chapter shows how much Krakow was part of a region without which it simply could not have existed. This connection, which changed over successive centuries, was obviously not without its repercussions on the region itself: deforestation, erosion, and the introduction of new plants all resulted from the surrounding areas’ responses to the needs of Krakow. The chapter on climate history written by Konrad Wnęk, Adam Izdebski, and Leszek Kowanetz also shows the extent to which Krakow cannot be understood in isolation from its regional context. The city not only experienced the same climate changes but also suffered the effects of elemental disasters in the Lesser Poland region. Finally, another theme in Krakow’s relations with its region—intentional and accidental migrations of plants—is taken up by Aldona Mueller-Bieniek in a chapter on the vegetation of medieval Krakow. The issue of the presence of diverse groups of plants in the city leads us to another important topic but probably the one least recognized by historians—the character of the city’s natural environment. Previously, questions on this topic had been asked mostly in the context of analyzing the specific geographical determinants of the city’s organizational and regulatory makeup. This issue is most clearly discernible (and best studied) in the case of Venice, but one might point to numerous less obvious examples (which almost any city could furnish).18 In our book, this topic is discussed briefly at the end of this introduction and is treated as an absolutely fundamental issue—the starting point for our deliberations. A much more interesting subject, to which we devote much attention in this book, is the creation of a kind of “urban nature,” both intentional (parks, gardens) and incidental (thickets near walls and watercourses; streams and canals; but also unique urban ecosystems like castles and citadels—in our case, the royal castle of Wawel).19 We ask what

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

has been special about city dwellers’ experience of nature—starting from medieval times. This is inseparably connected with the issue of environmental justice in the city (with regard to access to natural resources as well as to the pleasure and health derived from communing with nature), which appeared in the context of pollution.20 This topic takes up three chapters in our book. First is the text by Aldona Mueller-Bieniek, who describes the diverse ecosystems and plant communities present in Krakow in the Middle Ages. In turn, Małgorzata Praczyk’s text addresses the notion of Krakow’s nature, which was shaped in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and influences how the city is perceived even today as an almost mythical “green Krakow.” The special ecosystem or, more broadly, the natural environment in the city is dealt with by Andrzej Chwalba and Konrad Wnęk, whose chapter is devoted to the agency of the rivers, in particular of the largest Polish river, the Vistula, and its culture-creating power in the history of Krakow. In recent years in the United States there evolved a yet another way of writing about the history of cities in the context of nature, an approach that is virtually absent in Europe. These are ecobiographies of cities, which on the one hand capture the history of cities (which are often very short from a European perspective—and this makes looking at Krakow with its more than a thousand years of documented history so much different) in terms of natural environment and geographical location, and on the other hand, they try to identify the unique natural phenomena a given city has produced or lived with over the past century or two. After the first innovative attempts, many popular or specialized works were created over the past decade, created by a single author depicting a vision of the city’s history (e.g., Seattle, Los Angeles, or New Orleans) or by a team of authors from various fields (e.g., Philadelphia, Saint Louis).21 Our book is also an ecobiography, but a European one: we propose a different history of Krakow and seek to find Krakow’s centuries-long, evolving—and in our opinion unique—relationship with the world of nature. We want to capture the environmental history of Krakow in a holistic way, for the first time transferring the American idea to European soil, and also undertaking this in an interdisciplinary way, combining the approaches of historians, archaeologists, and environmental scientists. Krakow’s rich, long history deserves to be told from an environmental perspective. By telling the story of Krakow’s ecobiography, we hope to have something important to share with the city’s inhabitants, but also with environmental historians—on both sides of the Atlantic.

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Krakow and Polish History To help readers appreciate the dynamic and complex relationship that Krakow developed with its natural environment, it is necessary to explain briefly the city’s changing role in the history of the entire country. Krakow was the capital of the country for half a millennium, that is even longer than the current capital, Warsaw—from the mid-eleventh century until 1596, when the new Sweden-born king of Poland, Sigismund III Vasa, moved the royal court to Warsaw, closer to the Baltic Sea (even then, until the very dissolution of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1795, almost all royal coronations took place in the Krakow cathedral). All the economic consequences of these changes notwithstanding, this meant that Krakow was the capital of Poland under the powerful Jagiellonian dynasty (1385–1572), during the mythical Golden Age when the Commonwealth stretched from the Carpathians to what is now the Baltic states, and from the far outskirts of Berlin to Kiev—and when the Commonwealth experienced its Renaissance flourishing, which provided the foundations for Polish culture during the centuries to come. As a result, Krakow has become the treasury of national heritage, the home to monuments that recall the glory days of the country, and as Poland was under foreign rule during the nineteenth century, the city became central to the newly forged modern national identity and to the country’s historical imagination. This cultural allure continues today—it suffices to mention that both Polish Nobel prize winners in poetry, Wisława Szymborska and Czesław Miłosz, had a special connection with Krakow and lived in this city. Pope John Paul II, a unique figure of modern Polish identity, is believed by many in Poland to be the divine-inspired prophet who freed the country from communist rule. That he was the archbishop of Krakow before he moved to Rome further strengthened the city’s special place in the minds of the Polish people. Thus, writing about Krakow is not like writing about any other large city in Poland. Readers should bear in mind all these special meanings attached to Krakow in Polish culture, which we will briefly explain as necessary. Probably because of the rocky hill of Wawel, the later cathedral, and castle hill, located on the banks of the Vistula River, which controlled a crucial crossroads of north–south and east–west trade routes, ensured shelter (caves), and abundant food sources (wetlands), there has been human settlement in Krakow since time immemorial. The Wawel hill was already a well-protected stronghold by the end of the first millennium AD, as the central place for the tribal polity of the Vistulans. From 1000 AD it became one of the few bishoprics of the newly founded Polish state, ruled by the Piast dynasty, and

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Gdańsk

Kiev

Map I.1. Krakow’s location within the borders of the different political organisms to which it belonged. Source: Konrad Wnęk.

soon became a self-standing kingdom, recognized by the German Holy Roman Empire. Initially, the Piast polity had its center of gravity in the area of Poznań and Gniezno, halfway between Warsaw and Berlin (i.e., some 400–500 kilometers northwest of Krakow), and this is where the archbishop of the country took his seat in 1000 AD. However, soon after the political expansion of the Gniezno-based Piast polity culminated in the 1020s, their monarchy almost entirely collapsed. It suffered a Czech invasion and a popular rebellion against the oppressive rulers and the new religion of Christianity, which underpinned the Piast ideology. As a result, the Gniezno-Poznań area was so devastated that the new Piast ruler Kazimierz, who returned from exile in Germany and rebuilt the monarchy in the 1040s, had to look for a new power base. His choice was Krakow, which was not as devastated as Gniezno and Poznań and not viewed by Czechs as their lands, as was the case for another major urban center in Poland, Wrocław in Silesia. Krakow was also much closer to the great powers of Hungary and Kievan Ruś (see map I.1).22 Despite its new role as the seat of the royal court and proto-urban growth,

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Roy

al M

illra

Nowa Huta Steelworks

ce

Prą dn ik

Kleparz 1366

Ru

da

wa

Old Ru

Kraków

dawa

1257

W

ła

Wis

Old

Wawel

isła

Wis ła

Okół

Kazimierz 1335

Podgórze 1784

Quarters of the city

Wilga

Wisła

Rivers Old rivers Floodplain

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1

2 Miles

Map I.2. The medieval “pentapolis” of Krakow and the dynamic river system of the Krakow floodplain. Source: Konrad Wnęk.

for another two hundred years Krakow remained a constellation of several interdependent settlements (as shown in map I.2), many of them with their own churches, spread between numerous wetlands and small watercourses on the alluvial plain and elevated platforms surrounding the Wawel hill. The year 1257 was a major watershed in the city’s history, with the foundation of the new legal urban entity, the commune of Krakow, which was given its statutes “according to the German law” (i.e., modeled after the city of Magdeburg) by Prince Bolesław the Chaste. This meant not only that the new community of burghers gained autonomy vis-à-vis the princely or royal power but also that a new medieval city was planned and built on the lands north of the Wawel hill. With one of the largest market squares in this part of Europe, it remains a landmark in the cityscape to this day and a testament to the city’s commercial strength. In the fourteenth century, two more urban communes were founded in Krakow (Kleparz to the north and Kazimierz to the south of the main “1253 town”), which together with two larger autonomous suburbs (Garbary and Stradom) created the late medieval “pentapolis” of Krakow, located around

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

the Wawel hill on the northern banks of the Vistula River. Unless we specify one of these communes by name, whenever we discuss pre-1800 Krakow, we mean the entire agglomeration of these five interdependent urban organisms.23 After the thirteenth-century reordering of the city and the granting of autonomy, Krakow flourished economically, and when the Polish princedoms of the local Piast rulers became reunited into a single kingdom in the fourteenth century under the Piast king Władysław, the city’s political significance grew even further, making it one of the key royal capitals in Europe. In 1364, the last king of the Piast dynasty, Kazimierz the Great, founded a university (second only to Charles University in Prague, the oldest university in Central Europe, founded just a few years earlier). Thanks to this royal initiative and a large bequest of one of Kazimierz’s successors to the Polish throne, Jadwiga, Krakow became a major intellectual center of late medieval Europe and the cultural hub of the renewed Polish Kingdom. In the meantime, Poland started the long-term process of creating a state union with Lithuania, which began in 1385 with an invitation to the Polish throne the Lithuanian grand prince Władysław of the Jagiellonian dynasty (almost two centuries later, in 1569, this process ended with a complete union of the two monarchies and the creation of the dual Polish–Lithuanian state—the Commonwealth, res publica, effectively ruled by a parliament and the king, both elected by the country’s noblemen). As a result, Krakow became the center of power for the largest territorial state of early modern Europe before the rise of Russia in the eighteenth century.24 However, the city experienced a major reversal of its fate in 1596, as the first king of the new Swedish dynasty of the Waza that had followed the Jagiellons moved his court to Warsaw (for the fluctuations in Krakow’s population numbers against the background of the city’s history, see figure I.1). In fact, Krakow’s location had never been favorable for ruling the vast land mass of Central-Eastern Europe: it was actually located at the very southwest edge of the Commonwealth, and thus the decision to relocate the center of power to the better-connected city of Warsaw was indeed a reasonable one. For Krakow, however, this marked the beginning of a slow process of decline, as the city no longer enjoyed the same royal and aristocratic spending and no longer offered career opportunities at the royal court. Warsaw was on the rise and it easily outgrew Krakow in the eighteenth century, reaching population numbers that Krakow had never achieved. The decline of Krakow was also precipitated by other factors. The court’s relocation was followed two generations later by a series of major wars that devastated the entire country and led to general economic and demographic decline. From then on, Krakow became a medium-size Polish city, yet it was distinguished by its possession of two unique resources:

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Figure I.1. Population dynamics (in thousands) of Krakow (including the communes of Kazimierz and Kleparz). Source: Konrad Wnęk, based on P. Miodunka and K. Wnęk, “Demografia Krakowa,” in Ekobiografia Krakowa, ed. A. Izdebski and R. Szmytka (Krakow, 2018), 37–44.

the university and the material heritage of the Golden Age. It was only in the communist era, after World War II, that Krakow experienced demographic growth that again made it one of the biggest cities in the country. In fact, the city’s significance decreased even further after the Partitions of Poland (the dissolution of the Commonwealth and the annexation of its lands by the neighbors), when the city came under Austrian domination. The capital of the Austrian province encompassing the former Commonwealth’s lands, that is the Austrian dominion north of the Carpathians, called Galicja, was located not in Krakow but farther to the east, in Lviv (Lemberg/Lwów). This made Krakow a provincial backwater and later, a frontier garrison city, remodeled into a large fortress tasked with protecting the Austro-Hungarian Empire against the Russians. Because of this precarious military location as well as the old bourgeoisie’s active dislike of the new technologies and factories, there was little industry in the city during the nineteenth century, even though the railway arrived relatively early, already in 1847.25

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

The situation improved after the city became part of the new Republic of Poland created in November 1918—like many other new post–World War I states in Central Europe—after the collapse of the three Partition Empires (Prussia, Russia, and Austria). The city became one of the key administrative centers in the south of the country, and its intellectual role grew further with the founding of a new technical university (the Academy of Mining and Metallurgy). Its task was to train engineers for the Polish industry in the nearby Silesia region, and the location in Krakow was chosen because of its relative security compared to the hotly contested mining region (between Poland and Germany) of Upper Silesia around Katowice. In 1939, after the coordinated invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, Krakow again became a capital, this time of the German occupation administration. This was a humiliation to Warsaw—which defended itself against the Germans for longer than almost any other part of the country.26 Nevertheless, the final major change for the city came with the introduction of communism, the construction of the Nowa Huta steelworks, and the accompanying socialist model town just east of the old Krakow. A conscious decision to counterbalance the cultural influence of the bourgeois and intellectual city with a large workers’ community, the foundation of Nowa Huta not only led to huge pollution problems and environmental degradation but also completely reshaped the urban topography of Krakow and provided the single most important boost in the city’s demographic history.27 As a result, in the 2000s, Krakow finally became the second largest city in Poland after Warsaw, a development that was not foreseeable before 1945.28

The Natural Conditions of Krakow’s Growth No word better describes the topography and geological structure of the area where Krakow is situated than diverse. The city owes this to its location at the intersection of several geographical regions: the Sandomierz Basin, the Western Beskidian Foothills, the Oświęcim Basin, the Krakow-Częstochowa Upland, and the Krakow Gate (to be distinguished from the Florian Gate and the other gates of the city—this is the name for the Vistula valley in the vicinities of Krakow). The different characteristics of each region ensured a multitude of landforms and a wealth of natural resources.29 The areas around today’s Krakow have good soils. To the northeast, the so-called Proszowice Plateau, with its loesses and rich, humic chernozems, extends up to the city. Since the Middle Ages, its westernmost part has been conducive to cultivation; the horticultural villages of Łobzów, Nowa Wieś, and Czarna Wieś were established in the area. The name of the latter, literally

17

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Settlement complexes in the Krakow region from the 9th to mid-13th centuries scale

middle terrace

by Kazimierz Radwański areas settled in the 9th and 10th c.

areas settled from turn of 12th to mid-13th c.

areas settled in the 10th c.

flood terraces susceptible to flood waters of the Vistula and its Krakow tributaries

areas settled from turn of 10th to 12th c.

flood plain terrace Gródek moat earth and timber fortifications skeleton graves of early medieval non-churchside cemeteries

churches pre-dating the city charter, with churchside cemeteries probable churches with cemeteries long-distance routes local routes Prądnik Fan (middle terrace) escarpment and isolated horsts of the Krakow Gate

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

black village, derives from its fertile soils. To the west of the Proszowice Plateau stretches the Miechów Upland with its characteristic depressions covered with brown soils that are perfect for growing wheat.30 The Carpathian Foothills, built mainly of dolomites and marl, would not have afforded such good conditions for cultivation as the left-bank areas, but their elevations had significant defensive value ​​and were also used for grazing cattle. This trait is reflected in the present-day names of former service-providing villages, such as Skotniki (skotnik being an old name for a cattle herder) or Rżąka (originally meaning “extensive pastures”). Agricultural and pastureland areas stretched around the villages of Kurdwanów, Piaski, Łagiewniki, Jugowice, and Wola Duchacka.31 Mines on the southward sloping Olkusz Upland provided the city with lead and silver, and from the south of the Wieliczka Foothills and the southeast of the Bochnia Foothills came precious salt obtained initially from salt springs and then by mining. Krakow also had excellent resources in terms of energy and construction materials. The closeness of the Niepołomice forest and the Carpathian forest, whose edges include the villages of Swoszowice, Wróblowice, and Kosocice, ensured a steady supply of the most important fuel and building material of medieval and early modern times (see map I.3). In the immediate vicinity of the city, outstanding loess silt-loam cement and limestones were obtained for use in finishing religious and public buildings. The city’s streets were also surfaced with them. Brickyards in the vicinity of Krakow were also supplying building material in the late Middle Ages and early modern era.32 The decisive influence on the civilizational development of Krakow’s urban complex lay in the Vistula ice-marginal valley, and more precisely in the eastern part of the tectonic ditch, or graben, known as Krakow Gate. Several tributaries have been falling into the changing riverbed of the meandering Vistula over the centuries. Of particular significance to the development of the city’s settlement were two left-bank tributaries—the Rudawa and the Prądnik—which together with the right-bank Wilga had their confluence at Wawel within a stretch just three kilometers long.33 The Rudawa’s water was used quite early to power mills, sawmills, and grinders; in the thirteenth century, an artificial northern arm called Młynówka (Millrace) was created. It also helped to defend the city, as the city’s moats were filled with its waters. The ◀ Map I.3. Geographical conditions for the development of Krakow: flood routes, trade routes, and settlement complexes from the ninth to the mid-thirteenth century. Map by Anna Pietrzyk.

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Prądnik had similar economic significance with its banks sporting mills as well as bleachfields where canvas was whitened, giving the river its alternative name Białucha from the word for white. Sands and gravel ejected by the Vistula, the Rudawa, and the fast currents of the Białucha were deposited as a fan whose height at the Barbican was 212 meters above sea level, and 204 meters at Wawel. Wawel Hill rising to a height of 228 meters above sea level and marking the fan’s southern peak, was a promontory of sorts, behind which the material carried by the rivers accumulated. As a result, three terraces formed on the Vistula ice-marginal valley: a flood terrace (0.5–3 meters), a middle terrace, the Prądnik Fan (3–6 meters), and a high terrace (8–25 meters). To this day, characteristic faults marking the borders of the fan run along the Planty from Collegium Novum and Collegium Witkowski to the Wiślna Street exit, in the gardens of the Archaeological Museum, from the Royal Arsenal at number 64 on Ulica Grodzka to Gródek; from there, they turn ninety degrees eastward and extend to the Botanical Garden. On the hump that this formed, the fort-side settlement of Okół was established, and it is this settlement that was granted the Magdeburg rights in 1257, replanned into a regular street grid. The fan was so high that it ensured the city’s safety even during the most drastic floods that inundated the outlying settlements, including Kazimierz. At the same time, the area of​​ the Prądnik Fan limited the development of the main city in the Middle Ages and the early modern era. On the one hand, if the inhabitants of the growing city moved away from the area of safe elevation, they would be exposed to the danger of regular floods; on the other hand, a large area within the walls was occupied by church grounds—especially in the Okół area and northwestern and southeastern suburbs. As a result, the main urban commune of early modern Krakow never grew larger than twenty thousand inhabitants, with the entire agglomeration reaching only thirty thousand, while early modern Gdańsk easily exceeded fifty thousand. The Prądnik Fan was a natural bridge connecting north–south trade routes. In the direction of Greater Poland and Mazovia, a road ran from the Florian Gate through Prądnik Tyniecki (today’s district of Prądnik Czerwony), Dziekanowice, Słomniki, and Miechów. An alternate route led through Witkowice, Michałowice, and Miechów. The road to Silesia led from the Sławkowska Gate, through Kleparz, Krowodrza, Olkusz, Sławków, and Będzin, or through Zielonki, Skała, and Ogrodzieniec. Toward Bohemia and Moravia a route ran along the right bank of the Vistula from the Skawińska Gate in Kazimierz through Kobierzyn to Oświęcim, or a parallel northern route starting at the Vistulan Gate and leading through Kryspinów and Liszki.

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AND KRAKOW

For the east–west route, the most important role was played by the Vistula and routes leading to Ruthenia from the St. Nicholas Gate through Mogiła, Koszyce, Wiślica, and Sandomierz, and through Prusy, Luborzyca, and Proszowice. From the Wielicka and Bocheńska Gates in Kazimierz, routes led through Bochnia, Tarnów, and Rzeszów to Red Ruthenia and a road ran through Myślenice to Hungary.34 Thanks to its location at the intersection of important trade routes and its access to needed natural resources, Krakow attracted people from farther afield than Lesser Poland, allowing the city relatively quickly to recover after cataclysms such as floods, fires, and epidemics. After the period of decline and stagnation that began in the mid-seventeenth century, the city made another leap in the nineteenth century. With terrain that was free of major topographical obstacles, Krowodrza to the north and Płaszów to the south on the other side of the Vistula favored industrial investment.

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CHAPTER 1 THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

Konrad Wnęk, Adam Izdebski, and Leszek Kowanetz

In recent years the popular science pages of newspapers and other media have regularly informed readers about discoveries by climatologists that cast history’s most famous events in a new light. For example, the fall of the Roman Empire has been attributed to a cooling that weakened the Romans, while pressuring Germanic tribes to migrate to the Roman provinces. Meanwhile, the Ottoman Empire’s victorious march toward the heart of Europe was apparently stopped not by the heroic defenders of Vienna but by a mighty drought that shook the foundations of the Turkish state. Successive great civilizations turn out to have fallen to climate change, and climate becomes the preferred explanation as a determinant of human history, at least in popular accounts. But stepping back and looking at the academic publications on which articles in the press and on websites are based, it becomes apparent that specialists themselves are far more tentative in their hypotheses. Our fascination with climate change—and uneasiness about what we are currently experiencing—is so great that we simplify our portrayal of the past and project it onto our present fears. We take on faith information that the most cursory consideration should cast serious doubt on. It is important to gain some distance from such revelations and to understand the truth about past climate changes, weather, and climate extremes as 22

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

well as their importance in human history, based on our sources of knowledge about climate history and on possible connections between notions of weather and people’s lives in past centuries. The history of climate is among the older topics studied by environmental historians, and since its inception it has been something of a European specialty. It was pioneered by the French historian Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, who showed, among other things, the role of weather phenomena in setting off the French Revolution, and the British geographer Hubert Lamb, the author of the idea of the Medieval Climatic Optimum (or, initially, the Medieval Warm Epoch/Period). Interestingly, this term has long been used in science, but preference has been given to Medieval Climate Anomaly, because this period is not characterized by warming. It occurred only in certain parts of the world (not even across all of Europe—Lamb’s initial evidence came from England) and was interrupted by short episodes of significant cooling with considerable seasonal differences.1 The term anomaly also points to important hydrological changes that were taking place during medieval times in different parts of the world, and this diverts our attention away from focusing solely on temperatures.

THE MEDIEVAL CLIMATIC ANOMALY, the fate of the Medieval Warm Period hypothesis shows the extent to which climate research now involves political dispute. In the United States, those arguing against the anthropogenic nature of the climate change that is currently being observed use “medieval warming” as an argument for the lack of human influence on the current global warming. Using this rationale to ignore the past thirty years of scientific research, some fossil fuels advocates voice these views in American politics. They consider the substitution of the word warming for anomaly to be part of an anti-American conspiracy aimed at destroying the foundations of the US economy, which is based on fossil fuels and thus releases huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, contributing to the current warming and, more generally, climate destabilization.

Both Le Roy Ladurie and Lamb began their research in the 1960s. At that time, the climate reconstruction methods that have now been developed by the natural sciences—which we will discuss later in this chapter—were all still in their infancy. The only way to study historical climate variability was

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from written sources, ranging from chronicles to private correspondence and various archives. A good example of this approach is Le Roy Ladurie’s research on climate in medieval and modern France, which is based primarily on his recovery of the precise dates for the beginning of the grape harvest in various regions of the country. In other words, based on when the grapes were ripe, he determined the temperatures for late spring and early summer for a given region. Meanwhile, other researchers, such as the Swiss historian Christian Pfister, created large databases of all descriptions of weather phenomena in written sources for a given area, and used these data to re-create changes in precipitation levels or temperature. Pfister pioneered this approach and his reconstruction of the Swiss climate remains a model to be emulated to this day.2 He was also the first researcher to conduct a larger-scale examination of the impact of climate on human history.3 One of his more interesting works showed that the burning of witches at the stake in German lands in the early modern period was very closely associated with bad weather and poor harvests.4

The Modern Climate of Krakow The climate of Krakow is well understood, thanks primarily to daily meteorological measurements and observations that have been conducted continuously since 1792. Over Krakow, high pressure systems slightly prevail over low. However, whatever the air pressure regime, the prevailing winds are westerly.5 The general atmospheric circulation in Krakow and the fact that the city lies in an east to west stretch of the Vistula valley account for the dominance of westerly winds and a significant share of easterlies. In a valley the ability of air to escape northward or southward is limited and this is a decisive factor in the city’s poor ventilation and low air quality.6 The annual average air temperature in the years 1792–2018, was 8.5°C. The warmest year was 2015, with an average temperature of 11.3°C, and the coldest was 1829, at 5.3°C. Over the course of the year, monthly air temperature means vary most widely in winter, especially in December, when the mean temperature for the month ranged from –13.7°C in 1829 to 5.3°C in 2015 (see figure 1.1). Since instrumental measurements began in 1792, Krakow’s air temperatures have increased.7 The greatest increase has been in winter, at 3.4°C, followed by spring (1.9°C), and autumn (1.3°C), with the lowest increase (0.8°C) observed in the summer mean temperature. Over the entire period of instrumental measurement, Krakow’s annual air temperature has increased by 1.9°C (see figures 1.2a and 1.2b) Progressive urbanization and increasing air pollution have undoubtedly

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

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Figure 1.1. Annual courses of air temperature (°C) and precipitation totals (mm) in Krakow (monthly mean values of 1792–2018 and 1812–2018, respectively); whiskers indicate maxima and minima within the periods; precipitation totals from the period 1812–1848 were reconstructed using a highly correlated number of wet days. Source: Data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

resulted in the emergence of urban heat islands. One significant factor in creating heat islands is heat released into the atmosphere by human use of combustible energy resources for municipal purposes, transport, and industry. Urban heat islands are dynamic phenomena, with the largest differences between air temperatures in the city center and outside the urban area occurring on cloudless, still nights. In Krakow, the urban heat island effect averages 1.2°C, but in extreme cases it can be as much as 5°C or even 7°C. Of particular importance in urban areas, especially in areas of varied terrain, are temperature inversions, when cool air is trapped under a layer of warmer air. This occurs especially when conditions are windless and cloud cover is sparse, and limits the ability of a city’s polluted air to escape and disperse. In Krakow, temperature inversions affect more than half the days of the year, and at the lowest temperatures their frequency increases to as much as 92 percent. The area’s dense network of rivers increases Krakow’s humidity, promoting the formation and retention of fog, especially in the lowest-lying

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KONRAD WNĘK, ADAM IZDEBSKI, AND LESZEK KOWANETZ

Figure 1.2a. Annual (A) and seasonal: spring (MAM, B), summer (JJA, C), autumn (SON, D) and winter (DJF, E) air temperature variability in Krakow (1792–2018); values smoothed by eleven-year running mean. Sources: Data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

locations; this can combine with pollution to form a layer of smog over the city, which is particularly harmful to human health. Krakow’s location and the nature of its atmospheric circulation make conditions relatively conducive to rain and snowfall. This is seen in elevated levels of precipitation in the city, where annual totals are usually in the 650–700 mm range, which is well above the 590 mm average for the country as a whole. Krakow experiences the heavy rainfalls lasting several days that are typical of the Carpathian Mountains and their forelands. Caused by the accumulation

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

Figure 1.2b. Annual (A) and seasonal: summer (JJA, B) and winter (DJF, C) air temperature anomalies with respect to the 1961–90 normal period. Sources: Data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

of humid air masses flowing in from the north, these rainfalls are the most common cause of flooding in the upper Vistula basin. Annual precipitation totals vary significantly; during the period of instrumental observation and measurement (1812–2018) they have varied by 677.9 mm. The highest amount was 1,126.3 mm (167 percent of the mean) and occurred in 2010, and the lowest was 448.4 mm (66 percent of the mean) in 1993. Over the course of the year, monthly mean precipitation totals reach a clear peak of 98 mm in July, and a minimum of 29.4 mm in February. The monthly totals are most variable in July, May, and June (see figure 1.1). Precipitation total in the warm half of the year (May–October) is more than double that in the cool half of the year (November–April), which means that in terms of rainfall and snowfall, Krakow is classified as highly continental. The amount of precipitation is far more variable in the warm half of the year than the cold half (see figures 1.3a and 1.3b). The long-term course of precipitation totals reveals no trends, only more-or-less regular fluctuations, which is to say that it alternates between increases and decreases in precipitation totals (see figure 1.3a).

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Figure 1.3a. Annual (A) and seasonal: warm (May to October, B) and cold (November to April, C) precipitation totals variability in Krakow (1812–2018); values smoothed by eleven-year running mean; data from the period 1812–48 were reconstructed using a highly correlated number of wet days. Sources: Data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

Instrumental Observations and Measurements The University of Krakow’s tradition of meteorological observation dates back to the Middle Ages and continues to this day. Now, of course, it uses modern measuring devices, but at the same times and places. Thanks to the efforts of the Institute of Geography of the modern Jagiellonian University, it maintains both the locations and timings of observations introduced in the late eighteenth century (the “Historical Station,” located 220 meters above sea level, 50°04'N 19°58'E). The first observations, called “weather chronicles,” were conducted by university professors (including Marcin Biem) in 1502–17 and 1525–40.8 These chronicles were of course based only on observations, without

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

Figure 1.3b. Annual (A) and seasonal: warm (May to October, B) and cold (November to April, C) precipitation totals anomalies with respect to the 1961–90 normal period; data from the period 1812–48 were reconstructed using a highly correlated number of wet days. Sources: Data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

recording physical phenomena, because no instruments suitable for that purpose existed at the time. Such instruments were invented in the seventeenth century, and they appeared in Poland within a few years. The first documented instrumental observations were conducted in Warsaw in December 1654 or early 1655. At that time, Warsaw belonged to the Florentine meteorological network, the world’s first observation network for climatic phenomena. Organized by Grand Duke Ferdinand II and his scholars from the Accademia del Cimento, it consisted of eleven stations and carried out observations for more than a dozen years. Interestingly, even then, the different stations used the same physical devices and the same observation intervals.9

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THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

It was only at the end of the eighteenth century, influenced by new intellectual trends and following university reforms in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, that a modern astronomical observatory was established in Krakow to conduct meteorological measurements. It was located outside the city center to facilitate observation of the sky. It is still there today, in the Botanical Garden of the Jagiellonian University (see illustrations 1.1 and 1.2), and it is known as the historical meteorological station. It was commissioned on May 1, 1792, and observations were begun in 1792 by Jan Śniadecki. He also created the foundations of a methodology and research practice as part of his work at the University of Krakow, laying down detailed instructions and describing the basic instruments. Śniadecki conducted observations and recorded them in special journals. He used instruments most probably from Mannheim, Germany, including a mercury barometer, a mercury thermometer, and a hair hygrometer. Rainfall was not measured, but the state of the sky was described, generally cloudiness. Observations were made at designated local times, three times a day—between 6:00 a.m. and 7:00 a.m., between 2:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m., and at around 9:00 p.m.10 Śniadecki warned against recording observations in inappropriate conditions, such as when the sun’s rays were falling directly on the instruments, or the measurements were disrupted by stoves burning during cold winters. Even today, the room at the historical station where the instruments hang is still not heated. Most of the observation records have survived to this day. The longest data series, which begins in 1792, includes temperature, atmospheric pressure, humidity, and wind direction.11 However, precipitation began to be measured relatively late—from 1849 (previous results have not survived). The weather also enjoyed public interest at that time: it was reported regularly, albeit in a slightly different form—in newspapers, with a delay of several days. The data were published mainly in Gazeta Krakowska (see illustration 1.3) starting in 1811, mainly giving temperatures for individual days and the number of cold or warm days. From today’s point of view, when we are mainly interested in weather forecasts, this may appear odd, but at that time it was very important, mainly due to people’s dependence on the harvest being successful. The temperatures given affected decisions to start work in the fields and made it possible to determine a year’s potential for successfully growing various plants.

◀ Illustration 1.1. Plan of Krakow by Meno Passeck, 1817. Source: Historical Museum of the City of Krakow, sygn. 8/VIIIa.

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Illustration 1.2. The building of the historic astronomical and meteorological observatory in Krakow. Source: Materials from the scientific session organized by the History of Science Commission of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Astronomical Observatory of the Jagiellonian University in “15 rocznicę założenia przez Jana Śniadeckiego Obserwatorium Astronomicznego (9 V 2007),” Prace Komisji Historii Nauki PAU 10 (2010): 171.

Illustration 1.3. Excerpt from Gazeta Krakowska of 1815 with the lowest temperatures given for December 1814 and January 1815 (using the Réaumur scale). Source: “Największe stopnie zimna,” Gazeta Krakowska, January 11, 1815, sect. Dodatek do nr 4, p. 47.

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

It is thus reasonable that meteorological observation records were printed near the prices of cereals.12 The climate of Krakow changed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as can be discerned from instrumental meteorological data. The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries saw large fluctuations in average seasonal and annual temperature, which indicates high year-to-year (or annual) variability (see figures 1.2a and 1.2b, respectively, the absolute values and the anomalies, that is, differences with respect to the reference period of 1961–90). Of course, the most striking feature of both figures is the twentieth-century warming trend, most pronounced during the past four decades (from the 1980s onward)—which is due to the climate destabilization caused by the accumulation of anthropogenic emissions in the atmosphere. In earlier times, a cold period is clearly discernible, lasting roughly a century from the 1830s until the 1930s. It is worth noticing that trends for the entire year (the upper panel on both figures) are not the same as trends for the two opposite seasons, the summer (the middle panel) and the winter (the bottom panel). In the context of the cool century (1830s–1930s), the summer temperatures (together with those of spring and autumn) contributed to its onset in the 1830s, as the winter temperatures were already in the lower values from the very beginning of the instrumental period (i.e., since the measurements had started). At the same time, whereas the summer temperatures remained consistently lower throughout the entire hundred years, we can observe significant fluctuations of the winter temperatures. At first, they are persistently in the lowest values for the entire nineteenth century (even if there are some quasi-cyclical fluctuations); at the beginning of the twentieth century, however, there are two decades of higher winter temperatures, during which the summer temperatures still remained rather low. What is crucial, not only the seasonal trends tend to be decoupled for several decades during the past two centuries but also, if we look at single years, two seasons with extreme temperature do not occur at the same time. The best example is probably the year 1829: the coldest winter ever recorded instrumentally in Krakow, but a relatively warm summer. The same occurred during the 1810s, the final years of the Napoleonic wars: severe winters were followed by hot summers (some of them extremely warm compared to the entire two centuries of temperature measurements in Krakow!). In this context, it is also useful to compare the seasonal temperatures during the two world wars. Thus, relatively warm winters and slightly cooler than normal summers prevailed during World War I—little variability made it easier to survive war shortages and life in the trenches. During World War II, however, a series of very cold winters (one of the coldest in the twentieth

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Figure 1.4. Peak water levels on the Vistula, 1813–2010. Sources: Accessed April 2, 2018, https://dane.imgw.pl/data/dane_pomiarowo_obserwacyjne/dane_hydrologiczne/ polroczne_i_roczne/; http://www.krakow.rzgw.gov.pl/wodypolskie_old/index. php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1055:powodzie-w-polsce-i-malopols ce&catid=103&Itemid=252&showall=1&limitstart=&lang=pl.

century), and summers that remained normal placed an additional burden on the civilian population and the energy needs of the military. As figures 1.3a and 1.3b show, precipitation was even more variable than the temperatures, and it is important to note that there is relatively little correlation between the two, except for the rise in warm season rainfall totals during the past three decades. The differences between the warm and cold seasons are even more striking than the contrast between summer and winter temperatures. Winter precipitation has remained relatively stable over the past two hundred years, with extremely high values occurring incidentally in the 1850s and the 1910s (and a “wet” decade of the 1960s, also with unusually high warm season precipitation). But the warm seasons are highly variable and contribute the majority of the overall annual precipitation variability. (This is also important to remember in the context of floods: extreme rainfall events tend to occur irregularly in the summer, while the cold season snowfall/rainfall remains rather stable and thus more predictable.) Thus, when it comes to the warm season, the wettest decades during the past two centuries occurred

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

in the 1840s (which led to significant flooding and major famine, discussed in detail in chapter 2), in the 1900s–1910s (thus coinciding with the large floods that changed urban planning in Krakow—again, see chapter 2), and finally in the 1960s. One of the driest decades, in turn, was the late 1850s–early 1860s, which was also particularly dry in the northern and central parts of Poland.13 Of course, the inhabitants of Krakow feared the waves of floods from the upper Vistula basin more than they feared heavy rains as such. The Vistula River’s level at Bielany began to be recorded in 1813 during one of the most dramatic floods in the city’s history, and observations are conducted there to this day. This is also why we have data on when the river’s highest waters occurred (see figure 1.4), and there is no doubt that the record of 1813 has never yet been beaten. That said, it should be clarified that work to build dams and reservoirs has now made high waters a rarer event. However, the straightening of the Vistula river channel around Krakow and the construction of floodplains have potentially left the city at the mercy of a flood embankment failure.

Historical Data and Weather Observations The climate, particularly its nontypical meteorological components—such as prolonged drought or downpours, extremely harsh winters, frosts during the growing season, hail, and other phenomena—were often associated with astronomical phenomena in the Middle Ages, and comets were thought to bring various natural disasters. Old chronicles and annals, as well as other written records, have preserved more or less copious notes on changes in the weather, and these were also taken as manifestations of divine intervention. We therefore have a lot of data from the medieval and early modern periods, but it is difficult to expect the information to be accurate, as most observers recorded their observations without using objective parameters. Chroniclers of Krakow’s “weather” were most keenly interested in floods, which were the main threat to the city. Until the twelfth century, floods are mentioned in rather general terms, statements being limited to noting that in a given year, rivers broke their banks and flooded many areas. In later periods, we find detailed descriptions of a flood and even attempts to interpret and compare with situations in other countries. One of the first more detailed mentions of the climate is the description of a flood in 1221, which resulted from intense rainfall lasting from Easter until autumn. Many lowland villages were under water, all the sown cereals were lost, and the spring sowing was also unsuccessful. The flood and subsequent harsh winter resulted in a famine that lasted for three years. With the rural population being the main victim of this natural disaster, many villages and towns were deserted. The next disaster

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of comparable scale did not occur until 1253, when it rained day and night until July, causing a great flood and damaging the new crop. If the chroniclers of the time are to be believed, some of the fields and roads could be sailed and the surrounding hills were chosen for storing salvaged cereal.14 After the thirteenth century, reports of floods became very detailed and increasingly numerous. We will take a closer look at them separately at the end of this chapter because floods are not a matter purely of weather and climate—they are phenomena related to the interface between the natural world and social life. Floods are not really determined by the extent of rainfall or snow cover alone, but also by how man has transformed the landscape through which the water flows, by what infrastructure is there (buildings, roads, bridges, etc.), and by the direct reaction to precipitation and high waters in rivers.15 Seeing floods in these terms allows us to better show what role climate has played in the history of the city and its inhabitants. The sources assign less importance to “pure” weather phenomena, which were recorded but hard to describe in concrete terms. Thus, we read that in 1278 “winter was more severe than usual and waters flooded almost everywhere in the world.”16 It is doubtful that floods actually occurred everywhere that year, but the information about the causes of the river outbursts is entirely reasonable. The water level in rivers was easy to observe, including in periods of high temperatures, and one might even say that, dependent as they are on temperature and rainfall, high and low water levels were a sort of natural measuring instrument. Unfortunately, we know nothing of whether or not the water level of the Vistula was measured in medieval Poland. During periods of great heat, river levels dropped and, in extreme cases, this was recorded in historical sources. For instance, in 1322 “the heat was so great that the old folks said they had never seen such heat in the Krakow region, and that the Vistula River was so much reduced by the great drought that in many places ten- and twelve-year-old boys could easily wade across.”17 Similarly, we find references to harsh winters, which were recorded not only for severely low temperatures but also, above all, for their deleterious impact on trade, insofar as rivers were trading routes. Often these are very short notes such as one from the cusp of 940 to 941: “Harsh winter. Comets appeared”; or the winter of 1278: “Winter was harsher than usual.”18 A more striking image is invoked in a note from 1285, in which the author states: “The Baltic Sea iced over because of a heavy freeze.” This happened in later years, too. Sources say that in the winter of 1306 it was possible to cross the ice to Denmark, the cold weather said to have lasted unbroken for fourteen weeks, so these were not just episodes of weather. The early fifteenth century was indeed abundant in such events: in

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

1323 it was again noted, “Winter was so harsh that people rode on horses on the sea.” This was not pure rhetoric, since other sources also contained examples of ships trapped in the ice on the open sea. As they waited for a warming trend, the merchants aboard the ships visited each other (environmental data, as we write below, also indicate that the winters were particularly long, since spring temperatures were among the lowest for the entire past millennium). Plunderers also took advantage of this situation by attacking Denmark across the icebound Baltic. The winter of 1323 began early—on November 30—and lasted until March 6, so it is no wonder that on the frozen sea, inns and bars were set up to at least somewhat alleviate the fate of travelers. Of course, such descriptions, especially stories about riding a horse across the sea to Denmark or Sweden, should be considered with caution. The authors of these sources may have been taking information about winter travel infrastructure typical of the Baltic coast during the late Middle Ages and modern times and turning it into information about a completely unique phenomenon. The first modern map of the Baltic, the Swedish Carta Marina (published in Venice in 1539), shows an entire system of hostels and inns on the ice, which were probably set up every year along the Baltic coast. In the winter when land travel became very difficult, traveling along the frozen coastal waters was a convenient alternative—but by the time news of such solutions reached Warsaw or Krakow, they may have come across as incredible tales subjectively confirming the perceived severity of a particular winter.19 There is also evidence of acute winters in the latter decades of the fourteenth century, which is in line with the reconstructed spring temperatures we discuss below. For example, in 1363 in Poland, huge snowfalls and cold killed more than just farm animals: even wolves starved to death, unable to find food for themselves. An equally cold winter occurred two years later, causing losses in livestock, wiping out birds, and freezing fruit trees.20 It should be mentioned that the cold winter was more than an inconvenience. It resulted in water energy that was insufficient for the functioning of many professions, with the greatest harm suffered by millers, grinders, lumber millers and tanners, who effectively could not work at the time. There were also anomalies at other times in history: in 1493 the winter was so mild in January and February that “trees in orchards blossomed, the grass was tall, birds were dressing their nests,”21 but in March unexpected frosts destroyed the developing vegetation. Meanwhile, in 1507, the winter was so mild that contemporary writers found it worth noting that no major river was frozen. Again, this is in line with the general trend visible in environmental material toward warm springs.

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Environmental Data in the Archives of Nature Neither modern paleoclimatology nor our awareness of the scale of the threat posed by present-day climate change would exist without reconstructions of the history of climate that are based on data from the “archives of nature.” This concept by Christian Pfister refers to all natural processes (biological and chemical) whose courses depend on the weather and leave a trace in the environment.22 Such processes may include tree growth as well as the formation of stalagmites and stalactites in caves. The width of tree rings depends on the cumulated climate information during the growing season (usually from spring to autumn). Once formed, a ring remains unchanged and can survive in dead, dried wood for hundreds and thousands of years. Speleothems, in turn, are formed by water flowing from the surface into an underground cave, and thus contain a record of the isotopic composition of rainwater or snow. The water may show a predominance of, for example, oxygen from the ocean, which is a sign of precipitation coming from outside the area, that is, temporarily increased climatic humidity.

PALEOCLIMATOLOGY is the science of reconstructing the weather conditions and directions of the Earth’s climate changes for the preinstrumental period in the past. It is an interdisciplinary field combining elements of geography, geology, biology, and history. From geography it draws meteorological knowledge: weather measurement analysis methods and climatic and weather-generating process models. From geology it takes methods for studying lake, peat, marine, and cave sediments. Biology provides key knowledge on the behavior of living organisms whose remains contain information about the climatic conditions during their lifetime. Finally, history provides tools for analyzing texts in which past cultures described direct and indirect weather phenomena.

The paleoclimatic archive demands very careful analysis. The research begins with skillful extraction of the material itself: drilling a hole in the bottom of a lake, cutting a stalagmite and carefully bringing it to the surface, or drilling a millimeters-thin wood core from a living or dead tree. The material thus obtained must then be divided into samples and each appropriately measured (e.g., measuring the width of the tree rings or the chemical composition of the lake sediment samples). Next, the correct age needs to be estimated for

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

each of the analyzed samples. In the case of living trees, one can count rings and thus go back through hundreds of years to the time when the first tree ring was formed, “hopping” in one’s counting from living trees to dead. Most other archives, however, require radioactive dating methods, such as the 14C isotope method, which has been in common use for more than half a century. The last step is calibration, that is, determining the relationship between a measured phenomenon and actual weather conditions. Here, historical meteorology helps, that is, data on temperature and precipitation collected for one hundred to two hundred years in various parts of Europe and the world. The series is usually split in two halves, the most recent being used for calibration and the earliest for validation. Comparing measurements from wood or sediment samples against historical meteorological data, one can assess the nature and strength of the connection between a given natural phenomenon and weather conditions. In this way, an approximate reconstruction is obtained of specific weather conditions from before the beginning of instrumental measurements. Only this final result can be subjected to historical interpretation, but that must also take into account the uncertainty and margin of error of each stage of analysis, from measuring samples, through dating, to calibration. Of course, in few areas of the world do all possible types of natural archives exist. The availability of such information depends not only on whether there was a scientist to examine a specific archive somewhere but also on whether such archives were preserved at all in a given area. Different environments favor the creation of different archives. Karst areas have interesting caves where speleothems can be found; from the Arctic Circle to the tropics, tree rings resolve temperature conditions, or precipitation, drought, runoff, or soil moisture for a particular season of the year; postglacial areas and wetlands feature numerous lakes and peatlands. In the region of Krakow, we do not have many lakes, and no cave has been investigated by paleoclimatologists so far; however, because the area has been continually settled since the Middle Ages, not only living trees can be studied but also samples of wood preserved in historic buildings. Thus, dendrologists have been able to reconstruct temperatures for Lesser Poland and the Tatra Mountains at a one-year resolution for the past millennium. The German dendrologist Ulf Büntgen led a joint Swiss–Czech–German team that reconstructed late spring temperatures for the Tatras, including northern Slovakia and Lesser Poland, going back to the year 1040.23 This was based on hundreds of larch samples taken from high-mountain areas, which were measured and then compared against each other (for most of the period, the researchers had more than one sample). This is how the typical width

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Figure 1.5. Reconstruction of late spring (MJ) temperature anomalies (deviations from the average temperature for May and June of 1961–90) for the Tatra region based on the chronology of larch elaborated by U. Büntgen and team. SD—standard deviation; FFT—Fast Fourier Transform. Source: U. Büntgen et al., Greater Tatra Region, 1040– 2011 AD, Tree Ring Width, Larix decidua Mill., PAGES Euro-Med 2k Version, accessed December 12, 2017, https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo-search/study/1003402.

of larch rings was determined for a given year for a region centering on the Tatras. Because the larch’s growing season starts in late spring (May–June), changes in the annual growth of these trees’ rings in the Tatras can be used to reconstruct temperatures for this part of the year. Further research allowed the authors of this reconstruction to show that data from the Tatra Mountains are representative not only of the region itself but also of much of central Europe. It should be emphasized that this is a reconstruction of anomalies, and not of temperatures themselves. Anomalies are deviations from the average temperature of a period chosen by researchers as a reference point. In this case,

THE CLIMATE HISTORY OF KRAKOW

that period was three decades of the twentieth century, the years 1961–90. In other words, for almost the entire millennium, the reconstruction that the international team carried out tells us how much warmer or colder it was in May and June of a given year compared to the average temperature of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Figure 1.5 shows anomalies of spring temperatures in the Tatra Mountains and Lesser Poland. At the right, we can see the standard deviation: the statistical measure of variability that allows us to distinguish typical from atypical, in our case, unusually warm or cold, or at times extreme, late springs/ early summers. About two-thirds of all years are located within the range of the standard deviations from the average (–2SD up to +2SD). These can be considered more or less typical springs. Others are unusually warm or cold from the perspective of the past millennium; the coldest May–June seasons are labeled. It is important to note that this data presentation serves more as information for modern readers and researchers than as a way to closely approach the experience of Cracovians of the time; they were assessing winters from the vantage point of their own lives and memories, and thus had a fortyto fifty-year perspective at most, rather than an entire millennium. It is clear at a glance that the late spring–early summer temperatures in and around the Tatra Mountains (including Krakow) were highly variable. Two periods of particular seasonal cooling are clearly visible—the latter half of the fourteenth century and the period of 1750–1850. It is particularly interesting that the warmest periods include not the Middle Ages, but the sixteenth century and, of course, the latter half of the twentieth century—modern-day warming is clearly visible. This means that in the sixteenth century the conditions for agriculture, fruit-growing and gardening in particular, were particularly good in and around Krakow. Interestingly, there was a noticeable cooling in the first decades of the seventeenth century, which reached a maximum in the late 1630s and 1640s. This was a period of energy crisis in Krakow (as Piotr Miodunka writes in chapter 4). The price of firewood almost doubled and, although we have no definitive assessment of how cold the winters were at the time, the convergence of two phenomena—the increased cost of wood and the exceptionally cold springs—is striking. Importantly, these data also show that it is a misconception to talk about the climate history of the past millennium using a periodization (“eras”) comparable to the historical periodization. The Medieval Climate Anomaly (until 1300) shows conditions similar to those of later historical periods, and no extended warm period is noted for the Lesser Poland region during medieval times, and the seventeenth century (allegedly the coldest of the Little Ice Age)

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did not necessarily have the coldest springs of the past millennium.24 Instead of referring to great “historical and climatic epochs,” which leads to simplifications, it is worth looking at the impact of the climate on specific social phenomena in different chronological scales, ranging from years to centuries, without presupposing that a given period was specifically “good” or “bad,” and thus caused harm or aided economic development by its very nature. As this very first chapter of the book demonstrates, the environmental conditions of life in Krakow over the past millennium were changeable, they did not stay the same over time and required constant adaptation. Despite the fact that the Late Holocene (encompassing about the past three thousand years) is a generally relatively stable period in terms of climatic conditions (compared to other epochs of the Earth’s “big” history), at times fluctuations occurred that could alter the conditions of human life or cause substantial harm. The life of Cracovians and the history of the city repeatedly experienced weather “shocks” and had to adjust to fluctuations in thermal and hydrological conditions. Weather and climate permeates several spheres of social life and human relationships with the natural world. The rest of the book, starting with chapter 2, on Krakow’s relationship with the local hydrosphere, frequently refers to the data and findings presented in this chapter, and links different processes and events in the city’s history with the fluctuations of its climate and the vagaries of its weather.

CHAPTER 2 KRAKOW AND ITS RIVERS

Andrzej Chwalba with a contribution by Konrad Wnęk

For centuries, the Vistula—the largest Polish river, flowing through Krakow, Warsaw, and Gdańsk—gave to the city’s people and environment, but it also took from them. The interdependence of man and nature created a network of connections. But access to natural resources, including river water, was traditionally and for centuries unequally divided between certain groups in urban society and municipal and state institutions. Some were privileged while others were disadvantaged: there was an imbalance in security and material benefits. With one hand the Vistula gave life, or a chance to survive, and with the other, in other circumstances, it took life away. Since the very dawn of settlement, the ability to use the resources of the Vistula was a significant asset to Krakow. Settlers realized that the river had a potential that would be useful. Therefore, despite the dangers, they remained beside it. The balance of profits and losses must have been in the residents’ favor. The benefits that the water brought humans were supplemented by Krakow’s tributaries of the Vistula: the Rudawa, the Prądnik, the Wilga, and the Dłubnia, plus their temporary branches. Along with their backwaters, abandoned channels, and ponds, they formed a hydrographic network that had nutritional, economic, and defensive value. What benefits did the Vistula, including its fauna and flora, bring people? What role did it play in the lives of Cracovians? 43

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Above all, throughout the ages Krakow’s rivers were the main sources of water for drinking, manufacturing, and everyday activities. Some Cracovians used the Vistula River, and others used its local tributaries. For centuries, the inhabitants of Krakow took water for cooking, bathing, washing and cleaning things, scrubbing dishes, and freshening up farms and homes, as well as for raising farm animals in the city and immediate surroundings. Well water could only play a supplementary role. On the banks of the Vistula and its Krakow tributaries, women washed clothes, underwear, linen, sheets, and the like. These waters made it possible to irrigate gardens in the town and monasteries and farms on the outskirts during a dry summer. Animals were washed and scrubbed in the Vistula and the Rudawa. The rivers accepted everything and served everyone.1 River water was also useful to the tradespeople, providing the energy needed for their endeavors. It served the sustainable development of business, services, trade, crafts, and industry. Without the water used by craftspeople, many goods would have been impossible to produce. Those who benefited the most and were thus most dependent on the water were leather dyers, saddlers, tanners, leather goods producers, potters, makers of straps for clothing, and purse makers. It would be hard to imagine beer making without water resources, especially since Krakow was famous for its tasty, sought-after beers. In the Middle Ages, a royal brewery was located on the Vistula River near the royal castle on the Wawel Hill. Water resources were mainly used by craftspeople with workshops near rivers. The location of craft workshops has changed as the rivers and their branches have changed over the centuries.2 Branches of the Vistula flowed, for example, along the city walls or around Kazimierz, the second-oldest urban commune of the premodern Krakow agglomeration, making it into an island connected by a bridge to the main town-commune of Krakow proper, built farther away from the river, on the Prądnik Fan, where the main market square is located. The development of crafts in Kazimierz was fundamentally affected by the proximity of the river, which allowed anyone who so wished to start production. Craftspeople in Krakow proper, meanwhile, did not have such excellent conditions. Some, unable to use the Vistula waters, had access to the municipal water supply that served the city and its residents from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries onward. In fact, few cities of similar size in Europe managed to provide a municipal water system as effective as Krakow’s. It was the first of its kind in Poland. It would not have been possible to create and operate the municipal water supply without the good and judicious cooperation of the city’s authorities and residents or the support of the rulers. It began

KRAKOW AND ITS RIVERS

Illustration 2.1. View of the royal castle with timber port on the Vistula. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

at the waterworks inlet close to the city walls, near what is today Garncarska (Potters’) Street by the convent of Reformed Franciscans. This was a device driven by a waterwheel that forced water along wooden pipes and into barrels, that is, to the water supply system. The water came from the Rudawa. In the sixteenth century, an attempt to build an additional waterworks drawing directly from the Vistula was unsuccessful. In the city’s precharter period, the few craftsmen working to meet the needs of the Wawel stronghold and surrounding settlement had unlimited access to water and no limit on the ability to set up workshops. This changed when the city was granted its charter by Bolesław the Chaste in accordance with the Magdeburg rights of 1257. According to the charter, the right to economic exploitation of the river was held by the wójt-lokator—the administrator in charge of land affairs. The wójt had the right to use the Vistula River from Zwierzyniec to the borders of the monastery in Mogiła, far outside the immediate vicinity of the Prądnik Fan, where the new autonomous urban commune was located, and to exploit the Prądnik (referred to as “the Białucha” in its lower course) for economic purposes. The wójt was also charged with

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managing the banks of both rivers. Later, as the wójt’s role weakened, his responsibilities also diminished. The wójt understood the economic value of the river, and the charter thus granted him the right to own three mills. This right was hereditary and exempted from rent. His only obligation was to mill grain for the local needs of the prince. People interested in establishing other mills had to seek the wójt’s permission. To conclude a contract, they had to agree to his financial terms, meaning a regular rent had to be paid in the amount specified in the contract. After 1306, having benefited from the political situation, that is, the battle between the dukes for control of Krakow after the death of King Wenceslaus III, the wójt no longer had to mill grain for the monarchy. This is why King Kazimierz the Great built his own mill on the Vistula. Mills were not usually located on the banks of the river’s main stream because the current was too strong and the water too copious for the mills to operate effectively and safely. In addition, in times of flood, mills by the main stream were destroyed and debris from them would turn up far from Krakow. That aside, at least downstream of its confluence with the River Przemsza, the Vistula was a navigable river, and locating mill wheels on the banks hindered navigation. Mills posed a threat to rafts and ships, especially because some stretches of the river were very narrow. Not many mills were established on branches of the Vistula because first, the water was silty, and second, the flow was too slow and the water too shallow, thus providing relatively little energy. The Vistula overflowed, creating bends, marshes, swamps, ponds, and abandoned channels. Although this made it a great defense against enemies, it hindered or even prevented economic exploitation. However, the Rudawa had a more vigorous current that provided more energy, so over the centuries numerous prosperous mills were established along its banks. Already in 1327, King Władysław I the Elbow-high, the father of Kazimierz the Great, ordered the Rudawa to be dammed, which increased its power, and with it the economic attractiveness of the newly built mills. Today they are no longer there, but their history is recorded in names: the neighborhoods of Górne Młyny and Dolne Młyny (upper mills and lower mills), whose streets the Rudawa once flowed along. The greatest number of mills were built on a northern branch of the Rudawa River called the Royal Millrace. From the thirteenth century onward, some of those mills belonged to the Dominican Order’s holdings. A second branch of the Rudawa flowed through the Norbertine estate in Zwierzyniec, which also had several mills. Mills were also owned by kings. Growing popular need led to the opening of additional branches of the Rudawa for economic purposes, primarily for milling. As a result, in the western suburb

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of Krakow, these centuries-long transformations created a quasi-mechanized landscape of intertwined semi-artificial watercourses, enabling the harnessing of energy needed to process food for the Krakow agglomeration. The mills not only ground wheat or rye but also used hulling devices to make groats from buckwheat and other crops (krupa)—hence the name of Krupnicza Street, which was once close to the Rudawa. On the Vistula and Rudawa Rivers, some fulling mills also used a waterwheel to beat cloth and at the same time clean it of fats, as did malt houses and knife grinders. In the early Middle Ages, the Prądnik—located to the east of the Fan and the later Krakow commune—and its branches also had important economic functions and was the center of Krakow’s milling industries. Over time, however, its role waned as the growing city needed ever more flour and groats, and the fast-flowing but ultimately small Prądnik River was unable to keep up. However, it still fulfilled an important function in the production of paper, which was eagerly bought up by printers in Krakow and in municipal, royal, episcopal, and university offices. The Prądnik flowed from the Olkusz Upland, and its fast current gave it considerable energy potential, which was useful for paper manufacturing. The Prądnik was also popular for soaking and bleaching canvas. First, it would be laid out on grassy bankside areas and then steeped with water from the river to bleach in the sun. These activities are preserved in the name Blich Street (blech in the Middle Ages), where the Prądnik once flowed and issued into the Vistula.3 The mills, fulling mills, knife grinders, sawmills, and malt houses survived into the nineteenth century. Industrialization and the domination of production by fossil fuels wiped out the manufacturing establishments typical of the Middle Ages and early modern period. The industrial, machinery, metalworking, chemical, and food factories that arose in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries required large amounts of water for purposes other than producing energy, and ultimately these excessive needs could only be met by the Vistula, so the economic significance of its small Krakow tributaries diminished. The river’s copious water resources were an important factor in the decision to locate the Nowa Huta steelworks outside Krakow in Mogiła in 1949. Water was essential on account of production technology. Therefore, access to abundant water resources determined that the shortlist of towns and villages for the political and economic authorities to evaluate as locations for the steelworks included Nowy Korczyn and Połaniec, both on the Vistula, and towns on the Kłodnicki Canal in the Upper Silesia region. Until the nineteenth century, waste from workplaces, homes, and gastronomic premises was fed—in the case of the Krakow commune—through a

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system of canals into the Rudawa and the Vistula, and directly into the Vistula in the case of Kazimierz. The river provided good, fresh water, and took away dirty water, whose quality it improved as it flowed downstream. The filth flowing through the city and surrounding area produced odors of a pungency and intensity that can only be imagined, especially during the hot summer. However, the inhabitants of that time had resilience to and tolerance of unpleasant odors that far outstripped their modern-day counterparts. Written sources from that time devoted little space to the question, probably because it was self-evident. Modern wastewater treatment plants were only built in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Contemporary water treatment plants like Kujawy, Płaszów, and other smaller ones fulfill their role well. For centuries, until the twentieth century, the river was a source of food in the form of fish and crayfish.4 Since Krakow’s beginnings as a settlement, fish from the Vistula and the city’s other rivers were an important component of the inhabitants’ diet. By virtue of its privileged location, the right to fish was granted to both the wójt and the city’s residents, from the Norbertine monastery to the Skałka area (that is, a shorter stretch than that encompassed by the wójt’s milling rights). However, from 1306 onward, no one was permitted to fish without the wójt’s consent. In later decades his responsibilities changed, including with regard to fishing. By and large, the Vistula River was rich in fish until the twentieth century, so fishing was economically important. In his chronicles spreading the Vistula’s renown, Jan Długosz, the most famous late medieval historian of Poland, also raved about its wealth of fish. He said that, among others, salmon and sturgeon were caught, which, as he wrote, “are only to be found in outstanding rivers.” In addition, Vistulan catches for centuries included pike, roach, eels, catfish, perch, common nase, tench, chub, bream, and zanthe. Freshly caught fish were sold right on the river banks or at marketplaces. Fishermen also dried and smoked fish. Fish were also farmed in ponds formed in the Vistula’s backwaters and in its tributaries, the Prądnik and the Rudawa. The Rudawa provided an additional artificial supply through a canal, which then fed into fish-farming ponds owned by the Norbertines. The ponds have long been sealed, but remain memorialized in the name Plac na Stawach (Pondside square). Ponds were also established by townsfolk, especially from the sixteenth century onward, when owning a private pond was a symbol of wealth and prestige. The most commonly farmed breed was carp, which not only wound up on pond owners’ tables and at markets but also constituted a safeguard in the event of a siege. Fish, whether from ponds or rivers, were also gifted to guests. Their desirability

KRAKOW AND ITS RIVERS

Illustration 2.2. Successful fishing on the Vistula, interwar period. Source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

is attested by Krakow court cases involving their theft. Due to the number of fasting days on which meat was not permitted, they were much sought after and eagerly bought. According to the liturgical calendar, almost half the year consisted of fasting days. Aside from Fridays, these were most often Mondays and Wednesdays as well as during Lent and Advent. In addition, fish was popular because it was cheaper than meat, which not everyone could afford, and vegetables appeared late and featured rarely on tables—at most as a garnish. The fishery industry in Krakow actually ended in the 1950s, when the Vistula became catastrophically polluted, including by chemical plants in Dwory, near Oświęcim. In later decades, the water quality improved somewhat. The fish returned, however, and there is no shortage of amateur fishermen for them. Even since the democratic and economic transformation of 1989, the water quality still leaves much to be desired. According to research by the Provincial Inspectorate for Environmental Protection, in recent years the Vistula entering Krakow is in the fourth class of biological purity, and in the fifth (the worst) as it leaves, which results from sewage discharge, including from lesser,

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but very polluted streams.5 The Vistula has a concreted bed around Krakow that has robbed the river of its capacity to self-clean, and in its current fish are disturbed by excessive blockages and man-made obstacles. Restoration of the river would make it possible to rebuild the living ecosystem, but this would be too difficult to carry out because of the (built) heritage conservation protection in force in today’s Krakow. Beginning in 1306, fishing was strictly regulated, until the concessions of the twentieth century. The wójt and city council determined who could fish, on what financial terms, using what equipment, and on which days of the week. In the case of settlements and monasteries outside Krakow fishing rights were decided by royal privileges. Fishing conditions were established in Krakow in 1481, with the founding of a fisherman’s guild (rybitwy in Polish—which is the name of a part of the city to this day).6 Fishermen were subject not only to the city authorities but also to the authorities’ superordinates, because the fishing sites also lay beyond the borders of the autonomous communes of Krakow, Kazimierz, and Kleparz, which constituted the Krakow agglomeration. In subsequent centuries, fishermen were granted further privileges by monarchs. One modest trace of the rich history of the guild is the Fishermen’s Association established in Krakow in the nineteenth century. In that same century, as a result of overfishing of the Vistula and its Krakow tributaries, restrictions were extended. This phenomenon also affected other crown lands of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy: in 1885, Emperor Franz Joseph I signed the state fisheries act, the first paragraph of which said that “the freedom to fish is abolished.”7 So-called wild fishing was banned and the time of controlled and ordered fish farming and fish stocking began. Following this, the regional parliament passed a law that included a definition of precisely who could fish and under what conditions. The National Fishing Society dealt with, among others, restocking the Vistula and the Prądnik. The basic principles it formulated then have remained intact to this day. In the nineteenth century, due to changes in eating habits and secularization processes, whereby fasting days became fewer and were less strictly observed, fish began to play a lesser role in the life and economy of Krakow. The number of fishermen also decreased as the prices buyers were willing to pay for fish became unsatisfactory. In addition to fishing by privilege or license, as was commonplace and widespread, poaching was popular for the livelihood of many families. Poachers also fished in winter, making ice holes in the Vistula, stunning fish with wooden mallets and pulling them out by hand. The place names Rybitwa and Rybaki are remains of ancient fishing settlements whose inhabitants lived partly from poaching.

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Crayfish were fished far less, but were de rigueur on the tables of lords and wealthy townsfolk. They were sought-after, prestigious products, and crayfish soup was a distinguished dish, as nineteenth-century cookbooks attest. The consumption and popularity of crayfish soup can also be read about in the newspapers of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Krakow. Of lesser economic significance still were the wicker-industry willow plantations founded along the river in the nineteenth century. To this day, willow is an attractive raw material for the production of various wicker items, although it is no longer supplied from plantations along the river’s banks. Common reed from the river was also used commercially and industrially. No serious construction could be undertaken without sand and stones. Sand was supplied by the Vistula and its Krakow tributaries. Engravings and photographs have been preserved that show sand miners of a hundred and more years ago at work. The miners took several boats onto the river and set them into the current. The workers sank iron dredges into the bottom, then hauled gravel and sand into the boat. Later, industrial sand-dredger ships appeared. Extracting sand from the river bottom was one of the occupations of residents of the areas on the outskirts called Piaski (sands). The next most important product after sand was stones, which workers extracted from the river bottom, but also from stony banks and from old defensive dams and dikes. The houses of Krakow and its outskirts, and their foundations in particular, were built on such solid stone footings. Limestone occurred commonly, but was not usually used for this purpose due to its lack of durability. River stones were also used in road building inside and outside the city. The extraction of sand and stones was a centuries-long specialization for particular families who had the boats, the appropriate equipment, the skills, and the experience. The traditions of the river’s sand and stone miners were passed down until the twentieth century, when they were superseded by industrialized methods of exploiting the river. In discussing the material benefits the Vistula provided, we need to mention ice. It was harvested for industrial purposes, including the food industry. The Vistula usually froze in January (exceptionally in December) and the ice melted in spring—in March and April. Thus, for at least two to three months it was possible to transport blocks of ice to homes and food storage areas without great difficulty. Only the invention of cold stores and freezers and ice factories at the end of the nineteenth century and their spread in the twentieth century reduced the interest in Vistulan ice, thus resulting in the disappearance of an age-old profession. But even in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, ice was still being cut into blocks and used for industrial and food purposes.

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Between the Middle Ages and the early modern period, not much changed in how the river was exploited or in the relationship of the town and its inhabitants to the river. The changes happened very slowly, almost imperceptibly, taking between one and even several generations. One important aspect of the residents’ relationship with the river was continuity, including the continuity of their expectations of it. The city’s slow entrance into the industrial age in the latter half of the nineteenth century and the acceleration of urbanization caused a revolution that was easily seen but not easily understood.8 Previous types of work on and with the Vistula and its tributaries were interrupted, and some abandoned. The age of modernity brought about new social expectations. Alternative sources emerged for what the river had previously given. New expectations—but also new ways to satisfy needs—also reduced the river’s relative economic importance. The river began to have different and, above all, more limited impacts on Cracovians’ day-to-day lives than before. Residents moved farther and farther away from the Vistula, which is a problem for the river to this day. The city also distanced itself. New communication routes and new residential neighbourhoods were built ever further away. Some river branches disappeared; others were hidden under streets and pavements.

The Premodern Flood Regime in Krakow: Damage and Adaptation Konrad Wnęk Before the city was given its charter, Krakow’s inhabitants enjoyed an essentially secure life because they lived mainly in the Prądnik Fan area, which was not threatened by floodwaters. Unable to degrade the fan, high waters broke the banks and spilled over to create wetlands, basins, and peatlands, which simultaneously constituted important defensive features and sources of food. However, the new late medieval commune of Krakow and its immediate suburbs occupied a much larger area and were exposed to damage by flood surges. At the same time, it is important to remember that in the Middle Ages and early modern period, floods were seen not only as a threat but also as an ally. The floodwaters resupplied drying swamps and marshes, which as defensive areas were sometimes more effective than city walls (and also provided fish and other food). The abandoned river channels were useful because they received floodwaters, which thus did not threaten buildings. Therefore, until the end of the eighteenth century, swamps and basins were essentially not drained: they guaranteed the success and security of the city and its inhabitants. The greatest high waters were experienced between May and August, although catastrophic floods also occurred in February and March. 9 Since

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Krakow is located at the foot of the northernmost parts of the Carpathian mountain chain, as soon as the abundant summer rains or the late winter thaw starts rapidly after a huge buildup of snow, waters come down quickly and often take the lowlands of Krakow almost by surprise in a matter of days. To give an idea of this disastrous process, we cite one historical example. In January 1533, when heavy snowfalls were followed by a sudden thaw, water overflowed the banks and destroyed nearby houses in the city. A couple of months later in the same year, Krakow had to deal with the river overflowing again. The following year was no better, when waters broke the bridge at Kazimierz, again in July; the disaster must have been truly great, as the records show not only material losses but also numerous drownings, including the deaths in the Vistula’s waters of fifty carpenters as they tried to save the bridge. People at the time believed it to have been the most serious flood in Krakow for a hundred years. To imagine the amount of rainfall, suffice to say that the Bernardine church—located at the bottom of the Wawel hill, relatively close to the Vistula—was flooded to two cubits (about 105 cm, or 41 inches) above the main altar. The floods of 1533 and 1534 must have been extremely severe, for the king exempted the aggrieved townsfolk from taxation for six whole years.10 It should also be noted that society in the Middle Ages and early modern times up to the nineteenth century was heavily dependent on local agricultural production, which was foundational to its survival. Therefore, every weather disaster that cut food resources could mean death (rivers were the main transport corridors before the construction of the railway in the nineteenth century)—if not from starvation itself then as a result of the emergence of disease epidemics that easily attacked weakened bodies. As a result, the same Vistula and its tributaries, which provided Krakow with life-giving water, food, and energy, could also cause crises due to shortages as well as significant material losses and increased mortality when the river waters overflowed. And since high waters and overflows occurred cyclically every few years or decade, while smaller, less threatening events happened even several times a year, Krakow was constantly either anticipating or recovering from the visitation of dangerous water. The inhabitants were either preparing to defend themselves, or cleaning and rebuilding their homes. Over the past few decades, Polish scholars have systematically collected information from medieval and early modern writings on the Vistula floods. These data indicate that the floods intensified in Lesser Poland and Krakow in the seventeenth century (see figure 2.1). Perhaps their increased frequency was associated with the greater temperature instability that the environmental data show for this period (see chapter 1), or perhaps they were exacerbated by

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Figure 2.1. Number of source mentions of floods in Krakow and Lesser Poland in the years 1100–2000. Source: Konrad Wnęk, based on http://pth.net.pl/bazy-danych/ kleski-elementarne, accessed October 1, 2018.

the increased spatial development of Krakow in the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries. Contrary to a river overflow or high waters, a flood is always an act of nature and man, as both the scale of the impacts and the memory of the event depend on cultural and economic factors: man creates a setting in which a large river overflow becomes a major flood and is remembered as such. In the seventeenth century the city, although larger and richer, was nonetheless deprived of royal support because it ceased to be the capital and became more sensitive to high waters. As a result, the overflows that would normally not have been considered floods or particularly noteworthy caused damage more often and must have been observed and recorded in the sources with increased frequency. These “flood” data can thus not be taken as a faithful record of high water levels on the Vistula, but instead reflect high water levels and Vistula overflows that become floods when combined with particular infrastructure and human activities. At the same time, Krakow might have been experiencing the consequences of the boom in grain cultivation and upland colonization during Poland’s Golden Age in the sixteenth century, as well as the city’s own impact on the region, encouraging the spread of agriculture onto new lands

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and deforestation (as described in more detail in chapter 4).11 Recently devoid of trees and shrubs, turned into fields, grasslands, or wasteland, steep slopes of the Carpathian uplands made the flow of rainwater or snowmelt even faster, “compressing” the high waters into a shorter period of time (and thus raising their levels), and letting them reach Krakow more quickly, thus leading to greater damage and increased frequency of floods. In reality, the floods of the seventeenth century mainly affected the outskirts and Kazimierz—places that had become more densely built up as the Krakow agglomeration expanded in the sixteenth century. These districts were more low-lying than the so-called Old Town—the commune of Krakow proper—and closer to the Vistula. One of the many floods of the time—in September 1650—was described by Marcin Goliński, a merchant and councillor in Kazimierz: [September 4–5]: the rains are becoming severe in the mountains and with us (in Krakow). The Vistula flooded and the wild rivers: the Raba, Dunajec, Bug, San, and other rivers overflowed their banks, they flooded many fields, grains, cattle grazing in the fields, people, villages, it inundated barns, houses, it took trees [with] it, [so] that all sorts of damage was done down where the rivers converged; a dozen or more people traveling by carriage from Jarosław drowned, as well as animals in the forests: wolves and others drowned, carried away by the water, reptiles climbed out of the ground and drowned: frogs, snakes, lizards, moles were carried along in the water and poisoned the water, so people swelled up who drank it around that time. Snakes climbed into the trees, then fell from the trees and drowned; also cattle, horses, swine were swept away by the water. The water caused great harm and brought hunger, such that people will long remember that flood.12

The weather must have been equally inclement across northern Europe, as catastrophic floods also occurred in the Low Countries and Germany. Two years later Krakow again fell victim to flood, as also described by Goliński: The very heavy rains continued for two days and culminated on the third, from which, on 24 July from Tuesday to Wednesday night . . . a severe flood came, that so suddenly the Vistula overflowed, inundating vast crop fields, grains, meadows with stacking sheaves into shocks, gardens, salt in the king’s and merchants’ warehouses in Kazimierz, also ships . . . ; the poor took great damage and many people were washed away from Zwierzyniec. It flooded the villages of Zabłocie and Płasów [Płaszów] with the surrounding gardens and fields. Bereść [illegible] and Kazimierz town’s

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dike were utterly flooded, gardens, meadows were inundated, so that in the meadows in bersc [Bereść] the water was up to the peasants’ chests. The banks were severely washed away, in the dike around the folwark, much ground gave way, so that the tenement house took damage and began to fail, the water washed the Skawiński bridge away as far as to Krzemionki, making Krzemionki its [new] bank.13

In 1687 a very particular flood had the result that the Vistula created a new channel on the other side of Kazimierz. The old riverbed dried up, or, rather, turned into a stinking bog, but for reasons of fortification, water was restored to it and attempts were even made to return the river to its former course. As one might suspect, these efforts were destined to fail and from then on the Vistula slowly widened its course in its new place, completely leaving the old one during the great flood of 1813.14 Floods are recorded less frequently for the eighteenth century, but as the century progressed their destructive power was as great as in the mid-seventeenth century, perhaps again due to the spatial and demographic growth of the city after a period of decline. On July 21–25, 1774, an especially large flood swept people away, along with their homes. To this day, the walls of buildings retain traces indicating the level reached by the floodwaters. The following year, in January, the floe-laden Vistula rose up around the city—the waters were so extensive that the entire area was one great pond for as far as the eye could see. The ice floes did particular damage. The next flood took place on February 21. After the Wieliczka bridge (between Krakow and Podgórze) was broken, transport was maintained by ferries but led to a great tragedy: a ferry full of people foundered midway across the river and more than eighty drowned in the Vistula before they could be rescued.15 For more than a decade afterward, Cracovians were spared any great floods; it was not until 1813 that the city experienced the greatest flood in its history up to that time. The entire summer had been quite wet, and for several days before the Vistula’s surge it drizzled incessantly. In the mountains the rainfall was extremely heavy; there was a cloudburst, and the excessive quantities of water had no outlet. Rivers overflowed their banks and spilled everywhere. In Krakow, it happened in late August: an immense area was flooded, extending from the hills on Krzemionki, through what were then pastures in Błonie, up to the hills in Bronowice. With extraordinary force, the Vistula hit the nearby villages of Ludwinów, Zakrzówek, and Kapelanka, and the area became like a great sea. It was the largest recorded overflow of the Vistula River in Krakow and the first for which accurate water measurements have been preserved.

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Illustration 2.3. Plaque at the convent of the Norbertine Sisters in Zwierzyniec in Krakow commemorating the flood of 1813. Source: Private photo, Konrad Wnęk.

On August 26, 1813, the Vistula rose as never before near Krakow, surpassing the flood of 1774. In no time it had flooded both banks and risen so high that it reached roofs. The water took away people and their houses, which they clung to calling for help, but there was absolutely nothing to be done for them. The flood destroyed, dislodged, or damaged many houses and buildings, even those of brick. It drowned or carried away domestic animals, equipment, and trees in large numbers. The royal brewery and the residence and office of the subinspector of national treasures, located on a hill by the Vistula, were flooded up to the roof. The outskirts from the Vistula River to the Vistulan Gate, as well as the suburbs of Stradom, Kazimierz, Podgórze, and others, were also destroyed. The city authorities did what they could to help. Already on August 26, raging waters broke and carried away a wooden pile bridge on the Old Vistula between Stradom and Kazimierz, and on August 27 did the same to a wooden bridge built on arcades on the new Vistula between Kazimierz and Podgórze. The same day the water began to recede slightly, but for a long time it stayed at a level far from normal.16 Although terrifying, the view aroused great curiosity, and Cracovians went to the Wawel Castle hill to look on the great lake. All the houses in the suburb of Zwierzyniec were flooded above the windows, and some over their rooftops. The residents of Podgórze, which was also under water, had to flee to the hills of Krzemionki. A few boat owners rescued those cut off from the land by the water, mooring at the bishops’ palace, no less, and disembarking at Ulica Franciszkańska. The Vistula carried away trees, small buildings, stables,

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entire huts, thousands of sheaves of cereals, haystacks—everything the waters had swept from the fields and villages. More daring souls risked their lives venturing out onto the Vistula in small boats to grab entire wooden fences, doors, gates, and trees and bring them ashore.17 Krakow’s last premodern catastrophic flood occurred in the mid-nineteenth century. The year 1845 was remembered by the city’s residents for its long, cold winter. Everywhere, the snow and freezing temperatures were extraordinary. In Turin, temperatures reached –17°C, and in Paris, –14°C; people drove around the cities on sleds. On Easter, which fell on March 23, huge quantities of snow still lay on the streets in Krakow, and on Easter Monday many people went by sled to Zwierzyniec for the Emaus religious procession. Spring was also wet and unfavorable for working in the field. After three days of uninterrupted rain and downpours, there was finally a huge surge in the Vistula. The water rose to the thresholds of fishermen’s homes, and still, on and on it came; this continued until the summer, when in July the water began to recede. The damage it caused was enormous; communication with Podgórze was interrupted and took several more days to restore. In addition, a potato blight struck Krakow and all of what was then Galicia (the southern part of Poland, occupied by Austria from 1772 to 1918). This was the first time that this particular disaster had been encountered. Potato farming spread far and wide in the nineteenth century, displacing other crops, and was by then the dietary staple of most of the population. Unfortunately, the disease persisted for some years, leading to famine and, consequently, to a cholera and typhoid epidemic. This was most probably related to the wet weather conditions prevailing in Galicia at the time: lower temperatures and higher-than-usual humidity must have caused the potato blight to become so widespread.18 Starving people came from all over Galicia to Krakow, although the police looked on them for some time with indifference. Attempts were made to feed the throngs of beggars: monasteries distributed more than 1,300 portions of free soup, but many people died of starvation. Krakow’s hospitals had never seen so many sick as they did in 1847, mainly with typhus and cholera. The Krakow garrison of fewer than 4,000 people had an average of 540 people sick a day. Krakow’s death toll increased daily. In the general cemetery the following numbers of Christians alone were buried: 1,596 in 1845, 2,189 in 1846, and 3,930 in 1847 (with the total population of all of greater Krakow standing at about 40,000, although the dead may have included people who had not lived in Krakow before the flood). In some Galician highland villages, only one resident in twelve survived. This terrible starvation led to acts of cannibalism. In the village of Buchcice near Tarnów, a twelve-year-old boy

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killed and roasted his younger brother; in Stanisławów near Kalwaria, a mother killed her own child because she had nothing to feed him; in Kobiernik near Izdebnik a father lived off the body of a son who had died of hunger. Despite an abundant grain harvest in 1847, prices remained extremely high, but, slowly, life returned to its former rhythm.19 In the meantime, at the end of the winter of 1845–46 (in February–March 1846), a popular rebellion broke out against the Polish gentry, escalating into a massacre of the landowners, known as the Galician Slaughter. A quick look at water-level measurements for the Vistula in Bielany (see chapter 1) shows that since the mid-nineteenth century, high water levels had occurred and continue to occur in the Vistula in Krakow. Such events often led to material losses and temporary breaks in communication that qualify as floods. However, they no longer cause starvation or epidemics, because the advent of rail transport ended the city’s dependence on the fate of its immediate surroundings. Cereals, potatoes, and other foodstuffs could now be imported from all of Central Europe. A local “weather disaster” could be resolved relatively easily. This last great “old style” flood, just before the development of the railway network in the Lesser Poland region, is thus in some way symbolic. It shows that the history of local communities is influenced not only by natural phenomena but also by how people shape their relationships with the environment.

The Modern Flood Regime: The City Defends Itself Nevertheless, Vistula overflows—in particular the most extreme ones—were still seen as a major threat, but with the advent of the modern engineering the floods were viewed differently: not as a “natural” part of life in a river valley, but rather as a problem that can finally be solved. In fact, the threat of material damage caused by flooding escalated in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with Krakow’s physical expansion and encroachment into the lowlands along the banks of the Vistula. There, the Vistula was almost twice as wide as upstream of Krakow where the river cut through the calcareous rocks of the Jura Krakowsko-Częstochowska upland. As the wealth on floodplains accumulated with the city’s growth, so too did the residents’ readiness to defend, to prevent threats, and to organize to fight the elements. By then the extensive backwaters and abandoned channels no longer had a defensive or economic value. The turning point came in July 1903, when nature had a very serious flood in store for Krakow. It turned out to be the most violent in the history of modern cities and had the most disastrous consequences. It is constantly

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compared to the flood of 1813.20 The water was two meters above street level in Krakow and Podgórze near the river. The waters flooded 1,240 buildings and 60 industrial plants. It flooded Błonia, the Jordan Park, and the riverside parts of Podgórze and Dębniki. Paweł Czuj wrote: The night of July 12 to 13 was filled with uncertainty. The entire population watched over the embankments, at the gates—no one went to bed—and when a 1.5-m-deep flood was announced, ground-floor residents fled with their belongings to the attics. . . . On the only unflooded street, Zagrody, the entire inventory was kept. On July 13, when the surging waters flooded the streets of Dębniki and Zakrzówekwith a terrible crash—it did not last more than a dozen or so minutes, and the roads were replaced by gushing rivers. The waters raced so wildly that experienced fishermen refused to row down certain streets at any price. The waters broke the foundations beneath several houses, creating pits two meters deep. . . . The raging elements carried away wrecked barns, bricked roofs, and farming equipment that churned around the Dębnicki market square, blocking entry to the gates for boats carrying food and drinking water.21

In the following year, for a change, southern Poland and Krakow were hit by drought. The flood of 1903 caused losses of five million crowns. This traumatic experience taught the residents of Krakow and its outskirts that to fight the elements they must work together to protect the city. Therefore, from 1903, the city president Juliusz Leo’s vision to create a “Great Krakow” was put into action. Municipal leaders and councilors of the city’s surrounding villages subsequently agreed to be included within Krakow’s borders. Thus, the river, the bringer of misfortune, hastened events and decisions of significance to the city and its residents. It became a historical actor par excellence, co-deciding on the fate of modern Krakow. Councilors of Krakow and its outskirts passed a resolution to begin advanced protection works. In this sense, the 1903 inundation opened a new chapter in the fight against floods. The experience and memory of the flood of 1903 were, as we will soon see, of fundamental importance to future relations between the Vistula and the city. The great flood prompted the municipal authorities, headed by Leo, to set about many works aimed at securing the city against floods. Thanks to good relations with the government of Vienna, the president obtained the state authorities’ support for the intended investments, which were also related to the work being planned for a gigantic infrastructure project known as the Odra–Vistula– Danube canal, meant to unite the lands of the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy.

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Illustration 2.4. Makeshift wooden jetties erected during the flood of July 1925. Source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

The work deviated the Vistula slightly from its previous course, and engineering work accelerated the river’s flow and deepened the channel; in the same year, construction began on sturdy embankments to replace the existing flood-damaged ones. The city council’s discussion on combating threats displayed excellent awareness of the fact that when embankments fail to defend a city during a flood, the great pressure of water passing through broken embankments will flood a larger area than if no protection were in place. So if a city decides to build embankments, they must be solid and effective in defending against even the most extreme high water. After 1903, construction began on stone boulevards along the Vistula in the Kazimierz and Podgórze areas, according to a design by the engineer Roman Ingarden. These monumental boulevards serving as retaining walls became an important part of the flood protection system. They were built in the years 1907–12, and then in the 1920s and 1960s. The boulevards were supplemented up- and downstream by embankments, which were renovated and constantly reinforced. They were worked on in the 1930s, and also during the German occupation and after the end of World War II. The embankments required constant attention and strengthening in order not to fail in the event

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Illustration 2.5. Power and gas plant in Kazimierz, 1927, showing the harbor and coal barges. Source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

of a catastrophe. In turn, in association with the boulevards, channels were constructed to carry municipal sewage downstream, below the city. Until 1912, the embankments were under construction and the Vistula riverbed was regulated on the stretch from the Norbertine monastery to beyond Skałka, and in 1914 the remaining buildings in the village of Rybaki near Wawel were demolished. In the following years the level of the Vistula increased many times, especially in the summer during July, but the floods ceased to be dangerous; although in 1927, 1934, and the 1960s it overflowed the embankments, no major damage was caused. In 1970, the Vistula broke through to Ulica Kosciuszki, and the high flood surge forced the closure of the Dębnicki bridge. Another flood threatened in 1980, but the embankments, which had been strengthened in the 1970s, withstood the water pressure, as they did in 1997. In the twenty-first century, the Vistula’s highest level was recorded in May 2010. It was 38 cm lower than in 1813, but 5 cm above the level of 1903. Nevertheless, thanks to the technical safeguards—and the effective work of public services and solidarity of residents—there was no major damage other than some local

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flooding, although meteorological data show that there was 130 mm of rainfall. On May 18, at 10:00 a.m. the peak surge passed through Krakow. The water gauge in Bielany read 957 cm. Although the embankments essentially did their job, part of the city was flooded. The embankments and boulevards also held in July 1997 during the “flood of the century,” as they did in 2001. The river and its tributaries were no longer a partner for the city, or an enginemachine that supplied energy for its industry, but rather a danger that was now skillfully “escorted” through the city by means of a complex flood-defensive infrastructure and riverbeds-made-canals.

The Vistula and Cracovians’ Health The Vistula, with its marshes, mires, and abandoned channels, has also been a source of epidemics, diseases, and death. In the Middle Ages, it was already known that dirty water was harmful, which is why the city’s chief of waterworks took care of the moat at the waterworks—the mill wheel that lifted water from the Royal Millrace canal to wooden water pipes to be distributed around the city, even to Wawel. The chief of waterworks attended to water quality, repairing and maintaining the pipes. Every autumn, he ordered the waterworks closed and supervised a meticulous cleaning. Servants and apprentices of the chief of waterworks were responsible for this. At that time, the channel supplying the waterworks was also cleaned and the riverbanks were reinforced. To maintain the clarity of the water, the channel was covered with logs of varying lengths. This meant that no debris, leaves, or dust remained. The important role the municipal authorities played in the state of the water is evidenced by the fact that from 1452 two city councilors kept constant watch over the waterworks. In the Middle Ages, the pure water of the so-called Old Vistula between Krakow and Kazimierz was also used until the sixteenth century from the main stream of the river, but in later centuries, after the flood of 1687 (see above), the quality of the local water deteriorated significantly. From the late seventeenth century onward, silting began to be seen. Over time, it became a sewage channel. In the nineteenth century the city was growing rapidly, new buildings went up, and new residents arrived—the Old Vistula was by then no more than a silty stream that reeked even at a distance. Attempts to regulate it after 1818 failed. Eventually, in 1873 the city council decided to fill it in, and in the years 1878–80 replaced it with a new park alley, which ultimately integrated the three urban communes of premodern Krakow into a single metropolitan entity, and also bringing the Jewish inhabitants of Kazimierz into closer contact with the rest of the city. In the nineteenth century the Royal Millrace canal lost its former economic

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Illustration 2.6. In 1880 Kazimierz ceased to be an island, as shown in a plan by Mieczysław Dąbrowski from 1883 (for comparison, see an earlier plan of the city as reproduced in the previous chapter, illustration 1.1). At that time, the Stara Vistula riverbed was partly filled in. The rest of the abandoned channel was filled by 1912. The course of the Rudawa along today’s Ulica Retoryka, and the now-defunct Młynówka Królewska, can be seen. Source: Collections of the Historical Museum of the City of Krakow.

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and health value, worsening the sanitary conditions of its inhabitants and becoming a source of infection. The economic benefit of using it had already been limited. Its presence interfered with the city’s expansion, as did the Rudawa, which then flowed along a different channel than today. Until its closure after the flood of 1903, it flowed through Błonie, and then toward today’s Ulica Wenecja and Ulica Garncarska, right up to the Venetian House building opposite the Sacred Heart convent and on along Ulica Retoryka to the Vistula. After 1903, the Rudawa was diverted, subjected to engineering works, and bounded by an earth embankment. The work was completed in 1912.22 Since then, it has run near the Norbertine monastery in Zwierzyniec. This change was a successful concept of Krakow doctors, including Jagiellonian University medical faculty professors, who argued that residents’ health and the city’s aesthetics demanded the removal of the channels of the Vistula’s branches and the Rudawa. Pollution and water in interior channels were the source of dangerous diseases such as cholera, which erupted in several epidemics in 1849–73. The rivers, as history has frequently shown, were an excellent environment for bacteria, and the cause of “miasmas,” known locally as “plague air” (morowe powietrze). On top of that, in the Middle Ages and early modern period, victims of infectious diseases were sometimes thrown into the river, which caused the bacteria to spread quickly. This was pointed out as early as 1652, when the bodies of plague victims flowing down the Vistula caused epidemics to break out in downstream urban centers. Similar effects were caused by floods, which often lifted human remains out of the earth and carried them downriver, as happened at the hospital for lepers in the meadow-island of St. Sebastian. A similar situation happened at the cemetery for Tatar prisoners on an island in the bend facing Wawel. High waters had the same consequences, which of course spread diseases. “The Vistula is silvered in Young Polish [modernist] poetry,” the poem goes. But it could only turn silver in verse, because in reality it was a bath of uncleanliness and all manner of filth. Only with the 1901 construction of a modern waterworks network in Bielany near Krakow did sanitary and hygienic conditions definitely improve, and the train of diseases was definitively halted by a cholera vaccine that was widely used during World War I. But it also happened that the river was sometimes an effective barrier against the spread of diseases. In the Middle Ages, outside the city walls on an island among the Vistula’s backwaters and abandoned channels, a hospital was established for patients with venereal disease. It was meant to isolate the sick from the healthy.

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Illustration 2.7. Participants in a kayaking trip resting on the bank of the Vistula. In the background, the Camaldolese monastery in Bielany, 1929. Source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

The Vistula also devoured human lives. They died during floods, while working on the river, and in transit when a boat or ferry broke down or capsized. The river received suicides and convicts. Krakow’s courts often condemned those who robbed churches and private homes to death by drowning. Tied in a sack weighed down by heavy stones, they were carried to the middle of the river and thrown into the water. In 1349, on the order of King Casimir the Great, the priest Marcin Baryczka was drowned, perhaps for informing the king that Bodzanta, the bishop of Krakow, had excommunicated him. The king ordered Father Baryczka to be sown into a sack and thrown into an ice hole in winter. In the event of a particularly cruel murder, the convicted person was drowned together with a cat and a dog, which otherwise testifies to the power of superstition. In 1549 a girl was drowned in this manner for murdering her mother. In Krakow in the latter half of the sixteenth century an attempt was made to arrest the well-known Arian, Socyn, who was accused of contacting

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Satan. But the plan failed, as Socyn fled the city, thus preventing the holding of a spectacle on the Vistula with his participation. Executions on the Vistula, not being daily affairs, were usually watched by curious onlookers. Drowning in the Vistula was practiced as a death penalty until the end of the Polish– Lithuanian Commonwealth. The existence of the inhabitants of Krakow and outlying towns depended for centuries on the river network—the Vistula and its tributaries. This was particularly true until the end of the nineteenth century. The prosperity of the city and its inhabitants, the development of Krakow’s crafts and industrial production, all inevitably depended on access to water. Over many decades, the inhabitants learned to use the water resources effectively for their own and the city’s good. They were also increasingly able to meet the challenge of ruinous floods, although they could not completely eliminate the threat until the twentieth century. Advances in medicine and hygiene meant that in the twentieth century, rivers ceased to be carriers of bacteria or sources of dangerous infectious diseases. Contrary to these technological changes, Krakow’s change of political allegiances at the end of the eighteenth century had only a small impact on relations between the city, its inhabitants, and the river. Invaders and occupiers could not fail to notice the problems related to the river, and solving them was in the interest of those who ruled the city. The question of the river’s future relationship with the city and its inhabitants remains open because it has great potential. The river continues to be an opportunity for Krakow, and one that is all the more significant for the fact that it no longer presents the threat it has been through the ages.

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CHAPTER 3 PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

Aldona Mueller-Bieniek

Utterly other than us, ever in the background, quiet and secret, often unnoticed, undistinguished, green, as if from another world: plants. They are the primary producers on our planet, it is they that make life possible for most animal organisms, which in ecology are known as consumers and include, of course, humans. Through their ability to convert solar energy into chemical compounds, plants are a source of energy, including as food. They continue to provide energy many millennia after their deaths, in the form of fossil fuels. And what does a medieval city have to do with plants? It is thanks to the historical development of cultivation techniques enabling the production of easily stored surplus food (mainly cereals) that enabled the development of proto-urban and, later, urban centers where crafts, science, and culture grew rapidly. Neolithization was one of humanity’s developmental leaps—urbanization was the next, and its dynamics and social, economic, and ecological pros and cons can still be seen in action. A city is more than just people and what they make, such as buildings, roads, squares, and machines: it is also plants and other living organisms. In this chapter we consider only plants and their relationships with the inhabitants of medieval Krakow. Plants and their various parts were brought to the city as food, and some were probably grown in domestic gardens. But the story does not end at food. Plants “participated” in customs and ceremonies. 68

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They were used as condiments and spices, drugs and stimulants, and probably as poisons. They were also undoubtedly a common form of decoration in Krakow’s apartments; they could be used as dyes and preservatives, as various types of insulation, including thermal insulation, as straw or hay mattresses, and finally as building material and fuel. Sometimes they grew locally, initially unnoticed, then unwanted, removed, and disposed of. Some plants in turn certainly spread their seeds via people and animals moving around the city, in their droppings, on shoes, on hooves, on cart wheels, and so on, without their consciousness of being vectors. These plants reflect the role of the city in spreading not only biological materials but also ideas, goods, and services. The study of plant remains in ancient human settlements is called archaeobotany.1 In this case, it provides a valuable source of knowledge of Krakow’s environmental history in the form of particular items, mainly seeds,2 that were found in samples taken from undisturbed archaeological layers, reflecting a particular place and time in the past. Such direct information is usually not accessible in any written sources.

ARCHAEOBOTANY, as the name suggests, is a science on the border between archaeology and botany. It has developed its own research methodology using both archaeological and biological methods. The former are particularly useful in obtaining material for research and in interpreting it. However, identifying plants from their various parts, mainly fruit and seeds, employs botanical knowledge. Botany and ecology are also helpful in interpreting the combinations of remains of recovered plants. Written, ethnographic, and iconographic sources also provide important support. Carpology, or the study of fruit and seeds, despite being the most common and informationally rich, is just one of the many methods used in archaeobotanical research. In addition, analysis of pollen, charcoal, wood, fibers, starch grains, and so on can be used. It is also known as “palaeoethnobotany.”

Archaeobotanical studies on medieval Krakow were first begun in the 1930s by Władysław Szafer. After World War II, in the 1950s, systematic archaeobotanical research started within the area of medieval Krakow and its surroundings, in cooperation with Krakow’s Archaeological Museum and the Wawel Royal Castle Archaeological Laboratory. Environmental research intensified at the beginning of the twenty-first century.3 The results

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of carpological research (the study of fruit and seeds) conducted at the W. Szafer Institute of Botany of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Krakow were summarized in the monographical work Plants in the Daily Lives of the People of Medieval Kraków, published in 2012.4 Hitherto published studies have dealt mostly with food plants.5 Attention was also given to what we can learn from the co-occurrence of certain plants in particular samples or areas of the city,6 and on selected ecological groups of plants.7 Medieval finds were also interpreted with the help of renaissance herbariums.8 There were also some attempts to incorporate data from carpological and palynological analysis (field concerned with the study of pollen).9 This chapter covers selected topics intimately related to the lives of Cracovians: • medicinal and ritual plants, • consumable and edible plants, • imported, “unexpected” plants that reveal the city to be clearly territorially bounded, but also open to the outside world and located at the intersection of many, sometimes long-distance, routes, and • ruderal plants—“plant commoners.”

RUDERAL PLANTS, a commonly used term to describe plants that grow in habitats heavily affected by man—in cities, villages, roadsides, railway embankments, harbors, and waste dumps. There are several types of ruderal plant communities, depending on substrate, which can range from very poor and dry, such as ruins, to very fertile and humid, such as can be found near latrines and barns, along garden fences, and on waste dumps. These can be communities of low-growing annuals or perennial plants of considerable size. In this chapter, this term is used mainly for vegetation that could have developed in very fertile, humid, and undisturbed, untrodden places.

Plants could grow in a specific place as an important component of the landscape, but they could also be introduced to the area deliberately as crop plants, or by chance as weeds or on means of transport. Most identifiable historical plant remains are fruits and seeds—also known as “diaspores” (plant parts used for propagation). Plants generally develop various strategies for propagating, which includes the morphology of their fruits and seeds. Seeds

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can be adapted to be spread on the wind or be carried by water or animals. In a city, the human factor is very important. Traces of various forms of plant use can be found within the bounds of medieval Krakow. We need to bear in mind that, apart from plants spreading naturally, city residents have more than once deliberately brought in certain plants (or seeds), grown them in domestic gardens, inadvertently spread valuable surplus or seed material, or even inadvertently burned food dishes, or deliberately burned plants in some ceremonies. Archaeobotanical research, like all other studies, has weaknesses that should be borne in mind. The information we have, despite being real, tangible traces of the past lives of inhabitants, is extremely fragmentary and it is restricted by the physical borders of the archaeological study area and the peculiarities of plant seeds as a data source. It is known that the origins of seeds in urban samples are very diverse. The fact that we find the seeds of swamp plants in the heart of a medieval city does not necessarily mean that a swamp was there at the time—it most often indicates wetlands nearby, and, for example, the seeds found in the city arrived in mud stuck to wheels. Thus the presence of such seeds attests to the quality of tracks and the amount of mud in the city, not to the presence of a pond in the place where the sample was taken. We also very occasionally come across the seeds of eaten plants such as leafy vegetables, root vegetables, and many herbs, condiments, and spices that were usually eaten before flowering and fruiting. Despite such obvious limitations, about 370 plant species were identified in the soil layers belonging to medieval Krakow. They were selected from almost 300 samples taken from 30 places located in the medieval Krakow settlement. They were archaeologically dated to three rough chronological periods: tribal (from the beginning of medieval times to the end of tenth century), early medieval (from the beginning of eleventh century to the time of the town’s foundation in 1257), and late medieval (from the foundation to the end of fifteenth century).10 Organic remains are usually preserved well in conditions of constant high moisture. In a city, any construction works that disturb the ground are significant, as they irreversibly destroy or mix archaeological layers. A few special, undisturbed areas can be discerned within Krakow. The most distinctive are located in Wawel hill, where particularly organic-rich layers were preserved dating to the tribal period and the early Middle Ages (ca. 700–1100 AD), especially in area X, in an excavation between the Panieńska and Szlachecka bastions.11 Another area is located in the fortified suburbium called Okół, which developed just north of the Wawel castle hill (see figures 3.1 to 3.2). In both settlements intact layers have survived, most of which date to the tribal

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Figure 3.1. Deadly nightshade (Atropa belladonna L.): a, b—place where a subfossil seed was found, in this case in a sample dated to the tribal period (ninth–tenth centuries) from the Kanonicza Street site (reconstruction by R. Gaweł); c, d—the modern plant (photo by M. Szewczyk), e—subfossil specimen (photo by K. Stachowicz).

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

Figure 3.2. Celandine (Chelidonium majus L.): a—location of finds; from trench XXIX from Kanonicza 17 (compare fig. 3.1) three celandine seeds were found in three separate samples dated to the eleventh–twelfth centuries; b—detailed location of finds from area XII on Wawel, dated to the eleventh century; c—modern plant (photo by M. Szewczyk), d—subfossil specimen (photo by K. Stachowicz).

period and the early Middle Ages.12 The Main Market Square also turned out to be rich in plant materials, but mainly from the late medieval layers (ca. 1300–1500 AD). In recent years, a lot of new information has been obtained by examining samples from the courtyard of Bishop Erazm Ciołek’s villa at 17 Kanonicza Street and from a large excavation on the Main Market Square,

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located between the Cloth Halls and St. Mary’s Church, which add to the earlier research on this part of the city. This chapter presents only selected plants found in Krakow’s medieval layers—those that, assuming their location was not accidental, allow us to determine the character of a given place at a given time. Archaeological dating of medieval layers is usually imprecise, but for certain plants we can focus on a sequence of well-preserved, undisturbed strata—which is the case of the Kanonicza Street site and the new Main Market Square excavations. They allow us to track changes in these places over time.

The Fortified Suburbium of Okół At 17 Kanonicza Street, in a place previously adjoining the inside of the early medieval settlement’s ramparts (and thus on the very edge of the town settlement of the time, but still within its boundaries), layers were found that were botanically very rich.13 In trench XXIX (figure 3.3b) there survived strata that dated from the ninth–tenth centuries to the fourteenth, the thickest of which was archaeologically dated to the eleventh–twelfth centuries.14 In the lower part of the trench, just below that layer, in a sample dated to the ninth–tenth centuries, a deadly nightshade seed was found (Atropa belladonna L., figure 3.1). This is a forest plant with powerful healing properties, as well as being poisonous and hallucinogenic. In the past it was also used as a cosmetic because it dilates the pupils due to the atropine content; it is this property that is recorded in the second part of the Latin name belladonna. That property is still used in ophthalmology. It is associated with an oceanic climate; the limit of its range of occurrence passes through southern Poland, and it is currently a protected species in the country.15 The characteristic waterlogged seed from Kanonicza, which was found in a sample from the tribal period, is the only archaeobotanical find of this plant in Poland and is very unusual.16 Another plant with powerful healing properties is a greater celandine (Chelidonium majus L.). It grows mainly in ruderal places. Single celandine seeds (see figure 3.2) have been found in four samples out of three hundred, including three from from Kanonicza, from a layer dated to the eleventh to twelfth centuries, and one sample from Wawel dated to the eleventh century. The appearance of seeds of this plant may indicate a ruderal habitat such as domestic neighborhoods, thickets, roadsides—places that are partly shady and fertile. However, it seems more likely that the sporadic appearance of seeds of this plant in the sediment is due to its having been deliberately imported because of the medicinal use of celandine in the early Middle Ages, which was perhaps later abandoned.

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

It cannot be ruled out that celandine was brought to Central Europe as a healing or magical plant during the Middle Ages.17 In Germany, celandine seeds appear only in layers dated to the late Middle Ages (eleventh to thirteenth centuries). Furthermore, medieval Arab sources report that the plant was imported by Jewish merchants from China through the port of Al-Qulzum on the Red Sea.18 However, Józef Rostafiński, the Polish botanist working at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the author of a fundamental work summarizing the available knowledge about plants mentioned in medieval and Renaissance Polish literature, writes about this plant as being native (“Planta indigena”).19 Arabic sources, assuming the name corresponds to the same plant, attest to the value it held around the Mediterranean. In the case of finds from medieval Krakow, celandine’s characteristic seeds are curiously lacking in samples from after the foundation of the town, including in ruderal samples, where we would expect it to be. Interestingly, greater celandine seeds are generally found in Europe, mainly at medieval waterlogged sites.20 The earlier finds, usually uncharred seeds taken from dry sediments, are far less trustworthy.21 Fresh celandine seeds are often transported by ants,22 both across the surface and into the soil, and thus from younger layers to older layers. However, ants do not operate in wet, waterlogged sediments. Taking into account the limitations of archaeological and written sources,23 it would seem that celandine occurs north of the Carpathian Mountains mainly due to the plant’s medicinal use, deliberate cultivation, or importation. Modern medicine employs celandine leaves and roots, which contain more than fourteen alkaloids. They are used as choleretics, spasmolytics, sedatives, analgesics, and diuretics.24 In folk medicine, the uses of celandine include the application of its juice to remove warts. The higher-lying early medieval layers from Kanonicza had a high share of typical ruderal plants, especially common nettle (Urtica dioica L.), dog nettle (U. urens L.), maple-leaved goosefoot (Chenopodium hybridum L.), white goosefoot (C. album L.), and purple amaranth (Amaranthus lividus, see figure 3.3). This last is a crop plant, but in this case it apparently co-formed a nitrogenloving ruderal community typical of dumps of organic waste.25 The plant composition of successive layers from Kanonicza leads us to speculate that this place was being managed by settlers around the tenth century, and the deadly nightshade seed may signal the presence of someone familiar with the healing properties of plants. Later, the place was most probably abandoned and became a waste dump, which is also indicated by the abundance of seeds of ruderal plants that do not tolerate trampling. It also needs to be considered that while these layers were being formed (eleventh to

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Figure 3.3. Purple amaranth (Amaranthus lividus L.): a, b—location of find; c—modern plant (photo by B. Sudnik-Wójcikowa); d—subfossil specimens (photo K. Stachowicz).

twelfth centuries), the plants that grew here may have been eaten as “spinach” in historical and prehistorical times;26 however, this hypothesis is contradicted by the presence of plant diaspores that are mature, perhaps from old plants no longer fit for consumption. Considering that this place was within a fortified suburbium, in a valuable space surrounded by earthen ramparts, the fact that such ruderal plants could grow suggests that the area was avoided by the inhabitants. But at the same time, it cannot be ruled out that after strengthening the settlement’s ramparts, the place was permanently damp, favoring the accumulation of waste and the unencumbered growth of nitrogen-loving plants. In the other excavations of this site, just a few meters away, the conditions in which sediments formed were completely different. At Kanonicza, archaeological profiles taken from three

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trenches were studied (figure 3.3b). In trench XXXVII, mainly charred and mineralized seeds survived, totaling 574 specimens; trench XXXIV contained charred and waterlogged seeds, totaling 245 specimens, and the previously described trench XXIX, where waterlogged seeds predominated, contained almost 10,000 specimens. The method by which the remains were preserved (charring, mineralization, and waterlogging) indicates the conditions in which the sediments formed. The drying out of moist sediments destroys noncharred, waterlogged specimens, whereas mineralization may indicate, among others, significant concentrations of compounds from feces and secretions in the substrate. Studies on Kanonicza Street show how variable the prevailing environmental conditions in the city were, and are. They make us aware of the wide margin of error involved in making generalizations about the urban landscape based on environmental research that is usually highly local. At the same time, the studies on Kanonicza Street show how dynamic the city’s natural environment is: within a few meters of each other—or within a few decades in the same spot—there can be plant worlds that differ from one another entirely. An interesting but common plant that appeared at Kanonicza, including in the sample from the tribal period that contained deadly nightshade, is bulrush (Typha sp., probably common cattail—T. latifolia L.).27 Its seeds are among the most numerous in medieval Krakow, but they are mainly found in the layers formed before the foundation of the city commune of Krakow in the thirteenth century. Bulrush was found in nearly 60 percent of samples dated to the tribal period and 30 percent of early medieval samples. In the late medieval layers, bulrush seeds virtually cease to appear, being found in only 3 percent of the samples dated to this period. In general, bulrush seeds were preserved mostly on the Wawel hill, elevated above the natural watercourses. Bulrush is a decorative aquatic plant; a single spadix contains a large number of seeds. Its frequent appearance (regardless of the number of seeds found) in the prefoundation period and its subsequent disappearance are certainly not accidental. Bulrush had many uses: as an insulating material, in woven products such as ropes, and as stuffing for quilts or upholstered furniture.28 Bulrush rhizomes are quite rich in starch and were eaten before the introduction of potatoes, or during periods of famine.29 It is difficult to say whether the absence of seeds indicates that the plant disappeared around Krakow or its use was abandoned. It grows (T. latifolia L. and T. angustifolia L.—lesser bulrush) in fertile, stagnant, slow-flowing waters, creating reed beds. It seems that the changes in how often and how abundantly it is found stem both from changes in Cracovians’ customs and wealth and from changes in the regulation and exploitation of the wetlands.

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Figure 3.4. St. John’s wort (Hypericum perforatum L.): a, b—location of concentrated find of its seeds (seeds of various species of St. John’s wort were also found in many other samples within Krakow from all chronological periods); c—modern plant (photo by M. Szewczyk); d—subfossil specimens (photo. K. Stachowicz).

The Main Market Square Many interesting plants were found in trench C, which was located between the Cloth Halls and St. Mary’s Church in the eastern part of the Main Market Square (figure 3.4a). Until the end of the eleventh century there was a cemetery

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

Figure 3.5. Subfossil specimens of plants described in the text: a—hemlock (Conium maculatum L.); b—catnip (Nepeta cataria L.); c—black henbane (Hyoscyamus niger L.); d— yellow bittercress (Barbarea vulgaris R. Br.).(photos by A. Mueller-Bieniek).

here, whereas after the town’s foundation the area may have been occupied by light wooden stalls.30 Archaeological data and written sources, however, mainly contain information about larger stone or wooden constructions of significant value that were usually dug into the ground. Late fourteenth-century municipal account books only mention expenses for the roofing of the smatruz, a market hall for small traders that until the mid-fifteenth century was located in the western part of the market square.31 In the area between Rich Stalls and St. Mary’s Church, archaeologically undisturbed layers survived unaffected by any earthworks. Twelve samples were taken from the CW profile from the western wall (W) of the trench (C), and these covered the period from the early Middle Ages to the fourteenth century. In this area no paving stones were found, but judging from a reconstruction of communication routes dated to the second half of the thirteenth century and the first half of

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the fourteenth,32 the point where the CW profile was taken was close to a medieval road. In this profile, a thin layer of burned material that stretches for about a meter and is clearly distinct from neighboring layers deserves particular attention (see figure 3.4a). The sample collected from it (CW_5) is dominated by seeds of St. John’s wort (Hypericum perforatum L.), both charred and uncharred (see figure 3.4d). In addition, in this sample only charred seeds survived—a total of forty-six specimens belonging to twenty-two taxa of arable crops, weeds, and meadow plants. After St. John’s wort, the most common were yellow bittercress (Barbarea vulgaris R. Br., see figure 3.5d), also known as St. Barbara’s herb. This layer is most probably associated with the early medieval cemetery.33 In the Middle Ages, St. John’s wort had important medicinal and probably also ritual uses, as indicated by its alternate names in Polish, both then and in modern times, which reference St. John, little church, bells, or anchors.34 This plant’s powers were believed to include driving off demons and evil forces. This find, if associated with the cemetery, is most likely a leftover from protective rituals or rituals to honor the dead. The occurrence of St. John’s wort within limits of medieval Krakow is noteworthy. Several species of the St. John’s wort genus are found in Poland’s flora, the most regularly occurring is common St. John’s wort (Hypericum perforatum L.), but all species have similar properties and are used in herbal medicine. Common St. John’s wort is frequently found in the samples, mainly in waterlogged form, and most abundantly in the aforementioned sample and an early medieval sample from Kanonicza in which ruderal plants predominate. St. John’s wort grows on the outskirts of forests, in clearings, in thickets, and on grasslands, and was brought into the city as a medicinal plant or mixed in with fodder. In the majority of the remaining seventy-three samples that contained common St. John’s wort seeds, these are single, waterlogged specimens unrelated to any particular region of Krakow or specific chronological period. This testifies that St. John’s wort was permanently present in medieval Krakow, probably as a fodder plant (the seeds of most feed plants pass undigested through the digestive tract of herbivores), but also undoubtedly on account of its medicinal properties. In general, the seeds of St. John’s worts are more numerous and more frequently found in prefoundation samples, usually as individual specimens in samples rich in other plant remains. In this context, the find from the early medieval cemetery is extraordinary, as the seeds of St. John’s wort account for over half of all plant diaspores, and some of them were charred. Under the burned layer containing a significant number of St. John’s wort

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seeds is a sandy layer described by archaeologists as primary humus (the soil layer below which there are no archaeological finds). In the sample taken from just below the charred layer, only five plants were found, but two of those were represented by a significant number of uncharred specimens. They are mullein (Verbascum sp., sixty-eight specimens) and sandwort (Arenaria sp., forty-two specimens), indicating a type of vegetation growing on unforested areas of poor, dry soils and sandy soils. In turn, the layer located above the burned material contained only single charred and mineralized specimens belonging to three plants or groups of plants that grow on moderately moist (fresh) and fertile soils; this indicates an intensification of human activity (indeterminate amaranths, Chenopodiaceae indet.; hemlock, Conium maculatum L.; and white campion, Melandrium album). Above that is a sandy dividing layer associated with the period of foundation of the urban commune, so everything above the sandy dividing layer is considered to be from the late Middle Ages.35 The sample (RGCW_8) taken from above the sandy dividing layer has a very ruderal plant composition, which does not completely tally with the image of an urban market in a chartered town.36 The sample is most abundant in nitrogen-loving ruderal plants (see figure 3.5), such as goosefoot (Chenopodium album and C. hybridum), hemlock (Conium maculatum L.), black henbane (Hyoscyamus niger L.), European black nightshade (Solanum nigrum L.), black elder (Sambucus nigra L.), nettles (Urtica dioica L. and U. urens L.), catnip (Nepeta cataria L. and N. cf. pannonica), dead-nettle (Lamium sp.), and small mallow (Malva cf. pusilla). In this sample, a seed of blackspot hornpoppy (Glaucium corniculatum L. Rudolph), an extremely interesting poppy plant (Papaveraceae), was also found (see figure 3.6). Blackspot hornpoppy is an ephemerophyte in our lands—a plant that occurs episodically but cannot persist in the flora, usually for climatic reasons. This plant is a cereal crop weed to the south of the Carpathians and in the historical region of Podolia.37 It is also a valuable medicinal plant, including in folk medicine as an expectorant, a sedative, and an antidiabetic.38 In Krakow, it appears outside Wawel and Okół (see figure 3.6). It may have been mixed in with cereals grown on Ukrainian loess, or imported and even grown in gardens. Individual seeds of blackspot hornpoppy were also found in three other samples from diverse locations of medieval Krakow.39 Also worth noting are hemlock, a highly poisonous, foul-smelling plant,40 and catnip (see figure 3.5b). Catnip seeds were found in a total of sixteen samples out of three hundred, and only in Wawel and the Main Market Square. With the exception of forty-nine specimens from the above-described sample RGCW_8, they always occurred individually. The same was true of hemlock,

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Figure 3.6. Blackspot hornpoppy (Glaucium corniculatum L. Rudolph): a, b—location of finds; c—modern plant (photo by P. Kalinowski); d—subfossil specimen (photo by A. Mueller-Bieniek).

seeds of which were found in a total of ten samples, always as individual specimens, except for sample RGCW_8, where there were twenty-eight seeds. The fact that the sample from the late medieval Main Market Square contained an accumulation of seeds of plants that prefer fertile, untrampled habitats where they can reach considerable sizes and thus create impenetrable thickets is significant, and indicates a ruderal area, around huts or walls. It may have occupied a very limited area. At the same time, most of the prevailing plants in this sample have strong medicinal properties. However, of course,

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

Figure 3.7. Carrot (Daucus carota L.): a—location of described sample in the CW profile at the Main Market Square (cf. Figure 3.4 [RGCW_11, fourteenth century]); b–d— modern plants (photo by M. Szewczyk); e—subfossil specimens from the described sample, scale indicates 1 mm (photo by A. Mueller-Bieniek).

most of the plants growing in our area have more-or-less proven healing properties.41 In the CW profile, above the CW_8 sample, a layer of straw-rich manure dating to the fourteenth century is also of interest, and from it a total of three samples were taken. One of them (CW_11) contained carrot seeds (Daucus carota L.) with distinctive traits of sown material.42 The wild carrot variety is native to Europe and grows in meadows and ruderal communities. Its seeds are found at European archaeological sites from the Neolithic, and quite often at medieval ones. The seeds of wild and domesticated forms do not differ; the feature that is changed by cultivation is the root. However, in the sample from the layer dated to the fourteenth century,43 carrot seeds were found with their

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setae (bristles) artificially removed (see figure 3.7) just as the plant’s seeds are prepared for sowing today.44 The type of preservation (fossilization) and comparison against other carrot seeds from medieval Krakow can exclude natural processes in this case.45 This indicates the cultivation of carrots in Krakow or the surrounding area and is probably a find of seed material for sale on the Krakow market. This does not indicate the presence of carrot being grown at the place from which the sample was taken because the seeds are found in too high a density, and soil conditions were not suitable for plant growth (excessive moisture of the substrate, which also allowed the specimens to be preserved and to survive to the present day). The carrot species includes a number of subspecies and informal taxonomic groups that are ordered and accepted variously by the scientific community.46 Cultivated carrot alone is divided into two main groups: (1) eastern varieties, with mainly purple roots colored by anthocyanin compounds (D. carota ssp. sativus var. atrorubens Alef.); and (2) western varieties, with orange roots due to the presence of carotene compounds (D. carota ssp. sativus var. sativus). There are many hypotheses about the origins of the cultivation of this economically important vegetable, with its numerous varieties (from white to almost black). One of the more commonly accepted theories is that the cultivation of the earlier variety—the anthocyanin carrots—began in what is today’s Afghanistan, and was brought to Europe by the Arabs on some roundabout route along the African coast of the Mediterranean and the Iberian Peninsula, where it arrived in the twelfth century, and up to Western and Central Europe in the fourteenth century. The most commonly cultivated orange-rooted western varieties probably originate from cultivars bred in the Netherlands in the seventeenth century.47

Pedanius Dioscorides was a first-century Greek physician and botanist. He described around five hundred medicinal plants in the work De Materia Medica, which has been repeatedly rewritten and illustrated and was still in use in early modern times.

However, the first references to carrots in the literature are from ancient Greek and Roman sources. Dioscorides lists it under the name staphylinos, describing, among others, the plant’s characteristic black spot in the middle of its inflorescence. He also states that the root of this plant is used both as food and as medicine, with plants grown in gardens being tastier, and those

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

Illustration 3.1. Illustration of carrot from the Vienna Dioscorides. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

growing wild having more potent medicinal properties.48 In one of the oldest manuscripts containing the work of Dioscorides, in the early eighteenth-century Anicia Juliana Codex, also known as the Vienna Dioscorides, one illustration depicts a carrot with a thick orange root (see illustration 3.1); similar illustrations can be found in other iconographic sources.49 The ancestors of contemporary carotene varieties probably include lesser known yellow-rooted

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eastern cultivars, cultivable white-rooted wild varieties (Daucus carota ssp. carota) grown for medicinal purposes since antiquity, and wild European and Mediterranean varieties.50 The emergence of carrot seed material on the medieval Krakow market indicates that it was already known and cultivated in Poland at that time. 51 This is important evidence, given that the written sources are not explicit with regard to carrots, as the names “carrot” and “parsnip” are used interchangeably. Meanwhile, Renaissance herbalists describe the carrot as a little-known visitor to our country,52 which may reflect changes in diet going on at the end of the Middle Ages during a temporary decline in Krakow’s international significance, or the consequence of carrots being reintroduced as an ingredient of “Italian” cuisine by Queen Bona. It cannot be excluded that the mention refers only to the orange variety (the term carota is used), which, as previously stated, is believed to originate from seventeenth-century Dutch crops. A thorough interpretation of the findings from the CW profile from the Rynek Główny described above, supported by geochemical research and absolute dating, may still reveal valuable information about the natural environment and economic activities of this part of the city. There are more such areas where samples rich in organic remains were found. Sometimes, botanical research results can be linked to what we know about a place (a layer) from archaeological research. One example is the layer of fallow border between wooden bread stalls in the northwest of the Main Market Square, where numerous wild strawberry diaspores were found,53 indicating both that it was consumed in the city and that the narrow and probably roofed space between wooden stalls was used as a “secluded area.” Another place from which a single sample of a manure layer dated to the fourteenth or fifteenth century was taken is the RVI trench near the Town Hall. This extremely detritus-rich sample was found to contain, among others, numerous waterlogged seeds of water mannagrass (Glyceria fluitans),54 an edible grass that is historically important, especially economically.55 However, working with the whole material, multiple methodological problems are usually encountered in discerning fine data from the noise of a mass of organic debris of diverse origin and chronology.56 Krakow’s former inhabitants left behind archaeological layers that are an extremely valuable source of heritage—one that includes humble seeds and fruit that accompanied and bear silent witness to their lives. The hygiene and moisture conditions that prevailed in the city, though undoubtedly hard on residents, nevertheless allowed very rich and diverse botanical specimens to be preserved. These specimens are mostly of plants that are commonly found

PLANTS IN THE LIVES OF MEDIEVAL CRACOVIANS

around human settlements and imported into the area as food or other raw materials. The appearance of rare plants, whose value is known in written and ethnographic sources, or of plants that are apparently common and “ordinary” but that show up in extraordinary circumstances, bring color to the image of the medieval city. When supported by knowledge on a given plant’s occurrence and utility, this type of detailed information is more accessible than that from investigations on an entire body of plant material using methods of objective interpretation.57 At the same time, it seems to be clearer. The chapter briefly describes no more than ten plants, and yet about three hundred were found in various combinations, which goes to show the informational potential of this type of research. In terms of understanding the urban landscape, samples for which the same standard methods were used but no plant remains were found are also significant. This may indicate that good hygiene conditions prevailed in a given place at a given time, which is reflected by empty samples. However, these “unhygienic” samples bring archaeobotanists far more joy. They provide spectacular finds, such as deadly nightshade and greater celandine seeds or carrot sowing material, which highlight some aspects of urban life that are otherwise hardly visible in the written sources.

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CHAPTER 4 A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND Early Modern Krakow and Natural Resources

Piotr Miodunka

When the subject of a modern city’s environmental impact arises, our thoughts first turn to pollution, sprawling suburbs, or unsightly roadside advertising hoardings. But what would be the effect of a preindustrial-era city, similar to the modest-sized modern cities of Helena (Montana), Newport (Rhode Island), or Salem (Massachusetts)—as Krakow was around 1600—on its surrounding area? Such relationships were different back then. Because productivity was low and transport arduous and slow, the city required a relatively large area to supply it with a regular flow of food, raw materials, and semifinished products. The oldest systematic concept of a city’s spatial impact on its region comes from the German economist Johann Heinrich von Thünen. In his 1826 work, he included a model description of concentric zones supplying the city with the food products and raw materials it needed. His concept was born of research into cities (which were growing) and their interrelations with the rural hinterland, which has been revived recently in the field of urban environmental history. Since the nineteenth century, with the spread of modern transport and international trade, cities’ immediate outskirts have largely lost their provisioning role to direct connections with entities trading in a given commodity.1 Thus, the nature of a city’s influence on its region has changed, but the phenomenon itself remains. 88

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The Von Thünen model describes the operation of an isolated city as a zone of stable soil and climate conditions. The most proximal zone was specialized in high-quality vegetable growing, the next provided firewood and timber, and more remote rings were areas for field crops—the farther from the city, the more extensive the agriculture, and, finally, the most remote zone is pasture lands.

The following considerations are devoted to the impact of the Krakow agglomeration (i.e., the Krakow–Kazimierz–Kleparz tricity and suburbs) in the preindustrial and premodern period, not so much on the immediate area (within the modern city’s administrative borders), but on the environment of the more far-flung regions of historical Lesser Poland (today's south Poland, north of the Carpathians, up to the upper Vistula valley). Many researchers hold that the “draining” of energy in its broad sense (i.e., both fuels and food) led to the most far-reaching and often negative environmental transformations in a region whose resources a city exploited. This study is pioneering and preliminary, as existing studies into prepartition Krakow’s trade or Lesser Poland’s economic regionalization have only touched on the issues at the heart of contemporary environmental history.2 The way in which Krakow affected the region’s environment was largely a function of the city’s location. This was, of course, no accident, lying as it did at the intersection of a number of physical geographical macroregions. To the northeast of the city, up to the river Nida, lies a belt of fertile black soils, the best soil for growing that most demanding of cereal grains—wheat. To the north, this complex is supplemented by brown (eutrophic) soils that in places are also suitable for growing wheat. Good conditions are also afforded by the alluvial soils and humic lessive soils immediately surrounding Krakow on its other sides, although the alluvial soils are difficult to farm and in past times had poor yields. To the south of Krakow, more or less behind the Lanckorona–Myślenice line, there are mountainous soils ranging from relatively fertile pseudogley lessive soils to dystrophic and acidic brown soils only suitable for cultivating oats and potatoes. Before the sixteenth century these areas were mostly overgrown with forest. The same was true of the poorly fertile podzolic soils (suitable only for growing rye) that, slightly farther afield, stretched west of Krakow. We can therefore be sure that in the mid-thirteenth century, when the city gained its charter under the Magdeburg Law, the areas to the northeast of

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Krakow were being used for agriculture, and to the northwest and south the landscape was dominated by forests (except in the river valleys). This created ideal conditions for supplying a fast-growing city. Earlier, before its charter, Krakow’s fortified settlement and surrounding settlement had a relatively minor influence on the region as a whole. At that time, of greater impact were the ducal seat itself and the network of associated settlements serving it, which was inhabited by a population that provided certain services to the fortified settlement. Most of the information about this sector of the population is based on characteristic local place names that have been preserved. Among those around Krakow, of particular note are those related to animal farming, such as Owczary and Skotniki, which are related to sheep- and cattle farming, respectively, and thus closely related to a landscape of meadows and pastures.

Thermal Energy and Construction Material from the Forests Medieval and early modern cities had a huge demand for wood. In this context, wood is usually spoken of as a construction material (and the cause of numerous fires), and less frequently mentioned as the only fuel used domestically for both heating and cooking, and industrially (in forges, potter’s workshops, breweries, bakeries, etc.). So it comes as no surprise when Krakow was chartered in 1257, it already had a forest dedicated to its use—Chwacimiech (Facimiech)—located along the Vistula River, upstream of the city. It should be noted that the historic use of forests here (even up to the end of the nineteenth century) was multifaceted, and it largely devastated the area. Here we focus on those uses and omit those such as harvesting, beekeeping, or hunting that were not ruinous. First, as already mentioned, timber was harvested from the forests whether for construction (as beams, sawn timber, boards, and shingles) or for fuel. However, to obtain a fuel with a higher calorific value for industry, wood was converted to charcoal. It is assumed that a metric ton of charcoal used an average of five metric tons of wood. Charcoal was also used to fuel glassworks.3 In addition, industries increased deforestation to produce ash, potash (used in the manufacture of glass, soap, and dyes), pitch, tar, and turpentine. Finally, the wood was used by the city’s craftspeople, such as coopers and bookbinders. The increase in demand for charcoal energy was particularly favored by Krakow’s great demand for glassware; it was one of two centers of the glass trade (alongside Gdańsk) in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.4 Although the scale of transport of glass products into the city can be approximately established, it is difficult to estimate the environmental impact of the glassworks

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Table 4.1. The Krakow agglomeration’s theoretical demand for fuel in various periods Period

Population (approximate)

Demand expressed in firewood (t)

Demand expressed in charcoal (t)

c. 1350

15,000

30,000

15,000

1st half 17th c.

30,000

60,000

30,000

c. 1790

20,000

40,000

20,000

Source: author’s own work

that produced them. We do not know how much wood a single works consumed, but it was considerable, because it was converted into both ash and charcoal. Counting only the glassworks regularly delivering goods to Krakow, the city contributed to the cutting of forests in the vast areas of the Krakow province, but also in parts of Sandomierz province.5 It can be assumed that the works to the south and west were most closely associated with the city’s market. These were glassworks (operating in various periods) in the vicinity of Żywiec (Mikuszowice, Pewel), Sucha (Stryszawa), Myślenice, and Dobczyce (Trzebunia, Więciórka, Osieczany, Poręba, and Hucisko). The other regions providing glass were around Łagów, Radoszyce, and Szydłów.6 As mentioned earlier, until the nineteenth century, wood and charcoal were the main sources of domestic heating and heat energy for industry (breweries, bakeries, forges, etc.). The economic historian Paul Bairoch believed that the climate thus favored urbanization processes in the warmer parts of Europe. Depending on geographical location, each inhabitant of a city needed from one metric ton of firewood a year (in the south of the Old Continent) to two or three metric tons in the north.7 This considerably limited population growth and the development of many manufacturing sectors. Only London broke off its sole dependence on the abundance of surrounding forests through its early use of bituminous coal imported from the north of England. To determine how much forest area medieval and early modern Krakow needed to function, we should of course assume that energy consumption indexes for fuel for city inhabitants were greater than that, and instead equivalent to one metric ton of charcoal or two metric tons of firewood, or 29 gigajoules (GJ) per year per inhabitant (charcoal provides twice as much energy per unit of burned mass than even the best firewood). The theoretical annual demand for the Krakow agglomeration, depending on number of inhabitants, is shown in table 4.1 (assuming that Krakow used either only firewood or only charcoal). This means that at the peak of the early modern town’s growth (the end

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Figure 4.1. Price of firewood (dziesiątek and tafla) and charcoal (cartload) in Krakow, 1393–1795 (in grams of silver). Source: E. Tomaszewski, Ceny w Krakowie w latach 1601–1795 (Lwów, 1934), 88–91, 94.

of the sixteenth and first half of the seventeenth century), when the population of the Krakow agglomeration may have exceeded thirty thousand, the city’s fuel supply probably required annual imports of up to sixty thousand large carts of wood, or up to thirty thousand carts of charcoal (Krakow of course used both types of fuel, but we do not know in what proportions). This was already presenting a certain barrier to the city’s development, because the prices of these fuels in Krakow were clearly rising at this time (see figure 4.1). After about 1660, solid fuel prices in Krakow decreased, which we should understand as reflecting a demographic crisis in the city. It was not until the latter eighteenth century that firewood began to increase in price again (data on charcoal is lacking for this period), probably in response to a population increase. It is possible that the hike in fuel prices was also connected to the phases of colder winters and springs described in chapter 1. In the nineteenth century, rational forest management is assumed to have allowed about 200 metric tons of firewood to be obtained from 1 km2 (or

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

2.5–3.5 m3 per 1 ha).8 This means that at least 100 km2 of forest would be needed to meet the needs of a city of ten thousand inhabitants. This applies to firewood, but to obtain charcoal, a larger area should be assumed (it requires 5 metric tons of wood to produce 1 metric ton of charcoal).9 In practice, taking a combination of thermal energy sources—a minimum of 10 percent charcoal— thirty thousand Krakow inhabitants would have required about 270 km2 of forest for 54,000 metric tons of firewood per year and about another 1 km2 to be burned every year for 3,000 metric tons of charcoal.10 This means that while the agglomeration was booming demographically, within one hundred years it consumed at least 100 km2 of forest solely to produce charcoal for the immediate needs of local industry (this was usually permanent deforestation for cultivation and settlement) and it required the perpetual use of about 250 km2 of forest to provide firewood (or less, if the share of charcoal was larger). For comparison, the administrative borders of today’s Krakow cover more than 320 km2, and the main body of the Niepołomice forest covers around 110 km2. This shows the extent to which the largest metropolis of Old Poland depended on the forest resources of the entire region. Compared to the demand for thermal energy, the use of forests for building material seems less significant. Nevertheless, outside of Krakow and Kazimierz, the rest of the agglomeration had many wooden buildings, and even tenement houses had a lot of wooden components (ceilings, roofs). Quantities of construction timber imported into the city cannot be ascertained, if only because Krakow’s guild of timber rafters did not have full control of the wood trade. The city’s crafts required forest resources for both wooden semifinished products (staves for cask making, hoops for wheels, bookbinding boards) and forest industry products (ash, tar, lubricant).

THE CONGRESS OF KRAKOW TIMBER RAFTERS was an organization subordinate to Krakow’s ruler, and the equivalent of a craftsmen’s guild. It included rafters and wood traders who held a monopoly and were responsible for supplying timber and firewood to the royal court, to salt mines, and to the town. In practice, many private individuals among the aristocracy and church owned privileges allowing them to float wood for their own needs.

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We know that, initially, the forests closer to Krakow were heavily exploited, and as their resources were depleted, those farther out were turned to. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the inhabitants of nearby Mogilany and Krzyszkowice, among others, burned charcoal for Krakow.11 From the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, the main areas supplying Krakow with wood for both construction and fuel were the basins of the Skawa and Soła Rivers. Transport was mainly along the waterways because the Skawa was navigable more or less from Maków (Podhalański), and the Soła from Żywiec.12 This was not the only way that local wood resources were exploited; they also served to satisfy the city’s needs for other wooden products such as shingles and cooperage. Krakow’s customs registers and the excise register of the city of Kazimierz, show the typical products and areas associated with overland delivery in the mid-seventeenth century (see map 4.1). At that time, the main supplier of charcoal was the village of Bieńkówka in the royal estate of Lanckorona, as well as the villages of Barwałd, Stanisław, and Wysoka, which were located close to one another. Wooden products, mainly shingles, were supplied by many villages of the Lanckorona royal estate and the area around Sucha Beskidzka. The gradual disappearance of forests in the Krakow region is most easily seen in the example of this royal estate. In the mid-sixteenth century, nine of its villages (Baczyn, Bieńkówka, Budzów, Jachówka, Jasienica, Maków, Palcza, Trzebunia, and Zachełmia) had peasants involved in the manufacture of shingles. In addition, a glassworks was operating in Trzebunia, thus contributing to the depletion of the surrounding forests. One hundred years later, shingles were being produced in only three villages: Baczyn, Bieńkówka, and Jachówka. In the other villages, we have clear information that production had ceased. The glassworks had also ceased to operate. In the 1760s, there is no more mention of shingle makers, but the list of the royal estate’s income has an entry regarding tax on head of sheep and fees for using forest glades, mountain pastures, and freshly cleared fields (together accounting for almost 8.5 percent of total income).13 This attests to the permanent deforestation of the area and its agricultural use. This is evidenced by data in the real estate register known as “the Josephine cadastre,” according to which in the north of the Lanckorona estate (a town and twenty villages) forests occupied only 16 percent of taxed lands, and pastures 23 percent. In the southern part (settlements around modern-day Maków Podhalański) afforestation was much higher, at over 51 percent (11.6 percent of which were pastures).14 ◀ Map 4.1. Types of supply from nearby villages, and number of transports. Map by Piotr Miodunka and Anna Pietrzyk.

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THE JOSEPHINE CADASTRE was a land register compiled in 1785– 87 for Emperor Joseph II’s tax reform. It contains information on the uses and sizes of all revenue-generating real estate (arable land, gardens, orchards, meadows, ponds, pastures, forests) in every town or village within the 1772 borders of the Austrian Partition.

A more distant region of supply was the Soła catchment. The most significant wood reserves were the private manorial estate of Żywiec.15 These royal estates were concentrated to the south of Kęty. In the mid-sixteenth century, villages above the Soła’s middle stretch were actively engaged in exploiting forests and timber floating. These activities were so intense that one hundred years later it was decided to protect the tree stand and stop felling trees for anything more than local needs. However, the spread of sheep farming can be inferred. In the second half of the eighteenth century, the exploitation of the depleted local royal forests (the Kobierniki estate, the Lipnik estate) became more balanced: felling for construction timber appeared alongside shingle making.16 To the north of the Vistula and west of the Krakow agglomeration was another important region for supplying fuel and wood products. In the 1650s, charcoal was mainly transported from Przeginia, and to a lesser extent from Regulice and Grodziec. Firewood and wooden products were supplied by peasants from almost all villages between the Vistula River and the Tenczyński Hump, from Przegorzały and Olszanica to Kwaczała.17 Despite the fact that the Raba River flows relatively close to Krakow (just 25 km away), it joins the Vistula below Krakow. Therefore, forest industry products could not be supplied by river from the basin of the upper Raba River, and the quantity of overland supply was also not significant. Firewood was transported from Pcim and Stróża and ash and oak tannin from the farther-afield region of Rabka. If we consider that the southern region supplying the Krakow agglomeration with wood and derivative products (the Skawa and Soła basins) coincided with the Myślenicki district (later the Wadowicki district), then we can establish that in the mid-1780s it probably constituted about 1,000 km2 of forests (924 km2 according to the Josephine cadastre). But we should add that wood was also sent to supply the Wieliczka salt mine and the forestless surroundings of Proszowice, in addition to which, the forest law issued by

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

Joseph II (1782) limited the ability to exploit Galician forests. So, from the end of the eighteenth century we have information about firewood being brought in from the forests of the OjcÓw royal estate, and also about the region of Pszczyna in Prussian Silesia being an important supply area in the early nineteenth century.18 The most significant route for bringing this raw material to the city (alongside bituminous coal at that time) was thus still the Vistula. The great importance of this route was painfully affirmed to Cracovians in 1809, when, during one of the Napoleonic wars, the Austrian army blocked Vistulan fuel transports. Thanks to interventions by the highest political authorities, the route was unblocked, but only in November after peace had been achieved.19 The largest densely forested area around modern Krakow,the Niepołomice forest, supplied fuel and construction material, above all to the salt mines of Wieliczka and Bochnia and the Benedictine monastery in Staniątki. This forest was connected to Krakow in another way—as a royal hunting lodge. The Niepołomice forest was afforded partial protection (for twenty years) when the crown general sejm reduced felling by half on December 3, 1764.20 The official 1801 report of Antoni Baldacci notes the city’s growing problems with its wood supply, but does not indicate that it was replaced by bituminous coal.21 Nevertheless, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Krakow began increasingly to use bituminous coal as a fuel. In December 1801 an official recommendation was published (including in Gazeta Krakowska) explaining that coal should be burned; it was issued to prevent instances of smoke poisoning that had been reported.22 The beginning of the nineteenth century also saw intensive exploration for coal deposits south of Krakow and brief mining in Mogilany and Siepraw.23 Regular records of coal prices are known to us starting from 1812, probably in connection with a warehouse having been established for the fuel.24 If the estimates of licensed wood and coal traders are credible, in the early 1810s, Krakow consumed over 42,000 metric tons of bituminous coal per year.25 This would be a greater per capita consumption than at the end of the century, which is not necessarily accurate, but it certainly confirms Ambroży Grabowski’s observations in an 1836 guidebook to Krakow and surrounding areas. Describing the coal mines of the Tenczyński region, he added the following remark: “Coals, of which there are plentiful mines in Jaworzno, Dąbrowa, etc., and which are floated to Krakow along the Vistula before the destruction of forests whose names are barely known here, began only around 1800 to be made popular by Austr[ian] soldiers from the

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Figure 4.2. Price of 10 GJ of fuel in Krakow in 1811–1910, with reference to population changes. Source: Author’s work based on M. Górkiewicz, Ceny w Krakowie w latach 1796–1914 (Poznań, 1950), 272.

Netherlands. From the barracks their use spread to the city, and now they are the only fuel material.”26 Comparing prices of hard coal and hard firewood, it is clear that in that first period (until about 1830), it was cheaper to use coal than wood (see figure 4.2). In the fifteen years from 1830 to 1845, the cost of the two heating sources was the same, but after Krakow was incorporated into Austria, burning coal was more expensive. In the latter nineteenth century, the prices of both fuels increased with the city’s population, but the difference between them grew as coal use increased. In 1848 coal mining in the former Republic of Krakow (an area of just ​​ over 1,000 km2 in the immediate vicinity of Krakow!) exceeded 58,000 metric tons, completely meeting the city’s demand. In addition, in 1855 the import of coal from Prussian Silesia totaled more than 21,000 metric tons. In around 1880, Krakow’s demand for heating fuel was less than 1,900,000 GJ, that is roughly 31 GJ per capita, and coal covered 99.6 percent of this demand. The other former heating materials, wood and charcoal, had become almost completely insignificant.

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

UNLIKE IN KRAKOW, THIS SITUATION HELD IN LVIV, which in 1840 was primarily fueled with wood, charcoal, and peat, and a trace amount of coal brought in from Zhovkva. Only in 1861, after a railway connection had been established with Krakow, did coal become popular in the capital of Galicia. In Warsaw, this happened slightly earlier, in the mid-nineteenth century, as in Vienna. The city with the longest tradition of using coal as fuel in Poland is Gdańsk, to which it was already being delivered from Newcastle upon Tyne in the 1660s.

Arable Lands Provide Calories for Inhabitants and Feed for Animals In medieval and early modern Poland the diets of most inhabitants consisted predominantly of cereal products. Wheat was used for baking white bread and cakes, and in beer making. Rye was used for making widely consumed dark bread, and later for spirits. Grown in smaller amounts, barley was used to produce groats, and later also beers. Groats were also made from proso millet and buckwheat. Peas were widely grown (not only in gardens) and further supplemented cereal foods. The demand for cereals among the early modern urban population of the Krakow agglomeration can only be determined theoretically and by analogy, but this allows us to establish the approximate size of the production area. In about 1880, the average inhabitant of Krakow consumed about 270 kg of cereal per year (as bread and groats, excluding beer). Before the nineteenth century, bearing in mind that the diet included no potatoes, we have to assume greater consumption—at least 300 kg of grain per head (with wheat and rye constituting the decidedly larger part). Thus, a city of thirty thousand inhabitants needed a supply of at least 9,000 metric tons of cereals. Near Krakow, there were areas of relatively high yields around Proszowice and Kazimierza Wielka. We can assume that every hectare of this region sown with wheat or rye could provide a harvest cautiously estimated at about 360 kg, and more optimistically even 450 kg. Using the three-field crop rotation system, the area needed to feed the Krakow agglomeration should be tripled, and its size depending on population is presented, with variants, in table 4.2.27 The table shows that supplying the greater Krakow urban area at the peak of its early modern growth (the first half of the seventeenth century) would have required more than 600 km2 of arable land. Later, total consumption fell, but because in the first half of the nineteenth century the number of inhabitants in Krakow again reached thirty thousand and, finally, forty thousand, the

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Table 4.2. Theoretical area of arable land (in km2) needed to supply the Krakow agglomeration with bread cereals at different times. *Term describing surplus grains per sown grain, assuming average harvest, and after deduction of grain for future sowing, tithes and tributes, and to feed a family of five. Period

Population (approximate)

Area for 2-grain surplus yield

Area for 2.5-grain surplus yield

+/- 1,350

15,000

313

250

1st half 17th c.

30,000

625

500

+/- 1,790

20,000

417

333

+/- 1,850

40,000

833

667

Source: author’s own work

area required for food theoretically increased. In practice, in view of the rapid growth in popularity of potatoes (which were cultivated near Krakow beginning in the 1780s at the latest) and perhaps a gradual increase in agricultural yields, the area supplying bread cereals remained slightly above 600 km2.28 In the sixteenth century the Krakow agglomeration was the largest beer producer in Lesser Poland. It is estimated that in 1544–45, the demand of Krakow, Kazimierz, and Kleparz for wheat was over 6,200 metric tons, and for barley, 190 metric tons.29 Thus, during the agglomeration’s greatest demographic boom, its needs for making bread and beer required the cultivation of over 1,000 km2, assuming lower yields, or just under 850 km2 for higher yields. Thus far, the generally fertile surroundings of Proszowice have been described as an area supplying cereals. It is possible, however, to precisely represent the geographical spread of bread cereal supply to the Krakow agglomeration using the excise tax register of 1658–59.30 The map accurately confirms the monopoly of the Proszowice Plateau over the supply of bread cereals. The area of ​​regular transports stretches east of the Krakow–Słomniki line and south of the Słomniki–Działoszyce line, almost reaching the Nida valley in the Sandomierskie voivodeship. Cereal wagons on their way to the agglomeration sometimes covered 60 or even 70 km. Thanks to special tariff regulations, even when the Proszowice Plateau became separated from Krakow by the border between the Russian and Austrian annexed territories in Poland (which happened in 1815 and lasted for a hundred years), the grain supplies continued without interruption.31 According to data from the interwar period (1918–39) this area covered about 803 km2 of arable land (1,064 km2 in total), and thus could have fed the agglomeration, but would perhaps not have been enough to supply raw materials for breweries.32 It is worth noting

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

that arable land occupied as much as 75 percent of this area, and thus only 25 percent was given over to meadows, pastures, water bodies, forests, buildings, roads, and wasteland.

THE THREE-FIELD CROP ROTATION SYSTEM was a popular crop-growing scheme in late medieval Poland. It required the division of all arable land into three fields: winter, spring, and fallow land. Annually, each field was given over to a new use. In the winter field, wheat and rye were sown, in the spring field, barley and oats, and the fallow field served as a pasture. Prevailing to the south of Krakow were villages with long strips of agricultural land, where the most remote parts were usually left fallow for more than a year.

On the Proszowice Plateau, quite a lot of wheat is sown as well as a large amount of rye and—at least from the end of the eighteenth century—barley. Interestingly, according to the excise tax register of 1658–59, local peasants mostly imported a mixture of rye and wheat known as sążyca. Krakow’s great demand for grain affected not only the vegetation and land use of this fertile region but also land relief. Based on loess, the soils of the Proszowice Plateau were made susceptible to heavy erosion by prolonged intensive cultivation and other uses (roads). Due to the relatively sparse forest cover, the exposed surface layer is susceptible to the action both of rainfall and of drought (through wind erosion). But when traditional cereal crops predominated, the process was slower than it is today, when other plants (maize, beetroots) are grown on these lands.33 So far, we have discussed one side of the coin—the countryside as provider to the city of the materials it needed to function. However, the flip side should be mentioned—agriculture gained valuable fertilizer from the export of diverse waste products from the city. Until the nineteenth century, due to the small extent of cattle breeding, and especially the reduction in the number of head before winter, the countryside suffered a shortage of natural local fertilizer. The transport of material out of the city as part of cleaning operations could fill these gaps. We have information about this from Sidzina near Krakow, to which a local peasant transported fertilizer from Krakow for seven days in the winter of 1773.34

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THE CARTING of the city’s mud and human excrement (“night soil”) to the countryside as a fertilizer was common practice in England, the Netherlands, and around Paris as well as in China and Japan. A similar role was played by other municipal waste such as animal remains and ash.

Although cereals played the main role in the locals’ food supply, vegetables and fruit were also important, especially for Krakow as compared with other Polish cities. Historians agree that Krakow’s immediate rural surroundings and the entire agglomeration constituted the horticultural base from which commonly eaten vegetables were transported, such as cabbage, peas, carrots, parsley, onions, and turnips. This applies in particular to villages such as Łobzów, Czarna Wieś, and Nowa Wieś, where we have certified the definite prevalence of gardens, but probably also to villages located somewhat farther afield.35 The excise register from 1658–59 provides a few details on this matter. For example, we know that cabbage was imported from Zielonki and Łobzów in one direction, and from Barycz and Opatkowice in the other, and turnips from Bronowice, though it is not specified which of the two villages of this name—Bronowice Wielkie (Greater Bronowice) or Bronowice Małe (Lesser Bronowice) is being referred to. It seems that the region supplying Krakow with vegetables may have extended quite far north, since the OjcÓw royal estate recorded significant income from the sale of garden vegetables in 1789.36 According to data from around 1880, Krakow was a major consumer of fresh fruit and, to a lesser extent, dried fruit. The average per capita consumption of fresh fruit was then 36.9 kg per year, and of dried fruit, 4.3 kg. By way of comparison: consumption in Lviv in 1840 was 17.2 kg and 1.7 kg, respectively, and Vienna’s average for both types of fruit together totaled only 12.8 kg in 1860. Only in Hungarian cities were fruits consumed in quantities comparable to those consumed in Krakow (33 kg of fresh fruit per year).37

THE EXPANSION OF NUT CULTIVATION in Orawa is visible in the palynological data. Thanks to research on fossilized plant pollen preserved in peats, we know that in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Orawa, walnut farming spread significantly. Meanwhile, in Lesser Poland (data for the area around Jasło), the cultivation of nuts was contracting at that time.38

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

The main area supplying fresh and dried fruit was Pogórze Wielickie. The area specialized in fruit farming beginning in the sixteenth century at the latest; prunes were transported from there along the Dunajec and on to Warsaw, Toruń, and Gdańsk. Sizable overland deliveries of this commodity to Krakow (merchant transports only) were recorded in the early seventeenth century from Myślenice and Dobczyce. The record year of 1606, with the dispatch of fifty-six three- or four-horse wagons, carrying at least 56 metric tons of dried fruit.39 In the mid-seventeenth century, plums, pears, and apples were regularly delivered to the Krakow agglomeration mainly from an area of villages around ten to twenty kilometers south, across the Vistula (see map 4.1). The share of settlements to the east and west of Krakow in supplying the city with fruit was distinctly lower.40 The oldest Galician land cadastre (i.e., the Josephine cadastre) confirms the fruit-farming specialization of a wide belt of countryside between Skawina and Wieliczka. Although published aggregated data only show the land-use category as being gardens, the documentation for individual villages in this area assures us that the vast majority of these were fruit orchards.41 Thus, gardens representing more than 2 percent of agricultural land indicates that a higher than average area was occupied by fruit trees. In the villages that were most active in supplying fruit in the mid-seventeenth century, this share in the 1780s is clearly greater, including 4.4 percent in Mogilany, 3.8 percent in Ochmanów, 2.8 percent in Bodzanów, and 2.6 percent in Soboniowice. The cutting off of Krakow from its fruit basket between 1809 and 1846 did not interrupt the trade in this commodity. In the years 1836–38, an annual average of 107,770 kg of fresh fruit was imported from Galicia to the Free City of Krakow, and 113,995 kg of dried fruit, which in the latter case could have met the entire demand of the city at the time. We know that trade continued if only because, according to a report from 1834, the state of fruit growing in the Free City of Krakow was described as poor, with the exception of the communities of Mogiła and Zwierzyniec.42 It was not until the latter nineteenth century that this area became a fruit basket: in about 1870, some 152 fruit trees and 169 rootstocks per km2 were added (67 and 117, respectively, in powiats [districts] south of Krakow).43 Walnuts were also brought to Krakow from the foothills, and large quantities were even brought from Orawa (today's Slovakia). Krakow’s customs registers from the 1650s list villages such as Chlebnice, Walaska Dubowa, Malatiná, and, above all, the town of Trstená.44 Grasslands (i.e., meadows and pastures) had an important role for in providing energy for people and livestock. In general, before the nineteenth

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century, when intensive land development began, the Polish landscape was much richer in meadows. However, they were usually too boggy, yielding hay of little value. Before the spread of leguminous plants, hay was the main food for cattle, goats, and sheep, which were the animals needed to feed cities and to supply them with raw materials (skins, wool). Meanwhile, hay was also in great demand in the cities themselves, primarily as horse feed. Various sources indicate that it was transported from areas to the south and west of the agglomeration. In the sixteenth century, the royal court was supplied by the villages of Prokocim, Kurdwanów, Wola (Duchacka), Kobierzyn, and Skotniki. In the customs registers of the 1650s, the villages of Cholerzyn, Morawica, and Śmierdząca (Kryspinów) most often appear among suppliers from the west. From the south, the register records transports from Gaj and Libertów. The excise duty register from 1658 shows that the main area from which hay was brought to Krakow’s Kazimierz included Sidzina, Kobierzyn, and Opatkowice—villages closely neighboring one another. The royal demesne census, however, shows that the village of Płaszów also had extensive meadows. According to the Josephine cadastre, the area dedicated to ​​meadows in these last four villages ranged from 19.5 percent (Kobierzyn) to 28.6 percent (Opatkowice). Orchards, which were numerous to the south of Krakow, were also mown, thus increasing the local hay harvest. The cultivation of meadows to the south of Krakow is mainly explained by the demand for hay for horses, since a significant portion of the greater city’s demand for meat prior to the development of rail transport was met by driving beef cattle from the south of the Ruthenian voivodeship (i.e., from Sanok Land). Nevertheless, smaller peasant transports of livestock (mostly cows, calves, and sheep) defined the range of local meat stocks. It included all villages within a few kilometers of the city, villages along the main cattle routes north of the Vistula, and above all a large area south of the Vistula extending as far as Wieliczka, Siepraw, and Skawina.45 This is confirmed by data from 1658 (see map 4.1) registering the transport of livestock (beef cattle, cows, calves, sheep, pigs) and meat almost exclusively from areas south of the Krakow agglomeration. The right bank of Lesser Poland also provided some of the livestock in the nineteenth century. In 1836–38, on average, over three thousand cows and young livestock, over one thousand calves (younger than one year old), and over two thousand pigs were imported from Galicia to the Free City of Krakow.46

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

THE KRAKOW AGGLOMERATION’S PROVISIONING with meat was mainly handled by local butchers buying cattle from Przemyśl and Sanok Lands. From the Middle Ages to the nineteenth century, the purchased herds were driven from there to Krakow along “beef routes” (including through Jarosław, Rzeszów, Tarnów, Jasło, and Biecz). The transit route to Silesia bypassed Krakow to the south (running through Wieliczka and Skawina). From the east, pigs were also sent to domestic and foreign markets. This method of transport influenced the quality of the meat, which was tough and poorly layered with fat, but considered tasty.

The existence of extensive pastures in some villages to the south of Krakow further indicates the important role of cattle breeding. According to the Josephine cadastre, in Świątniki Górne, pastures exceeded 25 percent of agricultural land, and in neighboring Siepraw they constituted over 19 percent. A high proportion of pastures was also recorded in Płaszów (over 20 percent). The importance of cattle farming decreased in the nineteenth century, as can be assumed from the smaller share of pastures, which in Świątniki and Siepraw totaled only 16.5 percent in the mid-nineteenth century. While discussing the supply of meat, we should also mention the belt of numerous man-made ponds between Oświęcim and Zator that was famous from the end of the Middle Ages for supplying fish to the royal court and the city. There is probably some causal link in the gradual decline in pond fisheries coinciding with the transfer of the royal court to Warsaw in the late sixteenth century and the ensuing demographic crisis of Krakow after the 1650s. In the latter nineteenth century with the development of rail transport, Krakow’s closest agricultural resources lost their key significance. On the eve of World War I, only milk, potatoes, hay, and straw (and probably fruit and vegetables) came from the city’s closest, traditional sources. However, more than three-quarters of the city’s fodder oats were brought in by rail from more remote regions. Krakow was even more dependent on rail for the transport of livestock and meat, which came from eastern Galicia and Bukovina. The region supplying flour, and even bread itself, included not only Galicia but also Bohemia, Moravia, Hungary, and Austrian Silesia.47 Thanks to the development of rail freight, despite the increase in the city’s population in the second half of the nineteenth century, pressure to intensify land management did not

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increase significantly around Krakow. Both to the north of the Vistula (the Krakow powiat) and to the south (the Wieliczka powiat) the structure of agricultural land use was similar—arable land predominated (at about 75 percent of all) with a slight upward trend, while other uses shrank correspondingly.48 The increase in agricultural productivity should be noted: it was higher than elsewhere in western Galicia. For example, in the years 1901–10, the Krakow powiat achieved yields of 11.5 q/ha for wheat, 11 q/ha for rye, and 110.7 q/ha for potatoes, which was about 10 percent higher than in the relatively fertile lowland, Vistula valley part of Galicia.49 Throughout its centuries-long history, Krakow’s relationship with its region has almost diametrically reversed. In the beginning, until the city received its charter under the Magdeburg Law, it was not so much Krakow that affected the region as the opposite—the region’s environmental diversity enabled the successful development of the center. As the city grew in population and became an agglomeration, the situation changed fundamentally. Growing supply needs and low productivity significantly transformed the environment, deforesting the south and driving the development of agricultural resources to the northeast. Interestingly, the classic model of the preindustrial city formulated by Von Thünen does not apply to Krakow. It seems that the zone of the city’s strongest influence is an ellipse extending southwest to northeast, and areas of different functions do not form concentric bands, their locations instead being conditioned by geography. In line with Von Thünen’s concept, it is likely that the immediate surroundings of the former agglomeration (which fall within the administrative borders of modern-day Krakow) developed as a source of horticultural supplies, and possibly poultry. It was different with the zone of intensive agriculture dominated by bread cereals, which stretched several dozen kilometers to the northeast. Nearby areas to the west and south provided essential animal feed (hay). South of the Vistula, a fairly clear belt supplied the city with fresh fruit as well as a supplementary area that supplied meat. Meanwhile, all kinds of wood were imported from a vast area to the west and southwest of the city. According to this scheme, the region to the north that had been overlooked until now, seems to have been a reserve of water energy needed by numerous factories producing for Krakow. It is also inconsistent with Von Thünen’s model that since the Middle Ages a significant part of the supply of meat (and even dairy products) was acquired by the city from very remote areas, thanks to “cattle routes.” Krakow was relatively early in starting down the path toward independence from its immediate surroundings. By the beginning of the nineteenth

A CITY IS NOT AN ISLAND

century, the use of coal had already drastically reduced the need to burn slowly renewable wood. The development of the railway network (a connection to the west in 1847, and to the east after 1856) allowed the city to grow using the agricultural resources of eastern Galicia. This led to the creation of a new balance in Krakow’s relations with the region’s natural environment, until the next breakthrough—the construction of the metal works to the east of the city. But that is a subject for an entirely different story.

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CHAPTER 5 POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

Rafał Szmytka

The Krakow of the Jagiellonian dynasty was a flourishing city dominated by a royal castle that King Sigismund I and his son turned into a jewel of the Polish Renaissance. This period in the history of art is associated with clean shapes, clear, flawless form, and a return to the ancient ideals of the human body and order. The same is also true of early modern Krakow, with its architectural and artistic masterpieces. At the head of the long list of such works should be Wawel Castle and the Cloth Halls (Sukiennice), which were rebuilt at that time. Until the end of the sixteenth century, the status of the capital and the seat of the royal court ensured development within the walls of the fortified settlement of Krakow from its charter onward, and beyond the walls in numerous outlying settlements, two of which—Kazimierz and Kleparz—had municipal rights. Its location at the intersection of important trade routes made it a vibrant city, and one of the most densely populated centers in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, second only to Gdańsk. Although the oldest census entry is from 1791, it can be estimated from highway tax and head tax records that in the mid-sixteenth century 18,700 people were living in Krakow alone (discounting neighboring Kleparz and Kazimierz). In 1642, the number could have been no more than 19,750 inhabitants. The Swedish Deluge was a turning point in the city’s early modern history. This invasion and 108

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

the plague of 1651 that immediately preceded it halved the population, which in 1699 stood at 10,270 people.1 At the peak of its growth at the turn of the seventeenth century, a total of about 7,000 people probably lived in the other two cities, and the agglomeration may have had a combined population of about 30,000.2 The tax registers drawn up by the occupying Swedish authorities allow the mid-seventeenth-century density of construction to be determined. In 1656 a total of 664 properties were within the city walls, including private tenements and wooden houses, public buildings, churches, and convents.3 The greatest building density was in the area encompassing Szewska, Żydowska, and Szczepańska Streets. Not far behind were the neighborhoods lying encompassing Sławkowska, Świętego Jana, Floriańska, Szpitalna, and Świętego Krzyża Streets, along Ulica Grodzka, and around and to the south of the Main Market Square. From the Middle Ages to early modern times, Ulica Szewska was a particularly densely built-up street due to the proximity of the tanneries on the Rudawa River just beyond the city walls. Some 160 wooden houses and 30 tenement houses are estimated to have stood in Kleparz at the time, and about 430 buildings in Kazimierz. The remaining outlying settlements were built up to varying degrees, and the number of buildings standing on them did not exceed 400.4 Combining these data with the area enclosed by the medieval walls of Krakow, which together with Okół and Wawel amounted to 0.89 km², we discover a densely populated area with a few open squares (the Main Market Square and the Small Market Square were then built up with butchery and other stalls) abustle with the noise, diverse smells, garbage, and dirt inextricably associated with settlement, manufacturing, and trade. Krakow, just as any other city, experienced the problem of these pollutants affecting quality of life and the surrounding environment. However, the city is a unique example in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth: its population density and geographical conditions in combination with difficulties in developing the city’s economy “naturally” prevented Krakow from growing further. It was only the nineteenth century that brought change, with the creation of a centralized sewerage system that improved hygiene.

Waste and Soil Layers of Krakow’s Dump The interior of St. Adalbert’s Church on Krakow’s Main Square is accessible through a baroque portal, but just a few steps along the wall of the building are stairs leading down to a second, older Romanesque entrance. This often-rebuilt church bears witness to the city’s thousand-year history, in revealing the fundamental problem faced by people living between present-day Kleparz and

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Kazimierz—waste and its buildup into ground layers. This “pit” at the level of the Romanesque portal into Krakow’s oldest church is surrounded by layers of waste, debris, and sand two meters deep. Archaeological research within ​​the medieval city on the occasion of the 700th anniversary the city’s charter in 1957 and the 750th anniversary in 2007 focused mainly on examining the Main Market Square. The research revealed that the level of streets and squares was far lower centuries ago than it is in today’s Planty parks and that the surface we set foot on today often covers layers up to four or even five meters deep.5 Even the first analyses of excavated material provided much information on the conditions in which Krakow’s inhabitants lived in the Middle Ages and early modern times. Over the centuries, human activity has produced strata consisting mainly of garbage and debris: broken clay pots, construction ceramics, animal bones, charcoal and ash, pieces of decayed wood, damaged stone and metal objects, and various plant detritus.6 Every now and then they were covered with a layer of light-colored, probably riverine sand, debris, small stones or gravel whose function was not only to level the square but also to freshen up its appearance and to cover over the unpleasant odors of decomposing organic waste. As a result, embankments of up to several meters in height were created.7 Geochemical studies of material from the archaeological excavations showed that the part of the ​​ Main Market Square around Ulica Świętego Jana and the Cloth Halls cross has high levels of lead and copper, which flowed with rainwater and sewage in gutters to lower-lying parts of the city. The presence of heavy metals in this region can primarily be associated with the operation of the Great Weigh House, and the processing and trading of lead, which centered precisely on the Main Market Square.8 Heavy metals spread not only through the sewerage system but also on the footwear of people traveling on communication routes, such as streets, squares, and alleyways between buildings. The process of lead and copper accumulation in the debris that built up on the market square was also amplified by walls of structures built on and underneath the Main Market Square. They formed a protective barrier against pollutants penetrating into the ground. In addition, frequent construction work and deliberate leveling and paving of the Main Market Square often involved the use and redepositing of contaminated material from the accumulated debris.9 Higher copper and lead concentrations were also seen along the course of the former city moat, and were associated with polluted water being discharged through gates in the walls around the city: on Ulica Reformacka, All Saints Square, in places where local water-filled ditches had

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Table 5.1. Average heavy metal pollution levels in Krakow’s historical layers and nonurban soils in Krakow’s surroundings. Maximum allowed contamination values according to the Polish law

Historical layers of Krakow (mg/kg)

Natural soils in the Krakow region (mg/kg)

cadmium

1.7

0.7

4

chromium

12.2

35

12

17

25.6

40

Metal

nickel copper

223.2

15.2

7

lead

3,085.1

19.6

100

zinc

147.2

97.8

300

manganese

441.7

314.5

2000

0.7 (%)

1.30 (%)

1.90 (%)

iron

Source: M. Wardas and J. Such, “Analiza zawartości metali ciężkich w nawarstwieniach historycznych Krakowa i ich rola wskaźnikowa w badaniach archeologicznych,” Geologia 35, no. 1 (2009): 111.

been, such as in the Small Market Square, and suburbs farther afield associated with craftwork, such as Garbary (literally, tanneries) as identified by digs at Nos. 7 and 9 Ulica Krupnicza.10 The scale of land contamination in medieval and early modern Krakow is best seen in a comparison with the surroundings of Krakow where soils did not have any contact with human productive activity (see table 5.1). The unpleasant odor of decomposing plant and animal detritus and heavy-metal contamination (which was also found in drinking water from wells and the waterworks built along the streets) were not the only threats confronting Krakow residents as revealed in the ground-layer studies. The organic matter accumulated in the soil revealed well-preserved mushrooms, including a specimen of oak mazegill, Daedalea quercina, which causes undesirable brown rot in wood, but on the other hand, when burned it produces smoke that may have been used as a a mosquito repellent.11 Meanwhile, exposure to respiratory diseases is confirmed by the discovery of various species of mold and poisonous spores of Stachybotrys atra, which produce trichothecenes that can cause allergies and even death.12

Hydrographic Conditions, Waterworks, and the Sewage Network The Vistula’s proximity to medieval and early modern Krakow was an illusion. Although Wawel hill rose directly over its banks, the main city was separated from the river by the settlement of Stradom to the south, and by wetlands

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Illustration 5.1. An early modern view of Krakow from the northwest, based on the image in Georg Braun’s Civitates orbis terrarum. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

called Żabikruk and ponds to the southwest. The construction of a weir by St. Stanislaus’s Church in Skałka and the creation of an auxiliary channel of the Vistula flowing around Kazimierz to the west and south (called Nieciecza or Zakazimierka) protected the city against flooding and allowed goods to be floated down the Vistula.13 On the river itself was a timber port, which was depicted by Frans Hogenberg in the view of the city shown in Georg Braun’s Civitates orbis terrarum.14 The city being thus situated afforded it security during high waters on the Vistula, but it also hindered access to the water. This claim may seem erroneous because to the north in the direction of Piasek and Garbary, and then around the city walls and feeding the moat, ran the Rudawa River. Its water was used to drive royal and private mills scattered along its numerous branches.15 By the Szewska Gate (Cobbler’s Gate), the municipal smelter and four

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

malt houses (including one at Tasemberg, a trading square located at the site of modern-day Ulica Garbarska) drew their water from the Rudawa.16 At Kawiory, groat makers had workshops that used the Rudawa River to drive pestles to hull grains. Potters also used the river.17 Where the stream veered off southwestward toward Wawel and the Vistula, the craftworking settlement of Garbary rose up. Its inhabitants specialized in processing leather and supplied the shoemakers’ guild, which was already operating within the city walls. Tanners used a lot of water: it was needed for washing remnants of other tissues from animal skins, and for rinsing during the process of liming to remove hair, as well as for graining in the production of suede. The resulting waste poured directly into the nearby flowing river.18 Although in the Middle Ages it had been noticed that dirty water could cause illnesses (which is why a separate well was erected for lepers in Krakow),19 and Jews had been accused of poisoning wells to cause outbreaks of the plague, still only occasional attention was paid to how contaminants were connected to drinking water and human health.20 The “purifying” power of flowing waters was believed in,

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Illustration 5.2. Tanners—the main polluters of the Rudawa and principal producers of unpleasant odors. Illustration from the Balthasar Behem Codex. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

regardless of what their currents bore.21 The activities of Krakow’s tanners and the pouring of sewage into the Rudawa just past the Vistulan Gate was the subject of a controversy and caused King Sigismund Augustus to react. In a letter of June 12, 1569, he called on the city council to stop pouring “sordes et spurcicies” (filth and dirt) into the Rudawa by the Vistulan Gate and to build an underground channel to carry sewage beyond the city and Wawel, because the inhabitants were suffering greatly from the smells.22 Due to the considerable distance of the city from the fast-flowing Vistula,

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

water from the Rudawa was decidedly important for Krakow, because it supplied the municipal waterworks, whose beginnings date back to the end of the fourteenth century. A key feature of this system that developed throughout the fifteenth century was the waterworks inlet by the Sławkowska Gate, from which water was distributed along wooden pipes usually made of hollowed-out oak logs to outlets know as rząpia (sumps). These were either terminal or through-flow features and they made it possible to supply water directly to private premises.23 These were not rarities: many houses had reservoirs in their yards, and traces of washrooms with running water supplied by metal pipes inside living quarters have been preserved. This system allowed components to be maintained and parts to be replaced, but over time the increase in population made it ineffective. Therefore, in the early sixteenth century, the city council tried to reduce water consumption. This was met with opposition from poorer townsfolk. The king entered the dispute, and in 1521 ordered the construction of a second waterworks. Work was initially begun on the Vistula, but due to technical problems caused by the strong current and the difference in levels, the works were moved to a branch of the Rudawa—the Nieciecza. The new waterworks went into operation in the 1540s, and the expanded water supply network encompassed almost the entire city. It is doubtful, however, that it was still in operation in the seventeenth century, as there is no mention of it in the municipal account books. Therefore, by the late sixteenth century, the population of Krakow was most probably again consigned to a single inlet at the Sławkowska Gate. At that time, various mechanical filtration and water purification devices were set up, described as “brooms and combs for filth.”24 Kazimierz also had its own water supply system that provided water to individual houses. Tannery waste must also have reached the waterworks and its waterwheels, since the pollution of the Rudawa was the subject of repeated investigations by the city council in July 1604: Acting on your [the city councilors’] orders, we have inspected the houses at the Rudawa behind St. Peter’s. There, we saw an open sewer coming out of the Schillings’s garden. We saw a pigsty, with eight hogs inside, at [the estate of] the merchant Jan Boski, and a privy in the corner by the Rudawa. At Matys the Bricklayer’s, a privy is dug in the ground close to the Rudawa, but the feces go into the Rudawa from below. At Abel’s, there is a privy on the bank. At Karkoszka’s, another privy by the Rudawa. At Lenchart the Merchant’s, a privy on the bank and a pigsty, but empty. There, closer to Pragier’s, at the Bednarz house, there is both a privy and a pigsty with swine by the Rudawa. We went further, to the House of Matys

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the Surveyor, but we did not see there so much filth from the Rudawa side. And all this foul matter falls into the Rudawa, which is then carried by the troughs to the waterworks.25

A similar case arose in September 1620: Let it be known to all whom it may concern, that His Honour [wielki rządca krakowski] and His Honor the Mayor of Krakow and the city council order and admonish that no person should have the audacity to, in the Rudawa, rinse pigs and hogs being kept by innkeepers and distillers, under penalty of ten mulcts payable to His Honor the Mayor and the city council. [Furthermore,] by order of His Honor [administrator of royal grounds], such pigs and hogs shall be shot dead, since such rinsing greatly pollutes the Rudawa. Also, it is prohibited under severe penalties to tip privy sewage into it [the Rudawa], either by day or at night, or to wash one’s linen, for such things should only be done in places prepared for [rinsing] horses, as such washing causes them to damage piers along the river bank.26

Krakow was undoubtedly an important manufacturing center and water was indispensable to almost all fields of production. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, thirty-six guilds in the town had privileges listed in the Balthasar Behem Codex, which is illustrated with color miniatures. In the middle of this century, the number of guilds rose to thirty-nine, and by century’s end had reached almost fifty. The aforementioned tanners used the Rudawa. River water was also indispensable to the municipal bell foundry at the Sławkowska Gate, to paper mills beyond the city walls, and to print houses inside the city walls.27 However, the city’s main users of water, other than private individuals, were the numerous breweries, malt houses, and later, also distilleries. The processes of malt and beer production consumed huge quantities of water. A medium-sized brewery could consume an average of 3,000–5,000 liters of water per week.28 It was required in the malting process (i.e., the germination of previously steeped grain), which resulted in the formation of the enzymes needed to loosen the endosperm. The process lasted about seven to ten days and required the correct temperature and moisture level.29 Without water, it would not have been possible to brew a wort, and the beer would have quickly spoiled if essential apparatus and utensils had remained dirty. As one can see, the brewing water was only a small portion of the total water consumed, which was ten times the volume of beer produced. Krakow’s brewers used river water from the waterworks because it was considered to taste better.30 Estimating the annual consumption might be a painstaking task, but

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

Illustration 5.3. The medieval and early modern city never slept. Krakow’s bakers worked mostly at night. Illustration from the Balthasar Behem Codex. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

it is not impossible. First, the number of breweries and malt houses operating within the city walls must be determined. In 1564, 110 brewers functioned within the city walls.31 Twenty-five years later the city had 117 brewers, after which the number dropped, and in the seventeenth century there were fewer than 100.32 Using malt ground by the Kutlowski mill by St. Nicholas Gate (Brama

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Illustration 5.4. The coopers’ (bednarzy) guild’s bastion. An arch is shown through which gutter water flowed into the town moat. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

Mikołajska) and the stone mill by the Cobbler’s Gate, this number of factories had an annual production capacity of 275,000–420,000 hectoliters of beer, which placed Krakow among the very top European cities, behind Haarlem, Antwerp, and London.33 This production level was maintained in the latter sixteenth century, amounting to 4,000 to 5,000 brew kettles per year—one kettle could provide 3,725–7,489 liters of beer (an average of approximately 5,500 liters).

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Table 5.2. Quantity of water used in malting. Amount of malt (l) per single wort

Amount of water used (m3) 1 steeping

2 steepings

1360

17

27.2

3 steepings 4 steepings 37.4

47.6

5 steepings 57.8

1385

17.3

27.7

38.1

48.5

58.9

Source: S. Dryja and S. Sławiński, Krakowskie słodownie przełomu wieku XVI i XVII (Krakow, 2010), 16.

To prepare one kettle, a cycle of three to four steepings was used in the early modern period, pouring 1.8–2.0 m³ of water over every 100 kg (about 160 liters) of barley in the first steeping and 1.2 m³ for each subsequent change of water.34 The water used in the malting process (see table 5.2) had to be removed from the brewery: it was poured into the gutters in the streets. The sewage system could not cope with such large amounts, because domestic sewage and rainwater also had to be accommodated. The stratifications described earlier formed a waterproof barrier preventing the absorption of excess water from streets and squares, and the defensive walls surrounding the city must have acted as a seal, retaining damp and water. Of course, there were gates designated in the ramparts, to which the gutters that collected sewage and waste from homes and streets led. They often created a network serving several properties that, nonetheless, did not always work: “Matys Wilk suffers much when he sits in front of his hallway door, where his meal table stands, and [his neighbor] pours out kitchen waste through a gutter pipe that ends at Matys Wilk’s hallway door. Sometimes, he said, this pig swill would splash into his hallway. And all this happened because Janusz Kalay didn’t end his gutter pipe with a gargoyle at the wall as is customary in this city.”35 The sewage ran down the streets toward the city walls, where, through a “collector” such as at the Podelwie tenement house (32 Ulica Grodzka), or a street gutter along which water runs straight from the city to the entrance to St. Nicholas Gate, where it wound up in the moat.36 When faced with excess filth, these systems could not properly fulfill their function, which led to burdensome and hazardous consequences. Those that might appear threatening to life and health included the flooding of cellars.37 The destruction of brewery and malt house equipment and apparatus also damaged the quality of the alcoholic beverages produced: “The gutter beneath the [brew] kettles is decayed

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Illustration 5.5. The New Gate complex. The walls erected in the Middle Ages completely circled the city of the time. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

[i.e., damp] and rotten, also two big kettles, one for mashbill and the other for wort, old and decayed, causing no small damage. . . . We have also seen in the cellar that water springs from the ground, and that water is there all the time, which causes harm to the brew and the beer goes bad, which in turn is harmful to the soil.”38 The state of the gutters also left much to be desired—neglected, they caused properties to flood.39 They also led to neighborly conflicts “and they showed us the cobbled [road] and the gutter on platea legatorum [modern-day Ulica Poselska] that had been dammed with cobbles by Mr. Cezar to the detriment of the aforementioned Mr. Bieniasz. For we saw there a gutter running from Mr. Cezar’s kitchen behind the tenement house, whence mud and filth go through the tenement of Mr. Bieniasz, which is occasioned by that cobble dam built across the gutter by Mr. Cezar, a citizen of Krakow.”40 Residents had a decisive impact on the city’s deteriorating hygiene, caring only—as they did—about their own interests:

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

There, [Anna Zajączkowska, a citizen of Krakow] showed us the newly laid cobbling in front of the house of Szymon Sadek, which is incommensurably elevated with regard to all others; this is contrary to the long-established custom observed in this city of proper neighborly conduct, meaning that no one should do anything, in building and cobbling alike, that might cause harm to his neighbor. Mr. Szymon Sadek, as we have seen, caused harm to more than one neighbor by those cobblestones of his; in effect, the gutter was elevated higher up than stipulated by the old custom and there is stagnant water at the edge of the cobbled surface, running from that street and from those of Ulica Świętego Mikołaja and Ulica Scrofarum [“swine street,” modern-day Ulica Świętego Krzyża], so that because of that dammed gutter Mrs. Anna is suffering great trouble. There, she also showed us that Mr. Sebastian Nożka intends to do the same according to that custom and elevate [the cobblework?], so that her house might be cut off as a result, together with the brewery and malt house. There too, other neighbors, living as they do farther below toward the court of His Honor priest-abbot of Mogiła [Cistercian Abbey], showed us that in that gutter, reeking water is stagnant because of that dam and cannot flow farther as it used to. There they showed us the cobblework in front of the malt house of His Honor priest-abbot of Mogiła in the very corner of the city walls; that said cobblework is so much elevated above those of the city and neighbors that whenever water runs down that gutter, it has difficulty reaching the entrance to the city gate.41

The accumulation of excess water and failure to adapt to the continually revised building regulations led to the contents of cesspits, known as prywety (privies) or kloaki (drains,” but usually in fact just holes), overflowing. According to modern calculations, a family of five fills 1 m³ of cesspit in about seven years.42 Usually, they were built at the back of a property at a distance from boundary walls that was set by the city council. Records in the registers compiled during inspections by city quarters’ official building inspectors say, however, that this was rarely observed, so the contents of unemptied and overfilled privies leaked into neighbors’ cellars, causing losses in malt production, poisoning beer, and destroying stores of expensive wine: “Mr. Szymon dug so deep a hole . . . in the ground of his cellar, which the building inspectors have seen with their own eyes, and into it, having pierced the [cellar’s] wall, he let the filthy matter; as a result of that hole, the ground below has imbibed so much dampness and filth, that they percolate through the entire wall from the bottom outlet of the privy right down to the curb of the street. For my cellar is several cubits lower than his.”43

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Problems of damp and excess water were not the exclusive concern of poorer townsmen, as they also happened in residences directly adjacent to the market square.44 An image of the city lying in sodden ground is included in an entry in the road survey of the Krakow voivodeship from 1570: “As we came to Ulica Garncarska [today Krupnicza], which runs to the Cobbler’s Gate, the road was so bad that it could hardly be worse, as we have ourselves testified to the councilor, a[nother] councilor, who was riding before us, barely escaped drowning when his horse fell with him into the mud.”45 It was in a less-than-flattering tone that the German humanist Jan Hadelius, who attempted to become a professor at the University of Krakow, wrote: In old walls raised somewhere at the end of the world By a Roman hand—today a sluggish Sarmata sits. The Quirites were to come here, celebrated, To conquer wild peoples, as the ancients say. They quickly erected a great city in muddy lands, Encircled by clear Vistulan waves.46

Tilting at Windmills, or the Struggle with Garbage Krakow’s 20,000 townsfolk of the fifteenth century produced 110,000 m3 waste per year, of which 13,000 m³ was “dry mass” (dehydrated sludge and garbage).47 Similar values ​​can be assumed for late medieval and early modern Krakow. The quantity of waste must have caused the city to sink in mud and the smell of decay to fill the streets. At the same time, it explains why the layers are so thick. The city authorities were faced with a challenge—what should be done with these quantities of garbage and waste that were beginning to spill out onto the streets and into townsfolk’s homes?48 Time and again, the city’s books contained regulations calling for cleanups and for waste to be taken out beyond the city’s walls: “By that day all shall clean up the mud and manure and have it removed, lest they be found guilty and punished in the town hall.”49 These general appeals seem not to have come to much, because in a document of March 11, 1592, we read about the appointment and payment by the city council and each townsperson—homeowners and debt collectors alike—of a “king,”50 who at that time was Stanisław Węgrzynek. He was tasked with roaming the streets and squares with a horse-drawn cart that he loaded up with waste, which he then took out of the city, through the Vistulan Gate. ◀ Map 5.1. Pollution in Krakow from the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries. Map by Rafał Szmytka and Anna Pietrzyk.

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Residents were required to give him right of way and full access to accumulated waste. For this service, the owners of smaller properties had to pay one grosz a week, and the owners of large corner tenements and “houses in which guests stay,” two groszes. In addition, in their contract with Stanisław Węgrzynek, the town council pledged to reward him for “transporting mud, dung, vermin from the market, streets, harrows, and other common squares” in the sum of 80 Polish zlotys a year. However, the services provided by Węgrzynek did not include the removal of waste from private property or dirt from construction works that fouled public spaces. In such cases, the person creating the mess was responsible for cleaning up displaced soil or debris.51 In the final decade of the sixteenth century, however, little changed, because the regulations appealing to residents to maintain order were renewed, and at the end of August 1599 the matter of providing the “king” passage arose once more, indicating that the townspeople were not only not lovers of cleanliness: they didn’t even want to waste money on it.52 The city council’s struggle with Cracovians’ bad habits of the time can only be compared to tilting at windmills, as similar resolutions would appear throughout the seventeenth century: “By order of His Honor the Mayor and His Honors incumbent city Councilors . . . I have ordained that each homeowner should clean up the mud in front of his tenement or house and in the street itself for the coming feast and that none should dare, either himself or his servants, throw filth out in front of his tenement or house or the street itself on penalty of fourteen mulcts.”53 The deteriorating sanitary state of public spaces and private premises is attested by the city council’s desperate appeals for tidiness on holidays, such as the resolution of 1727, stating that before the procession of Corpus Christi everybody was “commanded to clean up the filth and mess” from in front of their tenement house, or another from 1733 on the occasion of an upcoming coronation. However, it was only at the end of the century, in 1779, that it was forbidden to pour dirty water out of windows straight onto the street.54

Animals in the City It was popular among Cracovians to keep domestic animals, which was of course nothing out of the ordinary in premodern cities. On their premises they kept chickens, geese, ducks, dogs, and cats, and also larger species, such as pigs, horses, and cows. They thus maintained a varied diet of meat and eggs, and profit could be made from selling animal manure (only of bovine origin) to the gardens surrounding the city.55 The large number of farm animals within the city walls translated into a

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

lot of excrement. Due to the still developing sewage and treatment system, this waste affected the general quality of life of Krakow’s residents. We illustrate the scale of the problem with an analogy. The modern beef cow excretes about 27 kg of manure per day, and a dairy cow as much as 35 kg, while a horse leaves about 22–40 kg of feces. Five hundred years ago, these animals weighed about 20 percent less, and so consumed less feed. Taking this into account, it can be estimated that a cow then excreted about 24–28 kg of manure per day, and a horse about 18–32 kg.56 Unfortunately, there is no way to know exactly how many such animals were kept within the city walls. Cows and horses were certainly a common sight in the city landscape. Counting only the tenements around the market square, the 1632 register of Krakow inns recorded six stables for at least 24 horses. At the same time, the inns and taverns of Kleparz could accommodate as many as 1,500!57 The city inspectors also mentioned that cows and horses were kept in tenements’ backyards. Despite the lack of precise data, based on this information it is possible to imagine the quantities of organic contaminants were produced by the largest animals alone. Cracovians were also keen on raising pigs. Because pigs do not have many food requirements and are quite quick to fatten, they were the perfect animals to rear in the city. Unfortunately, let loose on the streets, they rooted through rubbish in search of food and fouled the area with their excrement. In the sixteenth century, the city council tolerated the presence of livestock within the city walls, as revealed in numerous records of surveyors’ registers, such as those for Ulica Szewska, where “in the rear yard [of one of the tenements there was] a sty for rearing pigs.”58 Toward the end of the century, both royal and city-council regulations began to appear, ordering the removal of animal waste from the city and prohibiting the release of pigs onto the streets on pain of a fine. On January 26, 1574, the city council reminded residents of the need to remove dung from the city, and that “none dare let . . . a pig to the market square and streets, on pain of loss of property.”59 Twenty years later, his royal majesty became involved in this matter. Thus, on July 5, 1597, an edict on public safety was issued a second time that raised the issue of animal husbandry by Krakow’s cityfolk: “Item [meaning, likewise it is ordained] that everyone should tidy up in front of their house and have the mud, rubbish, manure, and other filth from the house, specifically from swine, carried or driven out of the city instead of dumping it on the market square or behind the house, nor should he let it out into the gutters, under penalty. Cattle and swine, which do not leave cemeteries and cobbled streets unmolested, should all be kept locked and hidden within the house and must not be let out into the street, under penalty.”60

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The situation began to worsen in the seventeenth century. Then, the city council’s regulations became far more drastic in nature. Not only was the keeping of swine and cattle banned within the city walls, it was also threatened that a crew of infantry from the royal castle would kill any hidden animals. In the municipal council regulation of June 17, 1639, was the following record: “Item, that none shall keep swine or cattle in the city, including within the walls, for if this cattle is not cleaned up by Tuesday, then the castle’s infantry will be requisitioning those animals and have them slaughtered; moreover, whoever is found keeping such cattle shall be liable to pay a penalty of ten mulcts.”61 The presence of animals in the city was primarily associated with “bad air” that might cause an outbreak of plague. Especially at the time of the Swedish Deluge, the sanitary conditions in Krakow must have been disastrous. The water and sewage systems were destroyed, many buildings fell to ruin, and the city itself became heavily depopulated. Just over half a year after the city was handed back by the Swedes, on May 27, 1658, the city council issued a decree eloquently presenting the following situation: “You must . . . know that there are people . . . who keep cows, swine, and other livestock in Krakow, whence a revolting smell emanates, from which one may expect (God forbid) that an epidemic would break out. The office urges therefore that henceforth . . . none shall dare keep cattle in Krakow.”62 Such regulations must have had little driving force and were not sufficiently imposed, since on October 3, 1662, the ban was renewed.63 Another problem was caused by stray dogs roaming the city. Their numbers were kept down by the municipal dogcatcher. He carried out executions at night once a week behind the New Gate, and later by the Rudawa in the neighborhood of Kawiory.64 Krakow lay on an important cattle-driving route from Russia through Silesia to German lands. That is why on the so-called embankment on the eastern side of the city there was a cattle market, and near it, “on Kotłow,” opposite Gródek, was a municipal slaughterhouse. Meat was traded on the Small Market Square, which did not stop the butchers living on Ulica Świętego Marka or Ulica Szpitalna from illegally breeding and slaughtering animals within the city walls. Such behavior was reprehensible, because perishable meat and the accumulation of fecal matter could spark an epidemic. The stench was also hard on neighbors. However, the butchers ignored inspections by municipal officials and repeated calls to transfer their activities beyond the walls, in loco privilegio.65 The city council even set up a special commission in 1630 tasked with controlling the illicit slaughterhouses from which animal waste streamed straight into the streets:

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

We have inspected the abattoirs and other places where butchers slaughter animals; these are set up at the rear of their houses or elsewhere in some remote nooks, so that the stench of rotting meat might cause no harm. Moreover, in those abattoirs there are smoke vents through which the odors and stench of rotting meat go out. . . . We have also seen that a gutter goes from the tenement house of Mrs. Jasiowicz, situated there along with the abattoir, right into the street, through which gutter a reeking streak of blood runs into the public road, whence the danger [of disease] lurks not only to passersby or people living in the neighborhood, but almost to the whole of the town.66

Air Pollution and Epidemiological Problems Crafts and manufacturing are inextricably associated with air pollution. However, in the Middle Ages and early modern era the problem was perceived in an entirely different light than today. Bad air was identified with bad smells. The documents cited earlier are liberally scattered with terms roughly equivalent to “filth,” “foul smells,” “stench of rotting flesh,” and “ugliness.” The sources of these smells were diverse: human excrement escaping from leaky and unemptied privies; animal feces filling unkempt cowsheds and sties that owners would not clear of dung; flooded and damp cellars; and illegal slaughterhouses. Because of the lack of awareness of the existence of bacteria and microorganisms, it was believed that it was these alien, distinctive smells that caused those epidemics and infections—that is, “airs” known as miasmas or pestilences. The outbreaks of infectious diseases in Krakow in the Middle Ages and the early modern era in particular were nothing out of the ordinary for Europe or the Kingdom of Poland. The high rates of mortality they inflicted were a result of the bacterial strains’ high resistance, the low level of medical knowledge, and conditions that favored the spread of disease. In describing these epidemics as “airs,” Europe’s inhabitants of the time were not far wrong, since infectious diseases were most often transmitted in droplets, but also in food, through contact with broken skin, and in the secretions of the infected. The carriers of the bacteria were animals and insects, and especially arthropods—bedbugs, lice, and ticks.67 Epidemics were spread by human migrations in early modern Europe, and especially in time of war, when large masses of people were concentrated into a small area. Lack of attention to hygiene, dirt, wounds, various infections, and poor nutrition caused diarrhea, dysentery, typhoid fever, and typhus.68 The best-known examples of epidemics devastating lands and following in the wake of battling armies are associated with the Thirty Years’ War, which devastated

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much of Central Europe, but left Poland almost entirely untouched. However, similar cases are also known to have occurred on Polish soil. In 1580 the army of Stephen Báthory carried typhus from Lesser Poland to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In 1621 the Black Death was spread through the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by soldiers returning from Khotyn,69 and the plague raged in the years 1623–25. The Polish and Swedish armies helped spread a plague in Poland in 1629–30, and something similar happened during the Deluge of 1655–60, when it and typhus accompanied the ravages of Swedish, Muscovite, and Transylvanian troops. The disease was also spread by merchants, such as in 1591, when it was carried from Warsaw to Krakow. Rural exoduses to the cities, and various major meetings and celebrations also played a significant role in the process of spreading disease, as did urban living conditions. The close quarters of cities, the overcrowding of moldy, damp rooms, and poor general and personal hygiene all created favorable conditions for insects that acted as disease vectors. Domestic livestock breeding also had a negative impact on residents’ health; moreover, pigs and dogs could dig up the graves of the dead in cemeteries within the city walls. Meanwhile, rodents—the main carriers of bubonic plague—nested near slaughterhouses, in tanneries, in breweries and malt houses, and in barns and stables. Illness could also be caused by poorly stored, damp and moldy food, as well as by consuming drinking water that was contaminated with human and animal waste.70 The list of epidemiological data from 1500–50 (see figure 5.1) for selected major cities of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth ranks Krakow first in number of years in which plague was recorded, at 92 out of 250; Warsaw, 89 years; Poznań, 77 years; and Lviv, 76 years. During these two and a half centuries, up to twelve-year-long endemic infections occurred in Krakow, such as in 1585–97.71 Several measures were aimed at trying to avoid plagues. “Air” mayors were elected and were tasked with preparing the city for the arrival of an epidemic and stopping it by the appropriate management of public services. They usually arose from patrician families and were extraordinarily courageous. These were men of great merit whose names are accorded pride of place in the city’s history: Piotr Wedelicki (1543), Andrzej Fogelweder (1543), Sebastian Zacherla (1652–1654), Jan Gaudenty Zacherla (1661–62, 1677–79), Michał Behm (1708–10) and Szczęsny Kwiatek (1592–93).72 It was their duty to close access to the city and create a sanitary cordon, and to maintain food supplies, which were supervised by “air” stewards. Patients were attended to by special barber surgeons paid from the city coffers, and the dead were buried by gravediggers recruited from among the city’s poor.73

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

Figure 5.1. Epidemics in cities of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, 1501–1750. Source: K. Wnęk, based on A. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem: Epidemie chorób zakaźnych w Rzeczypospolitej w XVI–XVIII wieku i ich następstwa demograficzne, społeczno-ekonomiczne i polityczne (Warsaw, 2000), 312–17.

At the news of an “air” approaching the borders of Lesser Poland, the mayor had the right to impose a quarantine and to close the city gates.74 Once the epidemic reached Krakow, special regulations were issued, including royal ones, ordering that the property of the afflicted be aired or burned: Lest the people, whenever they begin to congregate in infected houses and touch things belonging to those affected [by disease], set off that venom [to spread], we hereby ordain Your Honors to make sure that all

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Table 5.3. Assumed number of victims of epidemics in Krakow in the sixteenth–eighteenth centuries. Years of epidemics

Number of victims

1543

12,000–20,000

1588–1589

5,000–6,300

1591–1592

3,300–3,500

1625

20,000

1651/1652–1653

33,600–37,000

1677–1679

21,600

1707–1710

19,300–20,000

Source: A. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem: Epidemie chorób zakaźnych w Rzeczypospolitej w XVI–XVIII wieku i ich następstwa demograficzne, społeczno-ekonomiczne i polityczne (Warsaw, 2000), 332–34.

objects, clothes, and implements that may have been affected by the air [i.e., disease] are hung [in the open] in frosty or fair weather; . . . things that are vile and of little worth and may have been infected are allowed to be burned. . . . And do make sure that in all infected houses all the other things are properly aired before the people who enter there have the opportunity to touch them.75 .

Particular attention was paid to monitoring the gravediggers, who, when burying bodies, often stripped them of their clothes and sold them, thus contributing to the spread of the epidemic. Where suspicion arose, it was recommended that investigations be conducted and any questionable property be confiscated and incinerated.76 In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the city suffered numerous epidemics, but data on the exact number of deaths should be treated with some caution. The plague that broke out in the Krakow agglomeration in 1543 saw the deaths of at least 12,000 people.77 The toll was somewhat lower in the years 1588–89, at about 6,300 fatalities. A few years later, another epidemic took more than another 3,000 people. However, epidemics in 1625, 1651–52, and 1677 contributed to the decline of Krakow, taking more than 20,000 souls each.78 Importantly, in the second half of the seventeenth century, the replacement of the city’s lost population with new migrants declined. This influx had previously allowed the fairly high population of the Krakow agglomeration of the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth century

POLLUTION IN EARLY MODERN KRAKOW

to be maintained, whereas in the latter half of the seventeentth century, the decreasing importance of Krakow in the political and economic life of the Commonwealth and the country’s general economic collapse led to a lasting decline in the city’s population.

A City of Uncertain Fate Krakow’s geographic location and natural conditions had always been sources of both benefits and problems that the city had to wrestle with in order to grow. The spread of the settlement beyond Wawel and Okół and the granting of the city’s charter were giant steps forward. So too were the establishments of both Kazimierz and Kleparz. However, following the history of the city through the successive decades of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, one has the impression that Krakow was suffocating within its medieval walls and outlying settlements. The slow development of “ecological” responsibility (which at the time was related purely to the safety of the city’s community) and the lack of effective waste management led to the creation of deep layers of garbage and waste within the city walls. These, in turn, caused problems with rainwater discharge—domestic sewage in particular—and the water used by breweries. The waterworks that supplied water to residents and craftsmen was an extraordinary technological achievement, but at the same time it contributed to the continuous inundation of the city and to the overflowing of privies. The Rudawa, from which the water was drawn, allowed mills and grinding mills as well as the many tanners to operate; disregarding the health and quality of life of Krakow’s townsfolk, however, these facilities poured postproduction waste into the river, which then washed into the waterworks. Finally, the city’s famously resourceful residents ignored regulations issued by the city council and the king regarding the maintenance of order, the removal of waste from the city, and above all the ban on animal husbandry. Of course, the city’s development was stopped when the main seat of the royal court was transferred to Warsaw by Sigismund III Vasa, but the two hundred years of the city’s history discussed in this chapter show that, ignoring the forces of nature, Krakow was at best doomed to stagnation, and at worst to the catastrophe that took place in the mid-seventeenth century.

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CHAPTER 6 INDUSTRIALIZATION The Environmental End of Old Krakow?

Ewelina Szpak

The industrial revolution arrived relatively late in Krakow, and somewhat tamely. Industry only began to develop properly at the turn of the twentieth century and initially had only a slight effect on the relationship between Krakow’s residents and their natural environment. This meant that the “green” character of the urban landscape could be preserved and that it protected residents from the problems of industrial pollution (which is not to say that Krakow did not have to contend with pollution from other sources, and, above all, the effects of heating houses with coal). After World War II, this situation completely reversed. Krakow was caught in the jaws of heavy industry, and from then on nothing would be the same. The Stalinist period was a clear turning point, when the forced, ideologically driven industrialization of Krakow changed the material and societal landscape, but also, and more important, it created a range of threats. In this chapter I discuss both the early days of Cracovians’ experience of the environmental effects of industrialization, and the natural, social, and health consequences of the forced industrialization of the communist state referred to as People’s Poland.

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THE SECOND WAVE OF INDUSTRIALIZATION IN KRAKOW. A combination of historical circumstances left Krakow a nonindustrial city with relatively low growth until the end of the nineteenth century. This was also partly the result of the city’s role as a first line of defense against Russia: its physical spread was limited by Austrian fortifications. Although Krakow did not experience more pronounced development until early in the twentieth century, one important event on the road to the city’s industrialization was the promulgation of the Austrian Industrial Act that came into force in 1860 and abolished the medieval prerogative of guilds, which had hampered the growth of modern enterprises. And although this meant that the technical achievements of the industrial revolution that was taking place in the West (including steam engines) began to reach Krakow by the end of the nineteenth century, they spread very slowly. The obstacles to the city’s industrial development included the cheap labor in neighboring countries and the competition’s advantage on sales markets there, the local bourgeoisie’s limited capital, and difficulty of access to raw materials. Industrialization only really took off apace in the first decade of the twentieth century—at that time the greatest numbers of new factories came into being, and those already in existence experienced their greatest prosperity. The transition to a phase of growth into a major city after 1900 coincided with the “Greater Krakow” concept that was being implemented at the time, and resulted in a significant administrative expansion of the city.

A Garden City or a Machine City? In the early decades of the twentieth century both Krakow’s architectural milieu and the city authorities saw the city as hosting a unique collision between the worlds of nature and of culture. This perspective largely determined particular solutions in Krakow’s urban spatial planning. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, the fact that Krakow belonged to the Austrian Partition, and, above all, the city’s strategic location (and its character as a fortress on the border of the Partition) determined the urban shape of the city and limited its spatial development.1 It was only the concept of Great Krakow pushed through by Juliusz Leo, the removal of the fortifications around the city that began in 1907, and the purchase of land

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formerly occupied by fortifications of the Austrian Ministry of War that set in motion the project to expand the urban space. Along with the “opening up” of Krakow to its surrounding areas there was also a time of new planning and new ways of thinking about the landscape and the city’s natural space. It was then that the concept of Krakow as a garden city emerged. Although the concept was not ultimately realized because of the distinctly separate part of the city devoted to industrial activity (on the right bank of the Vistula), it was taken into consideration in urban planning by the city authorities.2 The fact that this conception of Krakow did not fly in the face of the city’s actual natural potential is evidenced by the genuine admiration of Ebenezer Howard, the author of the concept of the garden city, who visited Krakow in 1914.3 However, architects of the time were not convinced of the validity of the garden city idea. They focused their attention on the day-to-day problems of Krakow, for example, faulty sewers and the unregulated Vistula.4 The city had also struggled with the problem of air pollution for years; since the times of the Duchy of Warsaw when bituminous coal had become the main energy source for domestic heating, the city had seen regular appearances of smog, which Krakow’s press wrote about in the decades preceding World War I. At the same time, the futuristic idea of the machine city, fed by the fascination for modernity and noticeable at least in the output of Krakow’s avant-garde, gradually appeared in contemporary cultural texts and shaped a different view of the relationship between city and nature. According to the modernist fashion, a cityscape featuring the silhouette of a factory and its tall, smoking chimney on the horizon was synonymous with growth and progress. However, if the pace at which “industrial space” encroached into ​​Krakow was extremely slow until the mid-twentieth century: smoking factories were located outside the city limits. Until 1914–15, the industrialized part of Krakow was in principle located beyond the city’s administrative borders on the right bank of the Vistula. This location meant that the atmospheric pollution and chemical compounds emitted by the chemicals industry that was slowly growing in Podgórze, Borek, and Ludwinów did not reach the city center. Of course, this does not mean that the air quality in Krakow was impeccable or did not affect residents’ health and quality of life—problems with the sewage network and the air pollution produced by the household heating methods of the time were compounded by a microclimate that was still damp and windless. The problem of industry in Krakow was thus still peripheral, including in a spatial sense. After Poland regained independence, due to the nature of the city’s development and the architectural avant-garde’s still-small influence (the machine city concept),

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Krakow’s industry grew quite slowly and the spatial development plans of the early twentieth century continued to be implemented. At that time, the city was attempting to regulate water management and extended its administrative borders to include Wolski Forest, which had been purchased in 1917 and designated as a public park.

RAIL AND COMMUNICATION IN KRAKOW. The growth of railways in the nineteenth century was usually an accelerant to industrial development. In the case of Krakow and Galicia, this was not so clear-cut. Railway investments in Krakow began relatively early, in 1844, when the Senate of the Free City of Krakow decided to build a line connecting the city with the capitals of Austria and Prussia. Contrary to prior expectations, a rail connection with the countries of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Prussian Silesia did not accelerate economic development, but instead brought a flood of foreign goods, which also slowed the further development of local production. The Krakow rail junction was gradually expanded, and at the beginning of the twentieth century, as the city’s industry became more dynamic, Krakow began to serve as an important international transport hub. The central role was played by the east–west line through the city, connecting Germany and Austria to Russia and Romania. At the same time, the railways favored the development of mass local tourism, gradually changing transportation habits and the ways in which people spent their free time. Another revolution was brought about at the end of the nineteenth century by Krakow’s first trams. In 1882, the first horse-drawn tram line was inaugurated, and in 1901 electric trams appeared. A few years later, the first cars ventured out onto Krakow’s streets.

A Stalinist Blow? The plan for forced industrialization was imposed from above after World War II, when the idea of transforming ​​ not only nature and the environment but also man and society itself took on a powerful ideological dimension. In building a new socialist society, one of the most important roles went to rapid industrialization. The rebuilding of social and urban space was to go handin-hand with the rise of a new socialist mentality. In the latter half of the 1940s, discussions of Krakow’s spatial dimension

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Illustration 6.1. View of Nowa Huta—districts and industrial complexes, 1954. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

were dominated by plans for the construction of an integrated metallurgical plant. By 1946, the Bonarka Inorganic Industrial Plant was opened on the grounds of the former Bernard Liban Portland Cement Factory. At the same time, the Polfa Pharmaceutical Plant also went into operation. The aluminium works in Skawina was added in the early 1950s. These plants of course do not constitute an exhaustive list of industrial enterprises operating at that time, but they were undoubtedly at the forefront of those that would be most detrimental to the lives of Krakow’s population for the coming decades. Both the Bonarka and Polfa plants were born of chemicals enterprises that predated the war. Although in the following years they would pose a particularly severe health threat both to the inhabitants of Krakow’s immediate surroundings and to the fauna and flora of the area, at the time they were established no particularly dramatic protests were recorded. However, objections were raised to the planned construction of the Vladimir Lenin Steelworks in Nowa Huta. As discussions in the press and behind closed doors show, real

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awareness of the environmental dangers posed by the construction of the steelworks was primarily expressed by the scientific community at that time. City residents stated their resistance and disagreement over the construction of the plant more often by arguing that the investment was intended as an act of revenge by the communists for the elections of 1947. In reality, however, the location of the plants was decided not so much by ideological considerations as by the decision of Soviet consultants, who determined the location of the steelworks based on access to a workforce, the transport route linking Silesia with the country’s eastern border, and the water resources of the Vistula.5

Ecological Awareness? Other than climatologists and geologists, scientific and other specialists, who were aware of the negative consequences of building a plant in this particular location so close to the city, strong resistance to the plans to construct the steelworks also came from local peasants, who had been ruthlessly stripped of their land. Forced to sell their ancestral land for a pittance, they protested, not to protect nature or the environment, but primarily to defend their own heritage, tradition, and social status.6 Although the incursion of tractors into their fields and border strips undoubtedly provoked a sense of injustice resulting from the peasants’ identification with the earth, this can hardly be understood as a change in attitude to the natural environment or a burgeoning ecological sensitivity. That came about slowly for the residents in and around Krakow,. As early as the 1950s nearby residents perceived the factories’ increase in production and the authorities’ disregard for minimizing their impact on the surroundings. At that time, they sent letters and complaints to central and local government offices reporting a number of problems resulting from living in the vicinity of the industrial plant. This was true not only of Krakow but also of other cities.7 Desperate because of the harsh postwar living conditions, the letter writers recorded not only the clouds of brown smoke obscuring the sky and the skeletons of trees stripped of their leaves but also hair loss and widespread respiratory diseases around the largest industrial plants. Such letters reached the central authorities from Krakow and Skawina as well as from Łódź and Wrocław, although in many respects the situation in the Krakow region was far worse. In the following decades, the flow of complaints and the severity of the problems they described grew. In the case of Krakow, it was of no small importance that—as noted not only by those born and raised around the main square and the Old Town—the pollution emitted by the Nowa Huta steelworks and other plants was greatly deteriorating the fabric of the city’s heritage.

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Illustration 6.2. The construction of the Nowa Huta steelworks in the 1950s involved villagers in the area where the steelworks operated for subsequent decades being dispossessed of their land and protesting. Photo by Henryk Makarewicz / Imago Mundi Foundation collection.

“Man Is Durable, Monuments Are Not” In 1952 in Krakow, for the first time in history, an office for urban conservation was established. Less than a decade later, a first resolution was issued on the need to renovate the Old Town. The main cause of the worsening damage and erosion was the growing industry in the vicinity. The main problem was the action of harmful industrial particles and gases. As noted in the 1977 book SOS dla Krakowa (SOS for Krakow) by Jan Adamczewski: “Heavy emissions of particles and gases are changing the composition of the air, accelerating the erosion of stone and brick, and causing damage mainly by adding acids and sulfur into the environment on the one hand, and by introducing large quantities of fluorides on the other. Acidic sulfur compounds are causing limestone architectural features to decay.” Mentioning the causes of the excessive concentrations, he emphasized: “There are emitters close by— mostly domestic furnaces burning sulfur-bearing coal—and remote emitters, bringing huge discharges of gas and particles to Krakow.” At the same

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Illustration 6.3. Poster of the Social Committee for the Renovation of Krakow’s Monuments (Społeczny Komitet Ochrony Zabytków Krakowa), titled “Let’s protect global cultural heritage.” The organization was established in 1978. Its aim was to undertake initiatives to restore Krakow’s monuments as the shared property of all Poles. Source: Krzysztof Dydo’s Poster Gallery.

time he added: “We live in a transitional period—these problems must disappear in the future, otherwise this entire restoration will have made no sense. . . . Man is durable, monuments are not!”8 However, representatives of Krakow’s scientific centers believed that human resilience to the chemical compounds accumulating in Krakow’s air, water, and flora was becoming increasingly fragile. Toward the end of the 1960s, the Krakow Branch of the Polish Academy of Sciences established the Department of Fluorine Toxicology, with an interest in the biological effects of the enormous emissions of fluoride compounds from the aluminum works in Skawina. And although alarming results were presented at the 1976 conference of the Polish Academy of Sciences, they were quickly classified. Scientists from the AGH University of Science and Technology who had been conducting independent research on the scale of environmental threats and destruction found their research similarly blocked. As in the case of biologists, attempts to publish research results usually ended in rejection. “Someone who wanted to talk publicly about these things was called an enemy

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of the people without hesitation,” the doctor of engineering Feliks Stalony-Dobrzański recalled in 2011 in the pages of Tygodnik Powszechny.9 In fact, until almost the end of the 1970s, the problem of pollution was one of the more frequent topics to appear in censors’ guidelines, which ordered the elimination of information “about direct threats to human life and health posed by industry or chemicals” and prohibited the publication of information about accidents involving ecological or health risks.10 Reports of pollution in the Baltic, gas emissions, and the irreversible devastation of hundreds of hectares of forests associated with the operation of the Puławy nitrogen plant were all quashed, to mention but a few examples of censorship described by a former employee of the Central Press, Publications and Reports Office, Tomasz Strzyżewski, in his whistle-blowing book of the 1970s.11 In Krakow’s censorship of ecological topics, one interesting example was the excision from R. Jarecki’s 1974 How Much Time We Have Left of part of a report from a scientific conference at the University of Warsaw on the subject of shaping and protecting man’s environment.12 The deleted fragment concerned the Ojców National Park, formally established in 1956, which it claimed was “beyond saving . . . because the location of industry and the technology it uses have had a devastating effect on the vegetation of this special area. And it had seemed that this industry was relatively remote and should not poison the air over the park.”13 In the same material, the publishing ban also applied to information on pollution “exceeding all norms” in the Vistula and Odra, and a description of efforts undertaken by employees of the Jagiellonian University to convene a supreme nationwide body (acting under the aegis of the Presidium of the Government) to discipline all ministries and national offices and to bring the country’s development strategies into line with environmental protection requirements.

The Ambivalence of Local and Central Authorities The question thus arises of when and how local and central authorities became aware of Krakow’s growing environmental problems. It is impossible to say precisely when, but toward the end of the 1940s local decision makers were undoubtedly aware of the risks associated with the location of the Lenin Steelworks. Suggestions to build it closer to Skawina were rejected because of the threat to the city posed by wind directions, which would have carried huge amounts of pollution over the city. However, the same argument was not put forward a few years later when the construction of an aluminum works was planned for the same location.14

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The problems relating to ecology and the pollution of soil, waters, and air were also not unknown to the central authorities. The Warsaw historian Dariusz Jarosz finds that at the beginning of 1949, a meeting of the Health Commission and the Labour and Social Welfare Commission of the Polish parliament discussed the issue of excessive carbon dioxide emissions by silk factories (in particular the South Łódź Silk Industry Plant). During the Stalinist period, discussions of air, water, and soil pollution disappeared almost completely and, as Jarosz claims, “were limited to a restricted group of top party and state authorities.”15 It was not until 1954 that the State Inspectorate for Water Protection was established, and from 1957 the authorities took their first steps toward legal regulations on the protection of air, water, and soils. Despite laws and declarations, the environmental situation in Krakow did not improve at all in the 1960s; quite the opposite—that is when the city began to be described as an ecological disaster zone.16 The worsening state of the Vistula due to industrial activity resulted in the city’s issuing a ban on bathing in the river in 1964.17 In the same year, a government resolution was also adopted to “deglomerate” Krakow’s industry, allowing existing facilities in the city to develop only by modernizing, not through expanding. According to the resolution, expansion, as with the creation of further plants, would be limited to creating subsidiaries in other, remote locations. As Czesław Bywalec showed, the subsidiaries outside Krakow were less ecologically harmful because of their modernity.18 Legal regulations generally translated poorly into practice; however, it is important to note that discussions among a small group of specialists would often filter through to the press, which publicized many issues. This further motivated the public to take up initiatives such as writing letters to the authorities and to the editorial boards of Polish Radio and magazines. So the authorities’ growing ecological awareness that was at least beginning to be seen in the press and public debates was somewhat selective. In the public discourse and in the press, the Lenin Steelworks was still presented as a model factory, including in terms of its environmental impact. Meanwhile—as the sources show—in the 1960s and 1970s the plant was at its peak ecological harmfulness. This was due to the extensive manufacturing that was constantly being expanded within the integrated plant. Even during the setting up of the steelworks, its main designers stressed that the maximum permissible level of steel production to avoid harming the city was 1.5 million metric tons per year. Meanwhile, the expressly expanded plant produced 4 million metric tons of steel per year in the 1960s, and in 1977, a record 6.7 million metric tons.19 An optimistic plan for the subsequent years envisaged

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Illustration 6.4. Propaganda posters of the 1970s were supposed to emphasize state authorities’ care and understanding of environmental problems. Source: Collections of the Museum of Independence in Warsaw.

increasing production up to 9 or even 10 million metric tons,20 but the fact that efforts were concentrated on constructing the Katowice Steelworks meant that this was never achieved. The lack of investment funds that resulted partly from the construction of the competing Katowice Steelworks and the growing economic crisis caused a clear drop in production at the Nowa Huta plant, down to approximately 4.5 million metric tons of steel in 1982. However, this fall in production came too late as far as the environment was concerned. In the 1980s the accumulated long-term side effects of the steelworks around Krakow became particularly apparent.

Eco-opposition In the 1980s, the truth about the city’s environmental conditions began to reach the public. This was because in 1979 the censors had revoked the ban on publishing information about environmental pollution and because in the months

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Illustration 6.5. Front page of a publication from the series “Ecological Problems of Krakow,” published by the Polish Ecological Club since 1981.

immediately following the founding of the Solidarity movement the problem of water, air pollution, and the general state of the environment was taken up in the country as an act of opposition to the authorities’ policies. Krakow was a special city in this respect. Although throughout the “carnival of Solidarity” people released reserves of energy and determination to act that they had been holding in all across the country, it was here that the first ecological grouping came into being. It was the beginnings of the Polish Ecological Club (PKE), the first organization of its type in the communist bloc. Although the PKE quickly set up regional branches throughout the country, “the heart of the club was, however, Krakow and AGH,” Stalony-Dobrzański recalled years later. “We organized successive themed discussion forums . . . we published green pamphlets recording these discussions, then we sent them out to the authorities.”21 For the first time, they published reports on Krakow’s ecological problems, providing terrifying data on the pollution levels exceeding world standards several times.22

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One of the PKE’s greatest achievements was its success in closing down the electrolysis department at the aluminum works in Skawina. As measurements taken there showed, the fluoride levels in the residential areas around the plant were more than double the permissible standard, and cadmium levels in edible crop plants sometimes exceeded the norm by a factor of thirty. As a result, incidences of respiratory and bone diseases and related frequencies of sick leave were significantly higher than elsewhere in the country.23 The efforts and commitment of the ecological club’s participants produced many activities, including bringing up, or bringing into the public discourse, the issue of the growing conflict between industry and the city. Although martial law restricted pro-Solidarity ecologists’ ability to act, it did not manage to redirect the previously laid tracks of thinking about Krakow’s environmental problems. The thread of pro-ecological actions against the state system was also picked up by the Freedom and Peace Movement (Ruch Wolność i Pokój) established in 1985.24

Elites or Society? Knowledge of the catastrophic ecological state of the city entered the broader public consciousness, arousing resentment and anxiety, and leading to a demand for changes to the environmental protection system. Still, the greatest dissenters against further devastation were the most highly educated social circles—academics, intellectuals, doctors, and engineers. It was they who most strongly accused the city’s authorities of passivity and of being narrow-minded and irresponsible in their thinking about the city and the region. A discussion published in the Ecological Forum Quo vadis Cracovia stated: “Locating heavy industry in Krakow has led . . . to a sharp contradiction between the city and industry. . . . The entire process has so far proceeded with a passive attitude by the city authorities, who have focused their efforts purely on attempting to constantly adjust the living conditions in the city to the state created by leaving matters to run their course.”25 The communist authorities of the mid-1980s were accused of failing to actively intervene to save Krakow from further deterioration. However, if only because of the “awful air and constant smog” described by visitors to Krakow at the time, did other Cracovians report a similar commitment to issues of environmental protection? How was the average resident’s knowledge about the state of the city formed in the 1980s? The first research into ecological awareness was conducted in the second half of the decade.26 It revealed that the poorest ecological awareness was displayed by newcomers and Nowa Huta employees. The latter realized the scale

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of the problems that their company was causing, but because of their financial ties to the plant, they were not inclined to express outright negative opinions, or demands for steel production to end or be reduced that were appearing in other city districts. Such suggestions were most readily expressed by residents of western districts and some central parts of Krakow, the Old Town, parts of Grzegórzki and Wola Justowska, and therefore, as a rule, members of the city’s population who had lived here for generations. The same group of residents tended most often to somewhat generalize the negative effects of harmful industrial facilities to industry as a whole. The general distrust of the industry was expressed in the unpopularity of residences close to factories that were objectively of little ecological harm, such as shoe or agricultural machinery manufacturers. Only half of the city’s residents expressed a readiness to live within three kilometers of such plants, and only one in five or six in the immediate vicinity. In districts where newcomers predominated, such as Prokocim, Mistrzejowice, and other newer neighborhoods, but also in towns and villages near Krakow, ecological awareness was lowest. Interestingly, many of them viewed the city’s pollution purely in terms of what they saw, and thus did not identify it with levels of chemical compounds in the air, water, or soil, but associated it directly with the dirt they saw in the city itself.27 This brings us to the extent to which the Polish Ecological Club’s activity and the successive initiatives and slogans of the Freedom and Peace Movement expressed genuine grassroots ecological awareness—in the sense of concern for protecting the environment in Krakow and the surrounding area. Did the discussions and actions change the environmental attitudes of society in Krakow, or did they only change attitudes toward industry and the negative consequences of industry that manifested themselves obviously in the condition of the city? Although the actions of the first Polish and Cracovian ecologists had an enormous and unquestionable effect, materials and observations on the broader public reaction in the 1980s offer little cause to believe that they really gave birth to widespread ecological awareness. The actions taken in the 1980s were more linked to spreading to an ever-wider public a sense or realization of the environmental catastrophe and its multiple associated health problems. Both in reports by members of the Polish Ecological Club and in material prepared by the Krakow Health Department, the focus was primarily on how pollution affected quality of life—on human safety and cultural products (monuments)—and less on nature per se. Generally speaking, until the end of the 1980s (and still today), the true object being secured by protecting Krakow’s environment against human industrial activity remained man himself; nature,

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in the sense of the fauna and flora filling his surroundings, remained largely in the background. The ecological history of twentieth-century Krakow is the tale of a clear and ongoing change in the way society (and not only local elites) thinks about how urban space and urban nature relate to local industry exploiting local natural resources. At the beginning of the century there was a more or less consistent vision of a garden city protected and isolated from industry; nevertheless, it still had to deal with serious pollution that the city and city center themselves generated and that resulted from the topography and the contamination caused by the poor heating system and sewers. Shortly after World War II, this difficult combination of factors was further complicated by ongoing social and political revolution in which a key ideological role was played by heavy industry that was created by the state with no regard for the safety of the heritage or natural fabric of the royal city. The ecological catastrophe, which became visible within two decades, resulted directly from the top-down imposition of the brutal industrialization of the 1950s that was detached from “the city’s natural potential.” This evoked strong reactions among academics and intellectuals, which led to the gradual emergence of ecological awareness among wider social groups. The threats to health and to the material cultural heritage of Krakow (monuments, architecture) were so great that most activities focused on protecting the highest-held values—human health and life, and human cultural objects. This axiological take on anthropocentrism placed nature (the natural environment) on a lower rung. Since the 1970s, an increasingly conscious struggle for these highest values ran alongside anticommunist resistance and the fight for freedom and citizens’ rights. The system itself and the people at the controls became the main culprits of the city’s dramatic ecological deterioration of the 1980s. And although that was justified (due in part to the central planning system), the 1990s and modern times have shown that without grassroots and civic initiatives, without increased public awareness and ecological sensitivity, and without close and active cooperation of society with local (city) and national authorities, it is still difficult, even for a democratic state, to preserve a healthy balance between culture and nature in a city.

CHAPTER 7 THE HISTORY OF KRAKOW SMOG

Adam Izdebski and Konrad Wnęk

As with every other environmental phenomenon associated with human activity, smog—or air pollution in general—is a historical phenomenon. It arose under specific conditions comprising the variability of nature (including climate) and technological and economic development. It did not come into being and then remain as it was: it changed with society and nature. Nor was the phenomenon valued unchangingly in society, culture, or science. London’s famous smog or, more broadly, the pollution caused by burning bituminous coal, was for most of the nineteenth century considered to be salutary for human health. Although the British intellectual elite continued to believe in miasmas—that is, they considered the source of most diseases to be the contamination of air by the decomposition of organic matter (a ubiquitous process in cities until almost the end of the nineteenth century, including in Krakow, as described by Aldona Mueller-Bieniek in chapter 3 and Rafał Szmytka in chapter 5)—it was believed that impurities resulting from human technological activity were an excellent antidote to this harmful phenomenon. Inhaling coal smoke was even believed to cure certain diseases.1 When the role of bacteria in pathogenic processes was subsequently recognized, it was argued that industrial pollution had miraculous disinfectant properties. Only in the interwar period did the slow gathering of data on the health of working-class suburban residents and the activities of associations managing public hygiene and urban beautification (initially focused 147

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on the role of sunlight, which the smoke was obscuring, and not on the pollution itself) set in motion the process of changing social awareness and the scientific status quo.2 In Krakow no less than elsewhere, the history of “smoke and fumes” is a complex historical problem. The subject of smog and air pollution appears in nearly every chapter of this book, and the problem remains a major challenge for the city. Szmytka’s chapter 5 on life amid the pollution of the early modern city demonstrates that although the problem of coal smog did not exist in the strictest sense before the nineteenth century, the air in Krakow stank and had been exceptionally unhealthy even centuries earlier, mainly due to the operation of the numerous breweries and protoindustrial craft workshops. Szpak’s chapter 6 shows that closer to the present, at the end of the 1940s, the “classic” coal smog was “enriched” by industrial pollution that was even more harmful to health and to the physical fabric of Krakow, including the city’s monuments. The closure or modernization of factories in the Krakow region solved this problem, but industrial plant fumes were replaced by pollutants from the burning of fuel in car engines, which were often technologically primitive or poorly maintained.

LONDON SMOG. The term smog is a portmanteau of the words fog and smoke (from the burning of coal). It is currently used in a general sense to indicate all types of air pollutants that persist for long periods in urban areas. In its original meaning, it described the phenomenon that was probably first seen in London, before anywhere else in Europe. In the seventeenth century, the city almost completely switched to heating houses with coal from mines in northern England. Coal smoke combined with dense London fogs to form what looked like a romantic haze, but was in fact a lethal mixture for the respiratory system. London fogs, or London smog to be precise, became famous all over the world, especially after the “great smog” of early December 1952, when air pollution lasting for several days increased London’s death rate by several hundred percent. It was the statistical data collected during this extreme episode that shocked public opinion and forced the government to act, eventually leading to the resolution of the smog problem in UK cities within a few short years. Because of the international fame of Krakow’s problems with air pollution during the communist period and again in the twenty-first century, as well as the role of fog in exacerbating it, Krakow could rightly be called the “Polish London.” Unsurprisingly, “Krakow smog” has become a set phrase in Polish, with the ambivalent romantic-mortiferous connotations . . .

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The combination of wood and coal smoke with the urban heat island along with the moisture from the Vistula and its tributaries have been permanent elements of Krakow’s microclimate for several hundred years.3 Unusually strong temperature inversion over the city, very well documented for the past half century as dominating the local climate from October to March, is one of the main reasons for the enormous scale of the problem.4 Because the air masses in the upper layers of the troposphere (the lowest layers of our planet’s atmosphere) become warmer than those located immediately above the ground, there is no vertical mixing of the air masses. The air pollution in the lowest layers of the troposphere, where humans breathe, becomes locked in the same place it was produced (that is, in the city), accumulating over days and sometimes even weeks to create an almost unbearable mixture. Breweries and many other craftworks in early modern Krakow—one of the most important production centers of what was then the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth—burned huge quantities of wood, producing enough heat to bring about temperature inversion and enough smoke to create smog. Thus, smog must have been an everyday experience for Cracovians from at least the beginnings of the early modern period. After all, on top of craftworks, houses, mansions, and monasteries also had to be heated and cooking had to be done—all by burning wood. Obviously, however, it is impossible to accurately estimate the extent of air pollution generated by the stoves of that time. And there was no small number of them. According to the 1632 registry of inns, the streets within the city walls hosted 556 tenement houses (not counting Ulica Kanonicza, since ecclesiastical buildings were not included in the registry), 8 manor houses, 7 lesser manor houses, and 46 wooden houses on Ulica Gołębia, Ulica Reformacka, and Ulica Szpitalna. We can assume at least one chimney per house. To this number we should add about 100 breweries and malt houses equipped with ovens for drying malt, and soap factories.5 In addition, within the walls were bakeries, 100 goldsmiths, and 30 tinners.6 Therefore, it can be assumed that in the limited area of the ​​ medieval city smoke was coming from more than 1,000 chimneys throughout the year. Particulate emissions were significant and they negatively affected quality of life in the city.7 This conclusion is also surprisingly confirmed in iconographic material. In the Balthasar Behem Codex from that time (AD 1505) (aka the Codex Picturatus), which contained the privileges and statutes of the city of Krakow, one can clearly see chimneys, and black smoke enveloping the city, just as in the nineteenth century or in modern photographs of days when Krakow’s poor air quality beat records for exceeding European clean air standards (see

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Illustration 7.1. Chimneys smoking over the city. Illustration from the Balthasar Behem Codex. Source: Collections of the Jagiellonian Library.

illustrations 7.1 and 7.2). Even if the images are not realistic drawings of Krakow, as they are probably modeled on similar manuscripts from Germany or the Low Countries, they give us an idea of how the creator of the codex perceived a late medieval city such as Krakow. For the history of the smog itself, the key moment was the beginning of the nineteenth century. Chapter 4 by Piotr Miodunka, devoted to Krakow’s connections with the region shows that it was then (and thus extremely early for Central Europe) that Krakow switched from firing its houses with wood to using readily available coal. This change in energy source is confirmed not only in the varying prices of coal and firewood but also in the municipal authorities’ interest in the problems associated with such a significant technological change. On the one hand, city institutions were created to supervise trade in the new commodity, and on the other, the biggest problem turned out to be Cracovians’ ignorance about how coal should be burned. In short, there were numerous incidents of carbon monoxide poisoning and the city

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Illustration 7.2. Krakow’s John breweries in the latter nineteenth century.

authorities issued a special instruction, in Polish and German (as Krakow was part of the Austrian Empire at that time), to be read by every property owner in Krakow. It explained how to heat houses with coal, and it does not differ much from the warnings that can be seen today on screens in Krakow’s trams. It is from then that we can speak of Krakow smog in the stricter sense—as the pollutants produced by burning coal mixed with damp air—and fog in particular. In Krakow as in London, the smog problem is particularly severe because the city was and is located on very wet lands, where the Vistula and other watercourses produce ubiquitous moisture (although today, apart from the Vistula, the other, smaller rivers are almost invisible). As Andrzej Chwalba explains in chapter 2 of this book, the Vistula’s role in the history of Krakow should be understood more broadly as part of the life-giving and death-dealing relationship of the river to the city’s inhabitants. Local hydrological conditions therefore favor the formation of fogs, which bind locally with coal smoke and concentrate it even further. The characteristic smog haze—which Małgorzata Praczyk deals with in chapter 8—has almost become part of Krakow’s “natural” identity, with the alleged “city of greenery” and its “magic” still touching Poles’ imaginations. This makes the problem of air pollution even more difficult for modern Cracovians to solve. The scale of the challenge is apparent from a comparison of photographs of Krakow’s streets from various points in the twentieth century (see illustrations 7.3–7.4). Although the composition and sources of air pollution are changing, the visual effect—that “romantic mist”

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◀ Illustration 7.3. Ulica Floriańska in winter, in the 1930s. Source: The Walery Rzewuski Museum of the History of Photography in Krakow.  Illustration 7.4. A Krakow courtyard in the 1960s Source: The Museum of the History of Photography in Krakow.

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Figure 7.1. Seasonal (October to March): A—air temperature variability in Krakow (1792–2018); values smoothed by eleven-year running mean; and B—air temperature anomalies with respect to the 1961–90 normal period. Source: Leszek Kowanetz, data obtained from the Krakow Historical Station, homogenized.

in the Planty park encircling the Old Town—remains the same, and the unresolved problem persists. The origins of Krakow’s smog can be linked to the history of Krakow’s climate (see chapter 1 by Konrad Wnęk, Leszek Kowanetz, and Adam Izdebski). A chart of late spring temperature anomalies for the Tatras and Lesser Poland shows clearly that in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Krakow’s residents saw the coldest springs of the past millennium. Furthermore, at the threshold between those two centuries there were also particularly severe winters. Figure 7.1 shows the average temperature of the coldest months of the year—that is, the heating season—over the past two centuries (these are instrumental meteorological observations, and are thus precise measurements, not approximative paleoclimatic reconstructions). At the turn of the nineteenth century came almost a decade-long run of harsh autumn and winter seasons occurring almost every two years (including two extreme “once-a-century” seasons; only the “once-a-bicentenary winter” in 1828–29 was worse). It was during this time that the relative prices of firewood and coal changed, and the city authorities issued their instructions on the correct use of this second raw material. Interest in the new fuel must have been related to

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a sudden demand for heating energy to survive the successive harsh winters. In response to the increased frequency of extremely low winter temperatures (after what was a relatively warm and stable eighteenth century, according to the dendroclimatic data presented in chapter 1 on the climate history of Krakow), Cracovian society came up with a response mechanism. This solution to the problem of harsh winters became permanent, and smog became an inextricable part of the Krakow landscape. It should be emphasized that this period’s harsh winters and the transition to heating homes with coal do not warrant the claim that climate change (or extreme weather events) is the main reason for the appearance of smog in Krakow. Like every complex socionatural phenomenon, Krakow’s smog results from a combination of many different circumstances. Eventually, during the nineteenth century, all of Poland’s cities switched to coal as their main heating fuel, although in Krakow, climate fluctuation may have been one of the main reasons for the phenomenon having occurred so early. Tracking how city residents and visitors during successive historical eras responded to Krakow smog is no easy task. Smog was and is a regular part of everyday life. Although it sometimes appears in iconographic material (or its presence can be inferred by combining climate reconstructions, information about price movements, and our knowledge of the technology of the time), before the development of modern mass media in the nineteenth century, there were simply no sources in which smog could be written about. Cracovians’ perception of the problem, and how they dealt with it on a daily basis, only finally comes to light in the press from the early twentieth century. Let us begin by quoting a short article from the Krakow daily Nowa Reforma written in February 1906 (this is an excerpt from a longer text otherwise describing the appearance of Krakow in winter, snow clearing in the city, and the typical ways in which the locals took advantage of the charms of winter): Winter in the city is an uninvited guest, of whom we would be rid as soon as it was within our power. Even the air is not notably clean in winter in the great cities. While the dirtiest courtyards do indeed not stink during the frost, in return, the air is heavy with chimney smoke. It is enough to wash one’s face in the evening for the soiled water to convince one of how much soot in the winter season is carried in the air and, of course, enters the airways. Coniferous trees come out of this very badly. Specifically, snow settles abundantly on their branches and from the air they collect soot, which contains sulfuric acid. As the snow thaws, the needles absorb the acid and take it into the tree’s organism, which after years often dies of

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poisoning. This is a common phenomenon in factory districts. Deciduous trees, by losing leaves for the winter, avoid this danger.8

This quote is interesting for many reasons. First of all, it shows that early twentieth-century Cracovians had a clear awareness of the problem we now call smog. Above all, the effect was strikingly visible to the naked eye. The incessant settling of smog particulates blackened the city and killed trees. This aesthetic problem is also noted by other articles in the period’s press.9 In 1915, a press chronicler described a great storm passing over the city as an almost exclusively positive event. Its happiest effect for Krakow was that it washed the city of many years of dust and soot, which day-to-day could only be removed with great difficulty.10 But let us return to our quote. What is most noteworthy is the early awareness of health problems accompanying smog. This consciousness seems to have remained very general—the anonymous journalist writes not about the effect of soot and smoke on the respiratory system, but rather he shows in detail its impact on conifers. Interestingly, traces of such health consciousness can be sought many years earlier. In October 1889, the Association for the Beautification of the City (Towarzystwo Upiększania Miasta) tried to plant trees on many streets of Krakow, justifying its request to the city council through the positive role of trees in “refreshing the air and contributing to the well-being of the city’s inhabitants.”11 Also worth mentioning on the subject of health is the widespread awareness of the problems of carbon monoxide that accompanied Cracovians every winter. Here is an excerpt from another article: We stand, my wife and I, in front of the stove and look in despair at the dirty smoke issuing from between its tiles, slowly filling the room with a poisonous fragrance. “Nice prospect for the winter,” I say to my wife, who is hastening the smoke with a hand fan. “It’s nothing, it’s just during the first lighting,” responds my wife, whom heredity has burdened with optimism. “I know Krakow’s stoves,” I cry out, choking. “This is just the beginning.” My prediction was borne out. The next day, when the second fire was lit, the smoke began so strongly to belch—not through the chinks, but through the doors—that momentarily the room was dark. The dog, which had been sleeping next to the stove, hurriedly fled to the next room, to which my wife took the canary in its cage. I opened the window, closed the

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door to the next room and after three hours, when it had finally burned out, I had gotten some heat, much itching, and even more soot on the furniture, curtains, and paintings. The second day, I called for a chimney sweep, who came with two colleagues, as if to a council. Having tapped the stove as if a living patient, they cleaned it, and having taken a korona for this operation, and a ten-heller tip, they left, assuring me that the effect would be reliable.12

In the sentences that ensue, the author describes the headache that the smoke from the stove causes him, and unexpected meeting with a family he is acquainted with, a family with children and that normally avoided all kinds of “traders and confectioners.” Like the author, those townsfolk had been expelled from their homes by the smoke coming from the stoves and were forced to seek other shelter while their homes were aired.13 We can end by noting the interesting fact that a few years before World War I the whims of Krakow’s weather may have again driven a comparable technological innovation to that of the early nineteenth century, when, during the harsh winters and cool springs, Cracovians began using coal as their main heating fuel. The winter of 1908–9 was the harshest for more than a decade: the average temperature was more than 1ºC lower than all preceding winters since 1893. After it ended, an article by an engineer, E. Śmiałowski, appeared in a journal for Krakow’s architects, proposing that Krakow’s homes move over to oil-fired heating. It would be an innovation as far as Europe was concerned—the most modern metropolises such as London or Paris were slowly switching to gas, which was nevertheless derived from coal at that time through a production process that was very harmful to health and caused massive pollution. Śmiałowski supports his thesis by advancing mainly economic arguments, referring to high coal prices (which probably resulted from the winter having been harsh). Toward the end of the article, however, he draws attention to the fact that “in addition to its economy, heating stoves with oil presents numerous conveniences, freeing streets, basements, and homes of coal dust pollution, and almost completely eliminating the production of smoke and soot.”14 Significantly, the author mentions no health or other problems related to the smoke and soot. This is characteristic of the entire Krakow press of the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that we have reviewed in searching for references to smog. Although there can be no doubt that this problem has existed since Napoleonic times, or much earlier, the sources are curiously quiet on the subject, as has been the case many times in the history of Krakow —in the forced industrialization after World War II or even in the last decade before the birth of the modern anti-smog movement.

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Illustration 7.5. Cover of the August 1976 issue of the Krakow journal Aura, containing texts devoted to air pollution.

Engineer Śmiałowski’s proposals were not taken up. Coal remained the main fuel for heating Krakow’s houses until the early twenty-first century, and after World War II the history of Krakow’s smog enters a new stage. Industrial production, which intensified in the twentieth century, had already been another factor worsening the city’s more general smog problem. Before the war, the greatest “polluters” in Krakow—the Solvay Sodium Plant in Borek and the Bonarka Chemical Plant—“supplied” the Krakow air with successive doses of the industrial PM2.5 particulate matter that is responsible for producing smog. Their emissions in the latter twentieth century increased with the struggle to maximize production at all costs in existing plants and to build new ones nearby (including, in particular, the Lenin Steelworks and the aluminum works in Skawina). But heavy production was not the only major determinant of the city’s ecological disaster that was declared in the 1960s. The rapid spatial development of the city was also significant, with air corridors being ignored or not taken seriously enough, thus increasing the long-term persistence of atmospheric pollution, which accumulated within the city. The budding environmental awareness described in chapter 6 by Ewelina Szpak and chapter 8 by Małgorzata Praczyk did not mean, however, that knowledge about what caused smog to form or about air pollution, immediately

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Illustration 7.6. Caricature/cartoon from the Krakow journal Aura (January 1976): 25.

reached the wider public.15 Attempts to deal with this problem were made in various fields. They focused on the activities both of scientists and of Krakow’s ecological circles. Since the early 1970s at the latest, scientists have been studying the smog problem at the AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow. The activities of the first ecologists of the People’s Republic of Poland focused on the state’s environmental policy and the reduction of not only the industrial production of smog but also, first and foremost, the biological and cultural devastation of the most sensitive layer in the fabric of the historic city—its monuments. This entirely understandably prioritized action meant that other factors favoring the creation of smog remained peripheral to activists’ environmental operations, although they were undoubtedly conscious of and interested in them. They included the problems of both coal-fired heating and the spread of motorization and cars since the 1970s. The history of Krakow’s smog is a lens through which the essence of the city’s environmental history can be brought into focus. It comprises a constant litany of problems associated with its particular location and its important role

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in Polish history and the Polish economy of successive epochs. At the same time, we also see that the nature of these challenges is surprisingly changeable over the centuries: on the one hand, enduring and invariable sources of Krakow’s hardships, on the other, historical conditions that over the decades, centuries, and ages condemn subsequent generations of Cracovians to face new incarnations of old problems. If there is any lesson to be drawn from the environmental history of Krakow, it is the awareness that, although they result from today’s transport or heating technologies, our contemporary problems are really nothing new. Krakow is in a particularly difficult location, and solving problems that have gone unsolved for several hundred years will require extraordinary actions.

CHAPTER 8 THE POWER OF MYTH The Imagined Nature of Krakow

Małgorzata Praczyk

Seeking and discovering a city’s identity requires more than a journey through its streets, architecture, and monuments. A city’s identity also has an imaginary dimension, which of course—and this is as true of Krakow as anywhere—has been written about earlier.1 Zdzisław Mach and Krzysztof Frysztacki have drawn attention to this, noting that Krakow is “obviously ‘real’ in its rich facilities, shape and all the traits of human presence and social activity. At the same time, it is extraordinarily imagined.”2 It can therefore be assumed that Krakow’s space—including the natural space—is a phenomenon not only of physical nature but also of the imagination. It is not captured purely in statistics describing the number of parks or square meters of greenery per city inhabitant. It also exists in residents’ and tourists’ perception of the environmental value of ​​ a fortified town on the banks of the Vistula. However, not much attention has been devoted to the contribution of nature to this, the city’s imagined identity. Let us look therefore at the issues that relate to nature as an important element of the city’s imaginarium—the unique myth of a “green Krakow” that has taken on a life of its own and is part of the discourse on the symbolic dimension of the city. The vision of Krakow’s nature that emerges from descriptions of urban greenery in personal reports and numerous photographs of the city creates a prism through which we see the city’s green areas, regardless of how remotely 161

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this view corresponds to reality. This issue is well illustrated by an anecdote. I recently spoke with a friend who has lived in Krakow for many years. The discussion concerned a place of nature in the city, and its delightful atmosphere. At a certain point, I heard him utter some significant words: “When I came to Krakow,” my interlocutor remarked, “I was bathed in its beauty. I walked around the Planty and for a long time I admired the mist that often hovered just above the ground, and soaked up the romantic atmosphere. After a while, though, I realized that this ‘romantic mist’ was nothing more than city smog.” In writing about imagined nature, I refer to the great book by Phil Macnaghten and John Urry, Contested Natures, in which they show how to create imaginations of nature. Looking over the history of nature, they notice that “there is no such thing as nature, only natures.” However, these are, as they wrote, “historically, geographically and socially constituted.”3 Nature is therefore a potential that is “processed” according to how people imagine its role and understand its value, as they try to find a place for it in their own world. Sometimes they treat it in a utilitarian manner—creating small parks, occasionally fighting to preserve its most “wild” quality. The same has happened, and continues to do so, within Krakow. The various approaches to urban nature, which have been clearly visible over the past two centuries, reveal to us the nature of the myth of a green Krakow, and how it grew. It is also worth mentioning that people’s behavior toward nature is clearly seen on two levels, which, nonetheless, overlap. The first is that of the private emotional ties that exist between Krakow’s inhabitants and its nature. The second is the political side of nature. Now, I understand this political dimension as the presence of nature in public discourse, which thus extends as far as the fight to protect nature on the one hand and, on the other, the social practice of creating natural symbolism by including it in ideological or patriotic discourse and the like. Nature is actively shaped by Cracovians, and began to play a particular role in the history of the city in the first half of the nineteenth century. This is associated with the gradual change in how the city functioned—the removal of the defensive walls, the city’s spread, and its demographic growth. Then, in the 1820s and 1830s, in place of the medieval fortifications, city gardens—the Planty—were created. The “Plantations” around the Old Town, as they were described in writings, occupy an impressive twenty-one hectares and are four kilometers long. They were laid out according to the principles of an orderly garden that gradually sprouts benches, monuments, and so forth.4At the very

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beginning of the twentieth century, nearby municipalities gradually began to join Krakow, creating what was referred to as Wielki Krakow (Great Krakow).5 Many of them, at least partly because of their traditional easements, had different natural characters, which became blurred as the city progressively expanded.6

GARDEN CITIES—an idea conceived by Ebenezer Howard that inspired urban planners and architects in many countries around the world. Poland was no exception. We also began creating garden cities, which, according to Howard’s plans, were intended to combine particular elements of the countryside and the city enclosed in an urban system built on a small ring-shaped plan (the number of inhabitants was calculated at 32,000) that was friendly and convenient for everyday living. The bestknown Polish implementations of Howard’s idea include Podkowa Leśna, Milanówek, and Żarki-Letnisko. However, despite good intentions, many similar garden cities later became mere districts of larger cities that in reality failed to fulfill the requirements put forward by the British urban theorist.

The nascent concern about nature in the nineteenth century—and the struggle to maintain and protect it—built a sense of community among the city’s residents. The nineteenth century saw more than just industrialization, it also witnessed the accompanying birth of modern ecological awareness. And the importance of the ecosystem for human health and well-being thus became better understood. This bore fruit as concepts holding that the city should function as a healthy, human-friendly space. The perception of nature, which changed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, also changed the behavior of residents themselves. This is manifested in the emotional relationships that inhabitants have with particular places of importance to them—those that constitute their experience of living in a city (the presence of individual parks, the role of the river, the presence of certain animals) and that thus affect the identity of the people and of the city itself. In Krakow, the specific imaginings of nature that were created in this manner are next influenced by subsequent generations’ imaginings of this nature and by how the city is perceived and remembered. These places that Cracovians became attached to in the past constitute today an important part of Krakow’s

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identity, one it would be impossible to imagine the city existing without (such as the Planty parks). Nature is therefore not just part of the urban ecosystem— it is just as important in how the city is remembered, imagined, and valued by residents and tourists. Nature’s agency can be seen at both the physical and the material levels and, although perhaps less obviously, at the level of imaginings of Krakow’s nature and the importance of such ideas to the city’s identity. Nineteenth- and early twentieth-century guidebooks to Krakow and the surrounding area abound in descriptions praising the city’s natural beauty and its delightful location. For example, in describing the city, Ambroży Grabowski mentions that Krakow is “situated in an alluring locale generously furnished by nature.” Next, there are descriptions of the view of the city from various geographic sides, which Grabowski concludes with the following summary: “All is still lit by the rays of the sun; already it fills the traveler’s mind with a finer harmony.”7 In the Krakow Guidebook for 1835, by Stanisław Gieszkowski, we read that “this land, situated in one of the most delightful of locales, . . . has a very pleasant and healthy climate,” and “the most exquisite garden produce in Poland, including Cracovian pineapples and artichokes famed afar”; furthermore, Krakow has, among other things, “animals, and more specifically, no small number of wild birds.”8 The opinion that the climate was good and beneficial to the city’s inhabitants can also be found in the 1845 publication Souvenirs from Krakow by Józef Mączyński. 9 Krakow is described in similar terms in The Latest Illustrated Guide to Krakow and Surroundings, by Aleksander Napierkowski in 1883; the author states that “such a beautiful location as Krakow has can be boasted by few cities in Europe.”10 Praise for the location, nature, and good climate of Krakow in almost every guide to the city, beginning with those from the early nineteenth century, played an important role in creating the myth of a green Krakow. A considerable role was played by the aforementioned demolition of the city walls and the creation of the Planty in their stead. It seems that these ingredients are most responsible for the perception of Krakow as a “green” city. In Napierkowski’s guide, one reads that in place of the walls there are “vibrant and graceful strolls crossed by avenues planted with chestnuts, poplars, etc., where lawns stretch that have so enhanced the city. In the most inaccessible places, where there was the stench of filth of all kinds, now the resident of Krakow enjoys a stroll and breathes the clean air.”11 In the Illustrated Guide to Krakow and Surroundings Józef Jezierski writes, “The most beautiful park in

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Krakow is its most splendid Planty, encircling the entire heart of the city with a giant wreath. They are one of a kind, the pride of the city and the sweetest place for the Krakow public’s spring and summer walks.”12 We read about the Planty in similar terms in later guidebooks published in the interwar period of the twentieth century. Helena d’Abancourt repeats Józef Jezierski almost word-for-word,13 confirming to readers the already popular opinion of the most beautiful garden in Krakow. Karol Estreicher’s guide contains a detailed, two-and-a-half-page description of the nature and history of the Planty, where the author states, “They are one of the most characteristic ornaments in the image of Krakow . . . the planty always make a great impression with their beauty.”14 The greenery of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Krakow was intended to serve residents and create a pleasant living space. Nature was thus subjected to beautifying procedures in accordance with the prevailing aesthetic canons of the day and was arranged by Cracovian landscape architects. At that time, there was still no room in this nature for the “wildness” or “naturalness” that modern-day Cracovians appreciate and are willing to fight for. At that time, unregulated nature was associated with a lack of hygiene. That is why there was such a clear contrast between old Krakow and the newly added districts. As noted by Nathaniel D. Wood in a monograph devoted to the city at the turn of the twentieth century, the boundaries of old Krakow were even described as civilizational borders. As the author emphasized: “In this context, ‘nature’ was almost never viewed romantically or sentimentally, but instead symbolized backwardness and dirt.”15 In the nineteenth century, therefore, parks were established that had a practical and utilitarian function for humans. Next to the Planty another important area of greenery ​​ was the Strzelecki Park (literally, shooting park), founded not much later in 1837, but made significantly smaller over time.16 The Strzelecki Park was created at the initiative of the Krakow Rifle Society, a fraternity of marksmen who decided to create a park just outside the city with a palace as an observation tower, where Cracovians would meet for social purposes and shooting competitions would be held.17 For almost four decades, the Strzelecki Park was the second most important public park visited by the city’s inhabitants, after the centrally located Planty that served for daily strolls. These first two parks were created on the initiative of, respectively, the city authorities and an institutionalized shooting association.18

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HENRYK JORDAN (1842–1907), a Krakow university professor and medical doctor, was one of the greatest Polish promoters of the idea that contact with nature is necessary for the proper physical and psychosocial development of children. To generate the conditions for bringing up a new healthy generation of Poles, he encouraged the creation of parks-gardens equipped with sport infrastructure and at the same time green and full of trees. The first park of this kind was founded in Krakow in 1889. In Jordan’s vision, healthy activities should by accompanied by patriotic education, thus building strong foundations for the country’s future. Consequently, the so-called Jordan’s gardens often included small monuments devoted to the heroes of Polish history and culture, and the Jordan Park in Krakow boasts probably the largest collection of this kind in Poland, being constantly updated and enlarged still today.

The next three important parks were only created at the end of the nineteenth century. The first was the Henryk Jordan Park, known for its infrastructure supporting activities for children and young people. The next is the Bednarski Park located in Podgórze, then a separate town adjacent to Krakow. The park was built on the site of abandoned quarries. It is the only postindustrial area in Krakow to have been deliberately converted into a park.19 Formally, it became a park of Krakow after Podgórze was incorporated into the city in 1915.20 The last is the Krakowski Park, rich in facilities supporting social life and recreation. There are restaurants, cafés and a concert bowl as well as an outdoor swimming pool, ponds, and so on.21

TODAY’S KRAKOWSKI PARK is, unfortunately, a mere shadow of its earlier state. Initially fenced, it occupied an area of ​​seven hectares. It throbbed with life, and the public enjoyed spending time in its café, restaurants, and pastry shops. The park also housed a mini-zoo of sorts, a pond, and even a hippodrome, making it an ideal recreational space. However, it also attracted visitors with its cultural offerings. There were open-air concerts and it housed a much-loved summer theater, which could accommodate up to four hundred people. It was here that Krakow screened its first films.

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Illustration 8.1. Krakowski Park in 1926. Source: Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

The establishment of the above three parks was the result of grassroots initiatives by social activists. Particular figures played a key role here. The creation of these parks originated in a completely different way from the previous ones. According to the beliefs of the time, its rich infrastructure, playgrounds, and sports equipment surrounded by nature were intended to encourage activity and have a positive influence on the physical and mental development of young Cracovians.22 Wojciech Bednarski, a teacher, an activist of the Society for Beautifying the City of Podgórze (the suburb of Krakow located on the southern bank of the Vistula), and initiator of creation of the park in the quarry area, believed the young needed a natural space in which to spend time. His initiative stemmed from observing his students’ needs: movement and outdoor activities. Thus, the Jordan and Bednarski Parks belong to the nineteenth-century concepts of providing for health and hygiene, going hand in hand with changes in the way the fabric of a city is perceived. The Krakowski Park, in turn, was modeled on Viennese public gardens by a confectioner, Stanisław Rehman, who wanted to create a pleasant, natural space for socializing and spending free time.23

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Illustration 8.2. Cows grazing in Błonia. Photo by M. Lasyk / REPORTER.

All three social activists, however, remained bounded by the idea that nature should be subjugated. The imagined nature of Krakow was still a utilitarian nature, important for its role in serving man, and it was allowed into the city only to meet the needs of the city’s residents. This servile role was not only contingent on influencing physical health. In connection with the nineteenth-century birth of modern nationalism, nature was also included in a narrative that cocreated the national identity and served a didactic function. This inclusion of nature in the cultural and political sphere was primarily used in the Jordan Park, but also everywhere that monuments were located in the parks (in the Planty in particular) or where trees were planted, with the names given them relating to the country’s political history, emphasizing national pride. Appeals to nature were used to legitimize certain values ​​and confirm their authenticity. Błonia, located close to the city center but still treated as an outlying area in the nineteenth century, also had a utilitarian function. Błonia is unique in Europe—a huge urban meadow of ​​nearly fifty hectares. This unique area remained undeveloped, not so much for any need to protect its ecosystem, but due to its specific function—cattle were grazed in Błonia, and this continued until the mid-twentieth century.

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CITY MEADOWS—despite Krakow’s Błonia undoubtedly being a unique ecological feature in Europe, it is worth noting that similar urban meadows also exist and have been consciously established in other European cities. We should at least mention Oxford’s Christ Church Meadow, or Skaters’ Meadow in Cambridge (although this is a strictly controlled nature reserve that is closed to visitors). Other urban meadows can also be found in Oslo. They increase biodiversity, are effective at absorbing smog, and are cheaper to maintain, as well as being excellent recreational spots for city dwellers.

All three of these parks, and Błonia, were also featured in the narratives of guidebooks. By the early twentieth century, the Strzelecki Park is already being described as less important because of its area having been significantly reduced in the latter nineteenth century. It is replaced by Jordan Park, but it is emphasized that it is mainly of interest to young Cracovians, whereas Bednarski Park, which is the least furnished and arranged, makes only rare and minor appearances. Błonia is also often mentioned, and it is particularly in evidence in 1909’s Guide around the Surroundings of Krakow by Klemens Bąkowski. Bąkowski writes that “with the city’s growth, the Planty is no longer enough for the increased population to stroll in; nearby gardens have also long since disappeared: Kremera, Krzyżanowskich, Strzelecki, which used to be places of rest and amusement; of necessity greenery and space must be sought further afield—in Błonia.”24 Later too, Błonia was highlighted as an important place in which to spend free time—a favorite among the young. With time, however, it became one of the most important places in the city for strolls, picnics, various outdoor events, and more serious celebrations.25 Jacek Purchla even mentions it as “undoubtedly one of the seven wonders of Krakow.”26 Aptly and with humor describing the history of Błonia, Andrzej Kozioł cites many recollections of it as an important place of recreation for the inhabitants of Krakow. It is also no stranger to poetic texts. In an epigraph in his book, Kozioł uses the words of Maria Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska, who in one poem writes tenderly and at length about this great meadow “a quarter of an hour’s walk from the Market Square.”27 Another poet, Adam Zagajewski, also held Błonia in special esteem, writing about it as “the Sicily of this city that does not know the sea.”28

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The interwar period did not change much about the way nature in the city was perceived. Cracovians grew increasingly attached to the green areas mentioned above. The innovative solutions introduced when the almost onehundred-year-old Planty were built, or those in the later Jordan Park that brought infrastructure for children and youths to play and exercise outdoors, and the presence of a large meadow in the city, all reinforced residents’ sense of how exceptional the urban greenery was. As an extremely symbolically important Polish city, Krakow was the pride of residents not only for the quality of its monuments but also for the unique green areas established in the nineteenth century. The perception of this city as especially full of nature was reinforced by Ebenezer Howard, the author of the garden city concept, who in Krakow in 1912 for the international Esperanto congress described it as “a naturally developed garden city.”29 At the same time, the exhibition Architecture and Interiors in Garden Surroundings was being held in Krakow, drawing much inspiration from Howard’s concept.30 A house with a garden was one of its key elements, meant to guarantee a good, healthy life in the city, and the territorial expansion of Krakow that took place in the early twentieth century was intended to make this very assumption possible. However, Howard’s garden city idea was not put into any kind of systematic urban practice after World War I, even though Krakow was the first Polish city to consider the idea of a garden city when drawing up a new city plan.31 Entailing, as it did, the absorption of different urban and municipal entities with their own particular, densely built-up structures, the city’s expansion alone would have been enough to prevent such an idea from being put into practice.32 Moreover, as Paweł Kubicki emphasizes, the symbolic space of Krakow that defined its identity remained within the medieval town, enclosed by the ring of the Planty park. Once again we see the significance of the Planty—a park that was, and largely still is, foundational to any spatial thinking about Krakow. The World War II period, during which Poland become a satellite nation of the Soviet Union, radically changed the official political discourse about nature. In the hands of Stalinist propaganda and politics, nature became just another tool for manifesting the totalitarian power of the communist authorities and had no intrinsic value of its own. Therefore, Krakow’s growth in this era focused mainly on building industrial sites, without considering the value of nature, the problem of pollution, or their negative impact on the urban ecosystem. One particular example was, of course, the Nowa Huta integrated metallurgical plant established in 1954. It was the largest industrial plant in Krakow and one of the largest facilities of its kind in Poland. In the early

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1950s, the village in which it was built directly adjoined the city, and Nowa Huta was administratively incorporated into Krakow. However, the extent of environmental exploitation and destruction in the latter twentieth century gave rise to increasing opposition from the city’s residents. The policy of the central authorities was at odds with the needs of people, who were increasingly noticing its negative effects, despite the intense propaganda. During this period, we see a change in the mythological narrative of green Krakow. Thanks to the construction of Nowa Huta and other industrial plants, nature took on the role of the city’s lost Eden. References were made to past, preindustrial ages as a green and happy time for the city. This was especially true from the 1970s onward, when numerous ecological milieus began to find their voice. Then the already active circle of ecologists awoke an ecological awareness. The growing consciousness regarding environmental pollution in Krakow is demonstrated by articles that appeared with increasing regularity in the 1970s, in Aura, drawing attention to such issues. In an article titled “Krakow Beautiful . . . and Dirty,” Stanisława Dębska wrote: “The City Center is particularly polluted. This district’s central location, high population density, ever-increasing industrial output, growing tourism, motorization, and transport—these are all sources of pollution subjecting the City Center’s natural environment to constant and deleterious change.”33 Similarly, referring ironically to the city’s often-praised topography, Władysław Bieroń shared his view, writing: “When over 700 years ago Bolesław the Chaste granted Krakow its charter, he did not turn his thoughts to our times. And it is a pity, because the place was unremarkable: the physical geographic and climatic conditions mean that any burdens imposed by industrial civilization weigh doubly on Wawel’s town. These burdens are ‘produced’ by local industry, and are also imported from the highly industrialized voivodeships of Katowice and Bielsko.”34 Sentiment for “green” Krakow and its beautiful surroundings can also be felt in memoirs devoted to the city. The era of Krakow’s postwar industrialization that is associated with the founding of Nowa Huta is described by Cracovians as follows: “Once the city stood among a green horizon of meadows, fields and forests. To the east, the green stretched ever further, ever grayer and bluer toward the lines of hills that met the sky; today on the hillsides, paling in hazy smoke, the distant walls of new districts, housing estates and suburbs. . . . In the east, the cloudy horizon plays with dapples of smoke lit by a low sun, above the blocks of Nowa Huta.”35 At the same time, the splendor of Krakow’s greenery was still being praised. Stanisław Pagaczewski wrote of it thus:

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It is of course, we, Cracovians. We wander the enchanted ring of Planty, rest on Błonia’s easy sheets, kiss in Jordan Park, play with the monkeys in Wolski Forest, look in to Podgórze from time to time, to one of the most beautiful parks in Poland—H. Bednarski Park—we walk through the Krakowksi garden-square, sit on the benches of the Botanical Garden. . . . Imagine what would happen without that greenery. . . . Ah, I dare not imagine! We would have no place to catch our breath, to rest our eyes so tired by display window lamps, to sit down on a bench. . . . We would have nowhere to stroll by the moonlight or colorful spotlights, we would have no place to meet up with girls, to talk with retired colleagues, to play with children or read newspapers in a pleasant, green half-shade. Believe me, my dears, it would be very bad without the Planty, without the parks, without Błonia.36

The politicians of the People’s Republic of Poland took actions that severely degraded Krakow’s nature, but they did little to change the imagined vision of Krakow’s traditional nature that had been painted in the nineteenth century. In the guidebooks of the 1970s, there is still talk of the beautiful Planty, which is “Cracovians’ favorite place for walks.”37 Interestingly, even in Nowa Huta, we read in the guide cited above, “colorful blocks of flats among greenery and flowers” are one of the first impressions that you have when you enter the district.38 Krakow’s actual pollution therefore did not significantly affect the city’s perception as a “green” city. The city’s natural values ​​were also emphasized as part of its identity. It seems, however, that the turn of the twenty-first century saw a significant change in the way Krakow’s urban greenery was thought about. Something more than just the typical utilitarian urban park greenery known from the nineteenth century began to play an increasing role. Greater significance began to be given to unbridled nature and to what had previously been undervalued. Individual city districts began to pay attention—their inhabitants began to rediscover the functions they had previously fulfilled. And so, for example, in Krowodrza, a residential estate that has a rich fruit-farming past and was a center of vegetable growing, there are proposals to again plant flowers where they had been earlier, to cultivate the Krakow asparagus lettuce that was still common here in the mid-twentieth century.39 These were the appeals born of rebellion against investments planned near Młynówka. The perception handed down of Krakow as a garden city was also used by the initiators of the Garden City project that was launched in 1995. This project was tasked with developing knowledge about green areas in Krakow, but also with encouraging the greening of blocks of flats and spreading a gardening

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Illustration 8.3. Cecylia Malik, The 6 Rivers project: The Prądnik. Photo by Piotr Dziurdzia.

culture.40 Thus, using the well-known symbol of the garden city, it supported the spread of greenery in the city on the one hand, but it also perpetuated Cracovians’ mythical belief in the city’s unique natural environment on the other. If we imagine nature to be valuable in and of itself, it should be as “wild” as urban conditions will allow. A good example of this perception of nature and creating such an image of it is to be found in the activities of Cecylia Malik, an artist and ecological activist who, with her sister Justyna Koeke and friends, brings Cracovians together to defend the valuable ecosystems of the city. Thanks to actions such as the Modraszek Collective (defending Zakrzówka against developer investments), the 6 Rivers (action aimed at raising awareness of the presence of small rivers in Krakow and the need to protect them) or the Mother Poland (Matka Polka) (on tree felling), she is fundamentally changing how people think about Krakow’s nature: she is restoring its status, and drawing attention to the dependence not only of nature on people, but also, importantly, of people on nature. She makes nature an equal partner, pushing its utilitarian functions into the background. Traveling by canoe along the small, unknown rivers of Krakow, Malik gave value to this part of Krakow’s nature that was unbridled and lacking in symbolic value. The artist wrote:

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CECYLIA MALIK is an artist, performer, and activist. She has completed many projects, most in collaboration with family and friends. Her artistic activities are rooted in Krakow, with which Malik has been connected from birth. The most important are 365 Trees, 6 Rivers, the Modraszek Collective, and Mother Poland on tree felling. She has received numerous awards for her actions, including a prize at Kulturalne Odloty 2010 granted by the Krakow branch of Gazeta Wyborcza, the title “Culturist of the Year 2010” awarded by Polish national Radio 3’s Radio House of Culture, and a scholarship from the Minister of Culture and National Heritage.

“Everyone knows that the Vistula flows through Krakow, but the other rivers are very little known. From the city, you really can’t see them—almost nobody is interested in the rivers: they do not drive mills; they provide neither food nor water. There are, however, ecological corridors, nature reserves where urban animals live on illegal sewage and garbage dumps. I wanted to remind people of their names and show an endangered beauty.”41 Such efforts are also a sign of new tension that occasionally turns into conflict, as highlighted by change in the political paradigm, and thus also by the development of the capitalist economy. And so tension now arises not only between the authorities and the city’s population, as it did in the socialist state, but it is also emerging between business people (who want to increase profits by developing industry and translating urban development into economic profits) and other residents’ demands for the need to preserve nature and maintain biological balance. The conflict is therefore between different understandings of the concept of development, or rather, “sustainable development.” According to one, development is building a “good” space for people living in the city, whereas according to the other it is activity aimed at maximizing profit and bringing tangible benefits to a small group of entrepreneurs. Tension also arises from differing ideas about nature. For people who imagine nature on the model of nineteenth-century Krakow, it seems sufficient to have nothing more than symbols like the Planty or Jordan Park. Others, however, try to expand this natural urban imaginarium to include an unknown nature that is not necessarily imbued with symbolism. By their actions they show that restricting ourselves to the green areas formed in the nineteenth century impoverishes our image of Krakow’s nature. Interestingly, such thinking is also reflected in contemporary guidebooks, which describe unusual green areas and promote the undertakings of activists in Krakow. We can read such content,

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for example, in the guide Zrób to w Krakowie / Do It in Krakow, which presents Malik’s activities and proposes trips to Nowa Huta’s meadows.42 Despite the enormous environmental devastation caused by the industrialization of Krakow in the latter half of the twentieth century and the systematic shrinking of its green areas, the garden city myth is still firmly rooted. The vision formed over the nineteenth century still has a strong influence on residents’ imaginations, even though there are no statistical data to back it up. After all, Krakow is one of the least green cities in Poland. According to Joanna Torowska, in the rankings of indexes of green areas per capita in Poland, Krakow languishes toward the very bottom. The same is true for afforestation, which in Krakow is at around 5 percent, as compared to Łódź (a flagship industrial Polish city . . . both in reality and in the public imagination) where it stands at 20 percent.43 Nobody, however, thinks of Łódź as a “green” city, although this name is undoubtedly accorded to Krakow. The power of the myth of nature’s place in the city is visible when we look at the history of Krakow’s imagined nature. In the eyes of Krakow’s inhabitants, but also more widely, in the eyes of Poles, this image of the city’s nature is still tied to a vision from the turn of the twentieth century, when Planty and Błonia were largely responsible for Krakow being a “green city,” despite the fact that the real current state of the city’s greenery leaves much to be desired. However, actions and practices aimed at restoring “real” greenery to the city, and attempts to include areas that are unnoticed or littered but of value, only go to show how the perception of nature has changed over the ages. The myth of the green Krakow of the Planty and Błonia is broadening and morphing into an ecological myth of Krakow’s “wild” nature, but one still building on the vision of Krakow as a city of beautiful nature and natural value. It is important not to reject these values, but rather to realize that nature is always subject to interpretation. “True” or “wild” nature does not exist per se. So, it is worth remembering that this refreshing change of focus in the myth of the green city is still nothing more than an imaginary message. Filled with new meanings, it will affect how we perceive Krakow’s nature, but it will never come true—after all, such is the very nature of myth.

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Introduction: Environmental History and Krakow 1. Of course, numerous articles in Polish are devoted to environmental history—in particular a special issue of Historyka: Studia Metodologiczne devoted to the environmental history of Poland and Central and Eastern Europe (vol. 46, 2016, edited by A. Izdebski and R. Szmytka) and works by T. Samojlik (with different sets of coauthors), a biologist and historian from Białowieża, as well as texts by Polish researchers written in English. Rare examples of English-language works on Poland are: T. Samojlik, I. Rotherham, and B. Jędrzejewska, “Quantifying Historic Human Impacts on Forest Environments: A Case Study in Bialowieza Forest, Poland,” Environmental History 18 (2013): 576–602; A. Izdebski, G. Koloch, T. Słoczyński, and M. Tycner-Wolicka, “On the Use of Palynological Data in Economic History: New Methods and an Application to Agricultural Output in Central Europe, 0–2000 AD,” Explorations in Economic History 59 (2016): 17–39; and M. Falkowski, “Fear and Abundance: Reshaping of Royal Forests in Sixteenth-Century Poland and Lithuania,” Environmental History 22, no. 4 (2017): 618–42. Since the appearance of the Polish version of this book, two new monographs devoted to environmental history have also been published in Polish: A. Izdebski, Średniowieczni Rzymianie i przyroda: Interdyscyplinarna historia środowiskowa (Krakow, 2018); M. Praczyk, Pamięć środowiskowa we wspomnieniach osadników na “Ziemiach Odzyskanych” (Poznań, 2018). 2. The geographical setting of the modern city of Krakow is analyzed in detail in M. Baścik and B. Degórska, eds., Środowisko przyrodnicze Krakowa: Zasoby—ochrona—kształtowanie (with English summaries) (Krakow, 2015). 3. “America” in this text refers to the United States, unless otherwise indicated. 4. T. Kjærgaard, The Danish Revolution, 1500–1800: An Ecohistorical Interpretation, Studies in Environment and History (Cambridge, 1994); J. Radkau, Natur und Macht: eine Weltgeschichte der Umwelt (Munich, 2000); P. Warde, Ecology, Economy and State Formation in Early Modern Germany, Cambridge Studies in Population, Economy, and Society in Past Time 41 (Cambridge, 2006); an overview of studies of environmental history conducted in Europe around the turn of the twenty-first century can be found in an article written by historians from over ten European nations: V. Winiwarter et al., “Environmental History in Europe from 1994 to 2004: Enthusiasm and Consolidation,” Environment and History 10, no. 4 (2004): 501–30. Other worthwhile German and French introductions to environmental history include: V. Winiwarter and M. Knoll, Umweltgeschichte: eine Einführung (Cologne, 2007); B. Herrmann, Umweltgeschichte: Eine Einführung in Grundbegriffe (Berlin, 2013); and G. Quennet, Qu’est-ce que l’histoire environnementale? (Paris, 2014). 5. A. Wyczański, Studia nad folwarkiem szlacheckim w Polsce w latach 1500–1580 (Warsaw, 1960); A. Wyczański, La consommation alimentaire en Pologne aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles

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(Paris, 1985); K. Modzelewski, Organizacja gospodarcza państwa piastowskiego: X–XIII wiek (Wrocław, 1975); K. Modzelewski, L’Europe des barbares: Germains et Slaves face aux héritiers de Rome (Paris, 2006), translated to English as Barbarian Europe (Frankfurt, 2015); K. Modzelewski, Gesellschaftspsychologie einer Revolution (Cologne, 2018); K. Zamorski, Transformacja demograficzna w Galicji na tle przemian ludnościowych innych obszarów Europy Środkowej w drugiej połowie XIX i na początku XX w. (Krakow, 1991); H. Samsonowicz, Untersuchungen über das Danziger Bürgerkapital in der zweiten Hälfte des 15. Jahrhunderts (Weimar, 1969); and H. Samsonowicz, Życie miasta średniowiecznego (Poznań, 2017). 6. F. Bujak, Nauka, społeczeństwo, historia, ed. H. Madurowicz-Urbańska (Warsaw, 1976), 256. 7. A. Walawender, “Badania klęsk elementarnych,” Roczniki Dziejów Społecznych i Gospodarczych 1 (1931): 79–88; A. Walawender and F. Bujak, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Polsce i w krajach sąsiednich w latach 1450–1586, vol. 1, Zjawiska meteorologiczne i pomory (z wykresami), Badania z Dziejów Społecznych i Gospodarczych 10 (Lwów, 1932); S. Namaczyńska-Florczak, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Polsce i w krajach sąsiednich w latach 1648–1696, vol. 1, Zjawiska meteorologiczne i pomory, Badania z Dziejów Społecznych i Gospodarczych 23 (Lwów, 1937); and J. Szewczuk, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Galicji w latach 1772–1848 (z wykresami), Badania z Dziejów Społecznych i Gospodarczych 35 (Lwów, 1939). 8. An exhaustive summary of these studies is contained in a recently published Polish geographical history textbook: J. Tyszkiewicz, Geografia historyczna: Zarys problematyki, Nauki Pomocnicze Historii—Instytut Historii Polskiej Akademii Nauk. Seria Nowa (Warsaw, 2014). 9. E. Ligęza, Wodociągi dawnego Krakowa do połowy XVII wieku (Krakow, 1971); U. Sowina, Towns and People: Polish Lands against a European Background until the Mid-16th Century (Frankfurt am Main, 2016); and J. Laberschek, Sieć wodna średniowiecznego Krakowa i jej gospodarcze wykorzystanie (Warsaw, 2016). 10. The classic works include: J. A. Tarr, The Search for the Ultimate Sink: Urban Pollution in Historical Perspective, Technology and the Environment (Akron, 1996); M. V. Melosi, Garbage in the Cities: Refuse, Reform, and the Environment, History of the Urban Environment (Pittsburgh, 1981); and Melosi, Effluent America: Cities, Industry, Energy, and the Environment (Pittsburgh, 2001). 11. A good overview of addressed topics—and the preceding dialogue with American researchers—is provided in many collective works, such as: G. Massard-Guilbaud and C. Bernhardt, eds., Le démon moderne: la pollution dans les sociétés urbaines et industrielles d’Europe, Histoires Croisées (Clermont-Ferrand, 2002); and C. Bernhardt, ed., Umweltprobleme in europäischen Städten des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts (Münster, 2004). 12. B. Luckin, “Town, Country and Metropolis: The Formation of an Air Pollution Problem in London, 1800–1870,” in Energie und Stadt in Europa: von der Corindustriellen “Holllznot” bis zur Ölkrise der 1970er Jahre, ed. D. Schott, 77–91, Vierteljahrschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 135 (Stuttgart, 1997); and Luckin, “‘The Heart and Home of Horror’: The Great London Fogs of the Late Nineteenth Century,” Social History 28 (2003): 31–48. 13. On Manchester, see a comparative work by the American historian S. Mosley, The

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Chimney of the World: A History of Smoke Pollution in Victorian and Edwardian Manchester (Cambridge, 2001); on Great Britain as a whole, see P. Thorsheim, Inventing Pollution: Coal, Smoke, and Culture in Britain since 1800, Ohio University Press Series in Ecology and History (Athens, OH, 2006). 14. B. Luckin, Pollution and Control: A Social History of the Thames in the Nineteenth Century (Bristol, 1986); On the Ruhr Basin, see F.-J. Brüggemeier and T. Rommelspacher, Blauer Himmel über der Ruhr: Geschichte der Umwelt im Ruhrgebiet 1840–1990 (Essen, 1992); F.-J. Brüggemeier, “A Nature Fit for Industry: The Environmental History of the Ruhr Basin, 1840–1990,” Environmental History Review 18 (1994): 35–54; and Brüggemeier, Das unendliche Meer der Lüfte: Luftverschmutzung, Industrialisierung und Risikodebatten im 19. Jahrhundert (Essen, 1996); for a systematic bibliography of French works, see Quennet, Qu’est-ce que l’histoire environnementale? 145–63. It should be emphasized that thanks to work on both sides of the Atlantic, the environmental history of cities emerged relatively early as a subdiscipline of sorts. Since the early 1990s, the pages of American and European journals have hosted a discussion on the unique role of urban research in environmental history. See M. V. Melosi, “Cities, Technical Systems and the Environment,” Environmental History Review 14 (1990): 45–64; Melosi, “The Place of the City in Environmental History,” Environmental History Review 17 (1993): 1–23; C. Meisner Rosen and J. A. Tarr, “The Importance of an Urban Perspective in Environmental History,” Journal of Urban History 20 (1994): 299–310; J. J. Keyes, “A Place of Its Own: Urban Environmental History,” Journal of Urban History 26 (2000): 380–90; G. Massard-Guilbaud, “Pour une histoire environnementale de l’urbain,” Histoire Urbaine 18 (2007): 5–21; and G. Massard-Guilbaud and P. Thorsheim, “Cities, Environments, and European History,” Journal of Urban History 33, no. 5 (2007): 691–701. 15. S. Barles, “Le métabolisme urbain et la question écologique,” Les Annales de la Recherche Urbaine 92 (2002): 143–50; Barles, “A Metabolic Approach to the City: Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Paris,” in Resources of the City: Contributions to an Environmental History of Modern Europe, ed. D. Schott, B. Luckin, and G. Massard-Guilbaud, 28–47, Historical Urban Studies (Aldershot, 2005); and Barles, “Urban Metabolism of Paris and Its Region,” Journal of Industrial Ecology 13 (2009): 898–913. Barles work has inspired other researchers, for example, J. A. Tarr, “The Metabolism of the Industrial City: The Case of Pittsburgh,” Journal of Urban History 28 (2002): 511–45. 16. K. T. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States (Oxford, 1985); A. Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside: Suburban Sprawl and the Rise of American Environmentalism, Studies in Environment and History (New York, 2001) ); and M. Dagenais, “‘Returning to Nature’: Vacation and Life Style in the Montréal Region,” in Schott, Luckin, and Massard-Guilbaud, Resources of the City, 63–79. 17. W. Cronon, Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West (New York, 1991). 18. P. Bevilacqua, Venezia e le acque: una metafora planetaria, postfazione di M. Cacciari, Saggi. Storia e Scienze Sociali (Rome, 1998) ; for a nonobvious example, see J.-C. Perrot, Genèse d’une ville moderne: Caen au XVIIIe siècle (Paris, 1975). 19. This problem is practically absent from the literature on environmental history and urban history: Quennet, Qu’est-ce que l’histoire environnementale? 148. Of course, “intentional nature” has been better studied, but almost exclusively in terms of creating parks and nature

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protection, and principally in America. See: G. Cranz, The Politics of Park Design: A History of Urban Parks in America (Cambridge, MA, 1982); D. Schaffer, Garden Cities for America: The Radburn Experience (Philadelphia, 1982); W. H. Wilson, The City Beautiful Movement, Creating the North American Landscape (Baltimore, 1989); and R. Rosenzweig and E. Blackmar, The Park and the People: A History of Central Park (Ithaca, 1992). In recent years an increased interest in the subject has been seen in Europe. See: H. Meller, “Citizens in Pursuit of Nature: Gardens, Allotments and Private Space in European Cities, 1850–2000,” in Schott, Luckin, and Massard-Guilbaud, Resources of the City, 80–96; P. Clark, M. Niemi, and C. Nolin, eds., Green Landscapes in the European City, 1750–2010 (London, 2017); and M. O. Hannikainen, The Greening of London, 1920–2000 (London, 2017). 20. This problem is already well represented in the literature. See G. Massard-Guilbaud and R. Rodger, Environmental and Social Justice in the City: Historical Perspectives (Cambridge, 2011). 21. A. Hurley, ed., Common Fields: An Environmental History of St. Louis (St. Louis, 1997); C. E. Colten, ed., Transforming New Orleans and Its Environs: Centuries of Change (Pittsburgh, 2000); Colten, An Unnatural Metropolis: Wresting New Orleans from Nature (Baton Rouge, 2005); W. Deverell and G. Hise, eds., Land of Sunshine: An Environmental History of Metropolitan Los Angeles, History of the Urban Environment (Pittsburgh, 2005); M. W. Klingle, Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle (New Haven, 2007); and B. Black and M. J. Chiarappa, eds., Nature’s Entrepôt: Philadelphia’s Urban Sphere and Its Environmental Thresholds, History of the Urban Environment (Pittsburgh, 2012). 22. A deeper overview of the history of Poland can be found in: N. Davies, God’s Playground: A History of Poland, vols. 1–2 (Oxford, 1981); and A. Zamoyski, Poland: A History (New York, 2012). 23. On the development of Krakow and its decline in seventeenth–eighteenth centuries, see F. W. Carter, Trade and Urban Development in Poland: An Economic Geography of Cracow, from its Origins to 1795 (New York, 1994). 24. On the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, see R. Frost, The Oxford History of Poland-Lithuania. Volume 1: The Making of the Polish-Lithuanian Union, 1385–1569 (Oxford, 2015). 25. On the transformation of Krakow to a modern city, see N. D. Wood, Becoming Metropolitan: Urban Selfhood and the Making of Modern Cracow (DeKalb, 2010). 26. For Krakow under the German occupation, see: A. Rawson, Schindler’s Krakow: The City under the Nazis (Barnsley, South Yorkshire, 2015); and T. Pankiewicz, The Krakow Ghetto Pharmacy, trans. G. Mallory (Krakow, 2017). 27. On the building of Nowa Huta, see K. A. Lebow, Unfinished Utopia: Nowa Huta, Stalinism, and Polish Society, 1949–56 (London, 2013). 28. For a general history of Krakow, see: Z. Żygulski, Cracow: An Illustrated History (New York, 2001); and J. Małecki, A History of Kraków for Everyone, trans. J. Taylor-Kucia (Krakow, 2008). 29. The historical literature associating geographic and topographic conditions with the development of settlement is extensive and dates back to the nineteenth century. The first scholar to attempt to scientifically connect these elements was J. Szujski. Recently, M. Niezabitowski collated the latest research results and conclusions for publication in

NOTES TO PAGES 19–24

the chapter “Geografia a historia Krakowa: Warunki naturalne rozwoju Krakowa,” in Kraków: Nowe studia nad rozwojem miasta, ed. J. Wyrozumski, 19–43 (Krakow, 2007). This is supplemented by J. Laberschek, “Warunki topograficzne, sieć wodna, sieć drożna,” in Atlas historyczny miast polskich, ed. R. Czaja, vol. 5, Małopolska, ed. Z. Noga, issue 1, Kraków, ed. Z. Noga (Krakow, 2007). 30. Niezabitowski, Geografia a historia Krakowa, 24. 31. Niezabitowski, Geografia a historia Krakowa, 25–26. 32. Niezabitowski, Geografia a historia Krakowa, 24. 33. Niezabitowski, Geografia a historia Krakowa, 27. 34. Laberschek, “Warunki topograficzne,” 9.

Chapter 1: The Climate History of Krakow 1. On the Medieval Climatic Optimum, see H. H. Lamb, “The Early Medieval Warm Epoch and Its Sequel, ”Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 1, supp. C (1965): 13–37; Lamb, Climate, History and the Modern World (London, 1982); M. K. Hughes and H. F. Diaz, “Was There a ‘Medieval Warm Period,’ and If so, Where and When?”, Climatic Change 26, no. 2–3 (1994): 109–42; and H. F. Diaz et al., “Spatial and Temporal Characteristics of Climate in Medieval Times Revisited”, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society (2011): 1487–1500. For France, see E. Le Roy Ladurie, “Histoire et climat,” Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 14, no. 1 (1959): 3–23 (this is the first-ever article devoted to climate history); and Le Roy Ladurie, Histoire du climat depuis l’an mil (Paris, 1967). 2. C. Pfister, Klimageschichte der Schweiz 1525–1860: Das Klima der Schweiz von 1525–1860 und seine Bedeutung in der Geschichte von Bevölkerung und Landwirtschaft (Bern, 1988); and Pfister, Wetternachhersage: 500 Jahre Klimavariationen und Naturkatastrophen (1496–1995) (Bern, 1999). Pfister’s approach is currently being successfully used by the Czech geographer Rudolf Brázdil. See, for example, R. Brázdil and L. Friedmannová, “Temperature Patterns in the Czech Lands in 1751–1850: Comparison of Documentary Evidence and Instrumental Data” in Contemporary Climatology, ed. R. Brázdil and M. Kolář (Brno, 1994). 3. For a summary of his approach after decades of research, see C. Pfister, “The Vulnerability of Past Societies to Climatic Variation: A New Focus for Historical Climatology in the Twenty-First Century”, Climatic Change 100, no. 1 (2010): 25–31. 4. C. Pfister, “Climatic Extremes, Recurrent Crises and Witch Hunts Strategies of European Societies in Coping with Exogenous Shocks in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries”, Medieval History Journal 10, no. 1–2 (2007): 33–73. 5. The following description of Krakow’s climate is primarily based on the contributions by L. Kowanetz, R. Twardosz, Z. Ustrnul, A. Wypych, and others published in D. Matuszko, ed., Klimat Krakowa w XX wieku (Krakow, 2007), as well as A. Bokwa, Wieloletnie zmiany struktury mezoklimatu miasta na przykładzie Krakowa (Krakow, 2010). 6. A. Bokwa, “Klimat miasta a zanieczyszczenia powietrza”, Aura 9 (2016): 8–13. 7. A. Bokwa, A. Wypych, and Z. Ustrnul, “Climate Changes in the Vertical Zones of the Polish Carpathians in the Last 50 Years” in The Carpathians: Integrating Nature and Society towards Sustainability, ed. J. Kozak et al., 89–110 (Berlin, 2013); J. Trepińska, Z. Ustrnul, and L. Kowanetz, “Variability of the Air Temperature in Central Europe in the Years 1792–1995”, Geographia Polonica 70 (1997): 43–52.

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8. D. Limanówka, “Daily Weather Observations in Cracow in the 16th Century”, Zeszyty Naukowe UJ, Prace Geograficzne 102 (1996): 503–8; D. Limanówka, “The Transformation of Thermal Descriptive Characteristic in Cracow from 16th Century into the Quantitative Evaluation”, Zeszyty Naukowe UJ, Prace Geograficzne 107 (2000): 113–17; and D. Limanówka, Rekonstrukcja warunków klimatycznych Krakowa w pierwszej połowie XVI wieku (Warsaw, 2001), 25–32; for other observations in Krakow, see: A. Bokwa and D. Limanówka, “Weather Observations Carried by Michał of Wiślica in Cracow in the Years 1527–1551”, Prace Geograficzne IG UJ 10 (2000): 9–18; and A. Bokwa, D. Limanówka, and J. Wibig, “Preinstrumental Weather Observations in Poland in the 16th and 17th Centuries”, in History and Climate, ed. P. D. Jones, A. E. J. Ogilvie, T. D. Davies, and K. R. Briffa (New York, 2001). 9. D. Camuffo and C. Bertolin, “The Earliest Temperature Observations in the World: The Medici Network (1654–1670)”, Climatic Change 111 (2012): 335–63. 10. J. Hanik, Dzieje meteorologii i obserwacji meteorologicznych w Galicji od XVIII do XX wieku (Wrocław, 1972). 11. J. Trepińska, ed., Wahania klimatu w Krakowie (1792–1995) (Krakow, 1997); R. Twardosz, Dobowy przebieg opadów atmosferycznych w ujęciu synoptycznym i probabilistycznym na przykładzie Krakowa (1886–2002) (Krakow, 2005); and K. Piotrowicz, Sezonowa i wieloletnia zmienność typów pogody w Krakowie (Krakow, 2010). 12. K. Wnęk, Dzieje klimatu Galicji w latach 1848–1913: Wpływ zjawisk meteorologicznych na społeczno-gospodarczy rozwój Galicji (Krakow, 1999). 13. R. Przybylak et al., “Droughts in the Area of Poland in Recent Centuries”, Climate of the Past Discussions, June 11, 2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-2019–64. 14. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych o nadzwyczajnych zjawiskach hydrologiczno-meteorologicznych na ziemiach polskich w wiekach od X do XVI, ed. A. Rojecki (Warsaw, 1965), 24. 15. On “natural” disasters, in terms of events at the interface between nature and society, see G. J. Schenk, Historical Disaster Experiences: Towards a Comparative and Transcultural History of Disasters across Asia and Europe (Cham, 2017). 16. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych, 25. 17. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych, 32. 18. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych, 17. 19. O. Magnus, Carta marina, 1539, ed. E. Balzamo (Paris, 2005). 20. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych, 34. 21. Wyjątki ze źródeł historycznych, 85–86. 22. C. Pfister, Klimageschichte der Schweiz; R. Brázdil et al., “Historical Climatology in Europe: The State of the Art”, Climatic Change 70, no. 3 (2005): 363–430. 23. U. Büntgen et al., “Filling the Eastern European Gap in Millennium-Long Temperature Reconstructions”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110, no. 5 (2013): 1773–78. 24. On the debate surrounding the notion of the Little Ice Age, see, for example, M. Kelly and C. Ó Gráda, “The Waning of the Little Ice Age: Climate Change in Early Modern Europe”, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 44, no. 3 (2013): 301–25; contra: S. White, “The Real Little Ice Age”, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 44, no. 3 (2013): 327–52; for an overview of the problem, see C. Pfister, “Early Modern Europe”, in The Palgrave Handbook of Climate History, ed. S. White, C. Pfister, and F. Mauelshagen, 265–95 (London, 2018), esp. 267–69, with more literature.

NOTES TO PAGES 44–65

Chapter 2: Krakow and Its Rivers 1. Further, see J. Laberschek, Sieć wodna średniowiecznego Krakowa i jej gospodarcze wykorzystanie (Warsaw, 2016); and E. Ligęza, Wodociągi dawnego Krakowa do połowy XVII wieku (Krakow, 1971). 2. See K. Bąkowski, “Dawne kierunki rzek pod Wawelem,” Rocznik Krakowski 5 (1902): 138–72; and M. Tobiasz, Dziejowe przemiany sieci wodnej i zagospodarowania przestrzennego Krakowa (Wrocław, 1977). 3. See K. Trafas, ed., Zmiany biegu górnej Wisły i ich skutki (Warsaw, 1992). 4. S. Cios, Ryby w życiu Polaków od X do XIX w. (Olsztyn, 2007). 5. M. Gumińskiej and A. Delorme, eds., Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa. Przyczyny, teraźniejszość, perspektywy ekorozwoju miasta (Krakow, 1990). 6. M. Tobiasz, Cech rybaków krakowskich (Olsztyn, 1962), 21–38. 7. W. L. Lech, Wędkarze Krajowego Towarzystwa Rybackiego w Krakowie 1879–1950 (Gdańsk, 2016). 8. A deeper analysis of this phenomenon requires detailed research and a broader analysis. 9. See Gdy nadciągała wielka woda. Klęski powodzi na ziemiach polskich na przestrzeni wieków. Proceedings of the conference Wrocławskie Spotkania z Historią Gospodarczą, spotkanie VIII, ed. E. Kościk (Krakow, 2013). 10. J. Bieniarzówna, J. M. Małecki, and J. Mitkowski, Dzieje Krakowa, vol. 2, Kraków w wiekach XVI–XVIII (Krakow, 1984), 41. 11. A. Izdebski, G. Koloch, T. Słoczyński, and M. Tycner, “Historia przyrodniczo-gospodarcza Polski w świetle analizy ilościowej danych palinologicznych,” Historyka. Studia metodologiczne 45 (2015): 127–60; and A. Izdebski, G. Koloch, T. Słoczyński, and M. Tycner-Wolicka, “On the Use of Palynological Data in Economic History: New Methods and an Application to Agricultural Output in Central Europe, 0–2000 AD,” Explorations in Economic History 59 (2016): 17–39. 12. S. Namaczyńska, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Polsce i w krajach sąsiednich w latach 1648–1696, vol. 1, Zjawiska meteorologiczne i pomory (Lwów, 1937), 10. 13. Namaczyńska, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Polsce, 21. 14. K. Bąkowski, Dzieje Krakowa (Krakow, 1911), 31. 15. J. Szewczuk, Kronika klęsk elementarnych w Galicji w latach 1772–1848 (z wykresami) (Lwów, 1939), 6–7. 16. “Powódź,” Gazeta Krakowska, no. 69 (1813): 815. 17. A. Grabowski, Wspomnienia Ambrożego Grabowskiego, vol. 1 (Krakow, 1909), 198–201. 18. D. R. Mackenzie, “Scheduling Fungicide Applications for Potato Late,” Plant Disease 65, no. 5 (1981): 394. 19. W. Kopff, Wspomnienia z ostatnich lat Rzeczpospolitej Krakowskiej (Krakow, 1906), 105–6. 20. K. Karolczak and H. Żaliński, “Klęski powodziowe w Krakowie w dobie autonomicznej (1867–1918),” in Studia nad gospodarką i siecią osadniczą regionu górnej Wisły, ed. J. Rajman and J. Hampel, 14–36 (Warsaw, 1992). 21. P. Czuj, Jak dawniej bywało? Pamiątka konsekracji kościoła w Dębnikach (Krakow, 1938), 33. 22. M. Lempart, Rudawa: żywioł poskromiony (Krakow, 2016).

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Chapter 3: Plants in the Lives of Medieval Cracovians 1. D. M. Pearsall, Paleoethnobotany: A Handbook of Procedures (San Diego, 2000); and M. Lityńska-Zając and K. Wasylikowa, Przewodnik do badań archeobotanicznych (Poznań, 2005). 2. In this text, “seed” denotes everything that can be botanically described as fruit or seed. 3. K. Wasylikowa, A. Wacnik, and A. Mueller-Bieniek, “Badania archeobotaniczne w nawarstwieniach historycznych z terenu Krakowa: metodyka—stan badań—perspektywy,” Geologia 35 (2009): 89–100; and E. Zaitz, “Rozwój osadnictwa w średniowiecznym Krakowie na tle danych archeologicznych i paleośrodowiskowych,” in Rośliny w życiu codziennym mieszkańców średniowiecznego Krakowa, ed. A. Mueller-Bieniek, 11–23 (Krakow, 2012). 4. A. Mueller-Bieniek, ed., Rośliny w życiu codziennym mieszkańców średniowiecznego Krakowa (Krakow, 2012). 5. A. Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny spożywane w średniowiecznym Krakowie na podstawie danych archeologicznych,” Krzysztofory. Zeszyty Naukowe Muzeum Historycznego Miasta Krakowa, no. 28 (2010): 151–62; and A. Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe w badaniach archeobotanicznych średniowiecznego Krakowa, in Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym, 25–113. 6. A. Mueller-Bieniek and A. Walanus, “Codzienność mieszkańców średniowiecznego Krakowa w świetle analizy statystycznej danych archeobotanicznych,” in Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym, 115–65. 7. A. Mueller-Bieniek, A. Walanus, and E. Zaitz, “Cultivated Plants in Medieval Kraków (Poland), with Special Reference to Amaranth (Amaranthus lividus L. cf. var. lividus) and Ruderal Communities,” Acta Palaeobotanica 55, no. 1 (2015): 97–114. 8. A. Zemanek, “Wybrane rośliny średniowiecznego Krakowa w polskich zielnikach renesansu,” in Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym, 211–42. 9. A. Bieniek, A. Wacnik, and Z. Tomczyńska, “Rośliny z późnośredniowiecznych warstw archeologicznych na Rynku Głównym w Krakowie. Raport z badań prowadzonych w 2004 roku,” Materiały Archeologiczne 36 (2006): 201–19; and A. Mueller-Bieniek and A. Wacnik, “Badania średniowiecznego materiału roślinnego z terenu Okołu i okolic Rynku Głównego w Krakowie—porównanie danych karpologicznych i palinologicznych,” in Wpływ człowieka na roślinność Krakowa i okolic w okresie górnego czwartorzędu: VIII Polska Konferencja Paleobotaniki Czwartorzędu. Kraków, 6–9 June 2017, ed. D. Nalepka and R. Stachowicz-Rybka (Krakow, 2017), 75. 10. Further, see Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym. 11. K. Wasylikowa, “Plant Remains from Early and Late Medieval Time Found on the Wawel Hill in Cracow,” Acta Palaeobotanica 19 (1978): 115–200; Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 32, 33, 41–44. Figures 3.1–3.7 were collated by Agnieszka Sojka, for which I express heartfelt thanks. Thanks go to Emil Zaitz for providing archaeological documentation. 12. E. Zaitz, Sprawozdanie z badań archeologicznych prowadzonych przy budowie podziemi pod wschodnią częścią dziedzińca Pałacu Biskupa Erazma Ciołka na terenie posesji ul. Kanonicza 17 w Krakowie (wykopy XXXIV–XXXIX) (Krakow, 2005). 13. Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 33–36, 44–46; and Mueller-Bieniek, Walanus, and Zaitz, “Cultivated Plants,” 97–114.

NOTES TO PAGES 74–81

14. Zaitz, Sprawozdanie z badań; and Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 34, 35, 44–46. 15. H. Piękoś-Mirkowa and Z. Mirek, Flora Polski: Atlas roślin chronionych (Warsaw, 2003). 16. For more on the botanical composition of nightshade samples and finds in other regions, see Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 25–113. 17. Helmut Kroll, information provided by email. 18. Early modern Clysma, a port on the Egyptian Red Sea coast. See T. Lewicki, Źródła arabskie do dziejów Słowiańszczyzny, vol. 2, part 1 (Wrocław, 1969), 29, 76. 19. J. Rostafiński, Średniowieczna historya naturalna w Polsce, vol. 1 (Krakow, 1900), 172. 20. Helmut Kroll, “Literature on Archaeological Remains of Cultivated Plants 1981– 2004,” accessed September 28, 2017, http://www.archaeobotany.de/database.html. 21. M. Hajnalová, “Early Farming in Slovakia: An Archaeobotanical Perspective,” in The Origins and Spread of Domestic Plants in Southwest Asia and Europe, ed. S. Colledge and J. Conolly (Walnut Creek, CA, 2007), 308. 22. Celandine seeds contain elaiosomes, fleshy structures rich in fats, and a valuable food for ants, which thus help spread the seeds. 23. Regarding archaeological sources, for example, the radiocarbon dating of previous finds of subfossile, carbonized millet (Panicum miliaceum) from Neolithic features has always yielded much younger dates than the archaeological context: G. Motuzaite-Matuzeviciute et al., “The Early Chronology of Broomcorn Millet (Panicum miliaceum) in Europe,” Antiquity 87 (2013): 1073–85. In written sources, the naming of plants is generally ambiguous. 24. B. Broda and J. Mowszowicz, Przewodnik do oznaczania roślin leczniczych, trujących i użytkowych (Warsaw, 2000). 25. Mueller-Bieniek and Walanus, “Codzienność mieszkańców,” 128, 154, 155; and Mueller-Bieniek, Walanus, and Zaitz, “Cultivated Plants,” 97–114. 26. A. Maurizio, Pożywienie roślinne i rolnictwo w rozwoju dziejowym (Warsaw, 1926), 58–62. 27. Wasylikowa, “Plant Remains,” 161; Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 94. 28. Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 102, 103; K. Kluk, Dykcyonarz roślinny, w którym podług układu Linneusza są opisane rośliny nietylko kraiowe [ . . . ] ale oraz y cudzoziemskie [ . . . ] z poprzedzaiącym wykładem słow botanicznych y kilkorakim na końcu regestrem., vol. 3, R–Z (Warsaw, 1788); and S. Dowgielewicz, Roślinne surowce włókiennicze (Warsaw, 1954), 236–38. 29. Maurizio, Pożywienie roślinne, 88. 30. E. Zaitz, verbal information. 31. W. Komorowski and A. Sudacka, Rynek Główny w Krakowie (Wrocław, 2008), 40. 32. C. Buśko, “Z badań archeologicznych nad miastami południowej Polski. Rynek Główny w Krakowie w świetle prac przeprowadzonych w latach 2005–2007,” Archaeologia Historica 32 (2007): 229. 33. C. Buśko, verbal information. E. Zaitz, verbal information. 34. For the reference to St. John, see Kluk, Dykcyonarz roślinny, 47, 48; and for the other references, see Rostafiński, Średniowieczna historya, 236. 35. C. Buśko, verbal information.

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36. Mueller-Bieniek and Walanus, “Codzienność mieszkańców,” 142, 146, 150. 37. M. Woch, A. Mueller-Bieniek, and A. Urbisz, “Glaucium corniculatum (Papaveraceae): średniowieczny efemerofit we florze polskiej,” Fragmenta Floristica et Geobotanica 15 (2008): 223–30. 38. Broda and Mowszowicz, Przewodnik do oznaczania. 39. Samples Ref_4, RG9_d, RGCW_8, RGXIII_4: Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 37–41. 40. Rostafiński, Średniowieczna historya, 245. 41. Broda and Mowszowicz, Przewodnik do oznaczania; and A. Mueller-Bieniek and M. Woch, “Właściwości użytkowe i ekologiczne oraz kody roślin znalezionych w warstwach archeologicznych średniowiecznego Krakowa,” in Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym, 167–84. 42. A. Mueller-Bieniek, “Carrot (Daucus carota L.) in Medieval Kraków (S. Poland): A Cultivated Form?” Journal of Archaeological Science 37 (2010): 1725–30; and Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 89, 90, 92, 93. 43. D. Młodzianowska, Nasionoznawstwo: Podręcznik dla techników hodowli roślin i nasiennictwa (Warsaw, 1981), 103. 44. RGCW_11: Mueller-Bieniek, “Rośliny użytkowe,” 39. 45. Mueller-Bieniek, “Carrot (Daucus carota L.),” 1727. 46. P. Hanelt, Mansfeld’s Encyclopedia of Agricultural and Horticultural Crops (Except Ornamentals) (Berlin, 2001), 1266. 47. Hanelt, Mansfeld’s Encyclopedia, 1266, 1267. 48. D. Zohary, M. Hopf, and E. Weiss, Domestication of Plants in the Old World (Oxford, 2012), 160. 49. J. Stolarczyk and J. Janick “Carrot: History and Iconography,” Chronica Horticulturae 51 (2011). 50. Stolarczyk and Janick, “Carrot”; and Hanelt, Mansfeld’s Encyclopedia. 51. Further, see Mueller-Bieniek, “Carrot (Daucus carota L.),” 1725–30. 52. Rostafiński, Średniowieczna historya, 259, 260: “adventive and unknown [species]” (gościa i nieznaioma), according to S. Syreniusz (1540–1611). 53. Bieniek, Wacnik, and Tomczyńska, “Rośliny z późnośredniowiecznych,” 201–19. 54. Ł. Łuczaj et al., “Manna Grass (Glyceria) in Poland: The Use and Economic Value of This Wild Cereal from the Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century,” Human Ecology, no. 40 (2012): 721–33. 55. K. Wasylikowa, “Makroskopowe szczątki roślin znalezione w warstwie średniowiecznej na Rynku Głównym w Krakowie,” Materiae Archeologica 6 (1965): 191–96, and later identifications of the same by that author. 56. Further, see Mueller-Bieniek, Rośliny w życiu codziennym. 57. Mueller-Bieniek and Walanus, “Codzienność mieszkańców,” 115–65.

Chapter 4: A City Is Not an Island 1. D. Schott, “Resources of the City: Towards a European Urban Environmental History,” in Resources of the City: Contributions to an Environmental History of Modern Europe, ed. D. Schott, B. Luckin, and G. Massard-Guilbaud, 1–27 (Aldershot, 2005); and G. Billen, J.

NOTES TO PAGES 89–95

Garnier, and S. Barles, “History of the Urban Environmental Imprint: Introduction to a Multidisciplinary Approach to the Long-Term Relationships between Western Cities and Their Hinterland,” Regional Environmental Change 12, no. 2 (2012): 249, 250. 2. J. M. Małecki, Studia nad rynkiem regionalnym Krakowa w XVI wieku (Warsaw, 1963); M. Kulczykowski and M. Frančić, Kraków jako ośrodek towarowy Małopolski zachodniej w drugiej połowie XVIII wieku (Warsaw, 1963); and H. Madurowicz and A. Podraza, Regiony gospodarcze Małopolski zachodniej w drugiej połowie XVIII wieku (Wrocław, 1958). 3. Laser scanning of land relief has given us studies, including in Poland, that have identified the locations of old furnaces (charcoal kilns) for burning charcoal in certain forest complexes. See Paweł Rutkiewicz et al., “Charcoal Kilns as a Source of Data on the Past Iron Endustry (an Example from the River Czarna Valley, Central Poland),” Environmental and Socio-economic Studies 5, no. 3 (2017): 12–22. 4. A. Wyrobisz, Szkło w Polsce od XIV do XVII wieku (Wrocław, 1968) 181–83. 5. The extent of felling for glass production is evidenced by the names of numerous places derived from the Polish word huta (referring to smelting works, and at that time exclusively to glass-smelting works), such as Huta, Hucisko, and the like, which were established at the sites of former plants. 6. Wyrobisz, Szkło, 21–25, 29, 30, 35, 36. 7. P. Bairoch, Cities and Economic Development: From the Dawn of History to the Present (Chicago, 1988), 14. 8. F. Krausmann, “A City and Its Hinterland: Vienna’s Energy Metabolism 1800–2006,” in Long Term Socio-Ecological Research: Studies in Society-Nature Interactions across Spatial and Temporal Scales, ed. S. Singh, H. Haberl, M. Chertow et al. (New York, 2013), 259, 260. 9. The calorific value of charcoal is about twice that of dry firewood, but to produce 1 kg of charcoal, at least 5 kg of wood is needed. 10. Current data on the abundance of wood in forests were adopted assuming the prevalence of deciduous trees (75 percent), which were especially valued for the production of charcoal (e.g., beech). This gives about 260 m3 of wood per hectare of felled forest. 11. J. Konopka, Wieś Mogilany: Monografia (Krakow, 1885), 7, 13; Słownik historyczno-geograficzny województwa krakowskiego w średniowieczu, part 3, issue 2, Krzepice–Lasocice, ed. F. Sikora (Krakow, 1997), 246–48 (from 1429 there is also information about a serf from nearby Sułkowice who supplied coal to Krakow); Słownik . . . , part 4, issue 3, Mieszczyński Staw—Mogilany, ed. W. Bukowski (Krakow, 2011), 682, 683. In this vicinity, the potential vegetation was broadleaf forest, with plenty of oak—M. Matuszkiewicz, Potential Natural Vegetation of Poland (Potencjalna roślinność naturalna Polski) (Warsaw, 2008), map sheet D3. 12. Małecki, Studia, 39. 13. Lustracja województwa krakowskiego 1564, part 1, ed. J. Małecki (Warsaw, 1962) [hereafter: Lustracja 1564], 201–213; Lustracja województwa krakowskiego 1659–1664, part 1–3, ed. A. Falniowska-Gradowska and F. Leśniak (Warsaw, 2005) [hereafter: Lustracja 1659–1664], 266–82; Lustracja województwa krakowskiego 1765, part 1, Powiaty sądecki, szczyrzycki, biecki, czchowski oraz księstwa zatorskie i oświęcimskie, ed. A. Falniowska-Gradowska (Warsaw, 1973) [hereafter: Lustracja 1765], 92. 14. A. Falniowska-Gradowska, Studia nad społeczeństwem województwa krakowskiego w XVIII wieku. Struktura własności ziemskiej i użytkowania gruntów w świetle katastru józefiń-

187

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skiego (Warsaw, 1982), 170–73, 176–79. The other data on usable areas quoted in the text are also taken from this publication. 15. Lustracja 1659–1664, pp. 342, 430. The natural vegetation around Żywiec is mainly deciduous forests of hornbeam and beech. Matuszkiewicz, Potential Natural Vegetation. 16. Information about sheep rearing in Porąbka and the renting of huts to Wallachian herdsmen was already contained in the inspection of 1564, but one hundred years later sheep herding had become even more important (Lustracja 1564, pp. 244–46, 250; Lustracja 1659–1664, pp. 126–130, 248, 250; Lustracja 1765, pp. 253–257, 269, 270). 17. These areas are potential habitats of deciduous forests—Matuszkiewicz, Potential Natural Vegetation. 18. Lustracja województwa krakowskiego 1789, part 1, Powiat krakowski, proszowicki i ksiąski, ed. A. Falniowska-Gradowska and I. Rychlikowa (Warsaw, 1962) [hereafter: Lustracja 1789], 80; Archiwum Narodowe w Krakowie [hereafter: ANK], Akta miasta Krakowa [hereafter: AmK], Mag I 399, p. 419. 19. ANK, AmK, Mag I 399, pp. 871–89. 20. Volumina Legum 7 (Petersburg, 1860), 162–63. 21. E. Barwiński, “Kraków na początku XIX wieku,” Rocznik Krakowski 18 (1919): 38. 22. ANK, AmK, Mag I 399 (promulgation from December 18, 1801) all property owners had to then formally acknowledge having familiarized themselves with the rules for coal burning; Gazeta Krakowska, no. 15 (1802), February 21 (supplement). 23. E. Pietraszek, “Poszukiwania górnicze w południowej Małopolsce na przełomie XVIII i XIX w.,” Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej 9, no. 2 (1961): 67. 24. M. Górkiewicz, Ceny w Krakowie w latach 1796–1914 (Poznań, 1950), 191 (the first sporadic record concerns the year 1804); a coal warehouse is mentioned in documents from 1816—ANK, Wolne Miasto Kraków [hereafter: WMK] V-144, pp. 1, 7. 25. ANK, AmK, Mag I 399, s. 1133–1153—document of February 24, 1814, coal imports were estimated at 500,000 korzec (1 korzec = approx. 123 liters). 26. A. Grabowski, Kraków i jego okolice (Krakow, 1836), 240. 27. The checkerboard division of fields between farmers of these villages used just this three-field system of cultivation; see A. Prochownik, “Przemiany struktury osadniczo-agrarnej wsi powiatu proszowickiego od połowy XIX wieku do 1960 r. (na wybranych przykładach),” Dokumentacja Geograficzna, no. 6 (1965): 41, 129. 28. The Josephine cadastre of 1785–87 mentions the cultivation of potatoes in Libertów and Mogilany—Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in Lviv [hereafter: TsDIAL of Ukraine], f. 19, VIII 94; f. 19, VIII 121; continuous records exist for potato prices in Krakow since 1810 (Górkiewicz, Ceny, 104). 29. K. Boroda, Geografia gospodarcza Królestwa Polskiego w XVI wieku (Białystok, 2016), 553. There are no known later estimates of beer production, but it was probably less than in the sixteenth century, and the importance of barley in its production increased. 30. ANK, Archiwum miasta Kazimierza pod Krakowem [hereafter: AmKK], 744— Regestr wybierania accizy w Kazimierzu, ktora sie poczęła in anno praesenti 1658 . . . według constitutiey seymu generalnego warszawskiego . . . [hereafter: Akcyza 1658/1659], the title indicates that the register includes Kazimierz, near Krakow, but the area of supply to other parts of the agglomeration certainly did not differ significantly. Other taxation

NOTES TO PAGES 100–104

materials of the time, such as customs registers for the city of Krakow, did not record grain supplies. 31. J. Bieniarzówna and J. M. Małecki, Dzieje Krakowa, vol. 3, Kraków w latach 1796–1918 (Krakow, 1979), 110–15. 32. Calculation made on the basis of Skorowidz gmin Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej: ludność i budynki oraz powierzchnia ogólna i użytki rolne: na podstawie tymczasowych wyników drugiego powszechnego spisu ludności z dn. 9.XII 1931 r., part 3, Województwa południowe (Warsaw, 1933). 33. M. Żyła, “Water and Air Properties of Eroded Loess Soils of the Proszowice Plateau,” Folia Geographica. Series Geographica-Physica 40 (2009): 91–103; A. Kowalczyk and S. Smoroń, “Określenie erozji wodnej gleb w zlewni i ilości transportowanej zawiesiny w wodach potoku Ścieklec,” Woda-Środowisko-Obszary Wiejskie 16, no. 4(56) (2016): 43–55. 34. Stefanyk National Science Library, Manuscripts Department, f. 141 (the Aleksander Czołowski collection), I 1539, p. 1. 35. M. Frančić, “Kraków produkujący i konsumujący,” in Kulczykowski and Frančić, Kraków jako ośrodek, 169. Mariusz Kulczykowski, Mirosław Frančić, Kraków jako ośrodek towarowy Małopolski zachodniej w drugiej połowie XVIII wieku. Kraków produkujący i konsumujący, Warszawa 1963. 36. Lustracja 1789, pp. 75–78. 37. Statystyka Miasta Krakowa, ed. J. Kleczyński, issue 3 (Krakow, 1892), 144, 148, 149; Statistische Übersicht der Königliche Galizien und Lodomerien im Jahre 1840 [1840], bmw, Table 23; and R. Sandgruber, Die Anfänge der Konsumgeselschaft. Konsumgüterverbrauch, Lebensstandard und Alltagskultur in Österreich im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert (Munich, 1982), 137. 38. A. Izdebski, G. Koloch, T. Słoczyński, and M. Tycner, “Historia przyrodniczo-gospodarcza Polski w świetle analizy ilościowej danych palinologicznych,” Historyka 45 (2015): 155, 158. 39. F. Kiryk, “Dzieje powiatu myślenickiego w okresie przedrozbiorowym,” in Monografia powiatu myślenickiego, vol. 1, Historia, ed. R. Reinfuss (Krakow, 1970), 150. 40. Akcyza 1658/1659, passim. 41. Falniowska-Gradowska, Studia, passim. 42. ANK, WMK VI-65, p. 453. 43. M. Marassé, “Gospodarcze stosunki w Galicyi,” in Encyklopedya Rolnictwa i wiadomości związek z niem mających, ed. J. T. Lubomirski, E. Stawiski, and S. Przystański, vol. 2, D–G (Warsaw, 1874), 876. 44. ANK, AmK, 2166 (year: 1651), 2167 (year: 1653), 2169 (year: 1655), 2173 (year: 1658), passim. 45. Małecki, Studia, 75–77, 90, 91. Some animals (mainly cows and pigs) were also kept within the city walls—P. Miodunka, “Zaopatrzenie aglomeracji krakowskiej w żywność w połowie XVII wieku: Zarys problemu,” in Kraków—metropolia, vol. 3, Dziedzictwo, ed. J. Purchla (Krakow, 2018), 16. 46. S. Becher, Statistische Übersicht des Handels der österreichischen Monarchie mit dem Auslande während der Jahre 1829 bis 1841 (Stuttgart, 1841), 158, 159. Cattle and sheep exports from Galicia to the Free City of Krakow were decidedly less.

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47. B. Ogórek, Niezatarte piętno? Wpływ I wojny światowej na ludność miasta Krakowa (Krakow, 2018), 159–67. 48. Rocznik Statystyki Galicyi, vol. 1, 1886 (Lwów, 1886), 126, 127; Podręcznik Statystyki Galicyi, vol. 8, 1908 (Lwów, 1908), 154–57. 49. Podręcznik Statystyki Galicyi, vol. 9, 1913, part 2 (Lwów, 1913), 187.

Chapter 5: Pollution in Early Modern Krakow 1. M. Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia (wiek XVI i pierwsza połowa XVII),” in Kraków: Studia nad rozwojem miasta, ed. J. Dąbrowski (Krakow 1957), 203. 2. Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia,” 204–5. 3. Archiwum Narodowe w. Krakowie (hereafter: ANK), Akta miasta Krakowa (hereafter: AmK), MS 2627, 2628; Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia,” 212. 4. Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia,” 220. 5. M. Wardas, E. Zaitz, and M. Pawlikowski, “Rozpoznanie historycznych nawarstwień i podziemnej infrastruktury Krakowa, Kazimierza i ich przedmieść,” Roczniki Geomatyki 5, no. 8 (2007): 242. 6. Wardas, Zaitz, and Pawlikowski, “Rozpoznanie historycznych nawarstwień,” 240. 7. Wardas, Zaitz, and Pawlikowski, “Rozpoznanie historycznych nawarstwień,” 242. 8. A. Garbacz-Klempka, M. Wardas-Lasoń, and S. Rzadkosz, “Miedź i ołów: zanieczyszczenia historyczne na Rynku Głównym w Krakowie,” Archives of Foundry Engineering 12, no. 1 (2012): 33. 9. Wardas, Zaitz, and Pawlikowski, “Rozpoznanie historycznych nawarstwień,” 237–39. 10. M. Wardas and J. Such, “Analiza zawartości metali ciężkich w nawarstwieniach historycznych Krakowa i ich rola wskaźnikowa w badaniach archeologicznych,” Geologia 35, no. 1 (2009): 111. 11. K. Moszyński, Kultura ludowa Słowian, vol. 1, Kultura materialna (Krakow, 1929), 610. 12. W. Ochmański and W. Barabasz, “Mikrobiologiczne zagrożenie budynków i pomieszczeń mieszkalnych oraz ich wpływ na zdrowie (syndrom chorego budynku),” Przegląd Lekarski, no. 57 (2000): 419–23; Wardas, Zaitz, and Pawlikowski, “Rozpoznanie historycznych nawarstwień,” 239. 13. J. Laberschek, “Rozwój krakowskiego zespołu osadniczego ‘extra muros’ XIII–XVIII w.,” in Kraków: Nowe studia nad rozwojem miasta, ed. J. Wyrozumski (Krakow, 2007), 320–21. 14. G. Braun, Civitates Orbis Terrarum, vol. 6 (Colonia Agrippina, 1617), f. 43. 15. Laberschek, “Rozwój krakowskiego zespołu osadniczego,” 321. 16. K. Pieradzka, “Rozkwit średniowiecznego Krakowa,” in Dąbrowski, Kraków: Studia nad rozwojem miasta, 185. 17. Pieradzka, “Rozkwit średniowiecznego Krakowa,” 187. 18. P. Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę i usuwanie nieczystości w miastach stref bałtyckiej i sudecko-karpackiej w XIII–XVI wieku (Wrocław, 2011), 19–20. 19. U. Sowina, “Zanieczyszczenie wód w miastach średniowiecznych i wczesnonowożytnych,” Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej 53, no. 3–4 (2005): 329n88. 20. A different approach was proposed by some academicians and humanists such as Piotr Wedelicki, a professor of medicine and rector of the Krakow Academy. He inter-

NOTES TO PAGES 114–123

preted in the Aristotelian spirit the interdependence between the quality of water and its influence on human health. U. Sowina, Water, Towns and People: Polish Lands against a European Background until the Mid-16th Century (Frankfurt am Main, 2016), 37. 21. U. Sowina, “Gospodarowanie wodą w Krakowie a źródła jej zanieczyszczeń na przełomie średniowiecza i nowożytności,” in Nawarstwienia historyczne miast Europy Środkowej, ed. M. Wardas-Lasoń, 607–14 (Wrocław, 2017); and Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę, 19. 22. “Sigismundus Augustus rex Poloniae consulibus Cracouiensibus mandate, ne sordes in fluvium Rudawa deducere permittant,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 1, issue 1 (1507–1586), ed. F. Piekosiński (Krakow, 1885), 284. 23. Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę, 44. 24. E. Ligęza, Wodociągi dawnego Krakowa do połowy XVII wieku (Krakow, 1971), 32–35, 43–54. 25. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 3 (1598–1606), ed. K. Jelonek-Litewka, A. Litewka, and Ł. Walczy (Krakow, 2000), doc. no. 823, p. 176. 26. “Senatus consultum de fluvio Rudawa Mundo servando,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 2 (1587–1696), ed. F. Piekosiński, Krakow 1892, p. 884. 27. J. Bieniarzówna and J. M. Małecki, Dzieje Krakowa, vol. 2, Kraków w wiekach XVI– XVIII w. (Krakow, 1984), 20–29. 28. Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę, 19–20. 29. S. Dryja, “Technologia produkcji słodowniczej i piwowarskiej w średniowieczu i na początku ery nowożytnej w Krakowie,” in Wytwórczość w Polsce średniowiecznej i nowożytnej, ed. J. Chudziakowa and A. Sosnowska (Toruń, 2009), 187. 30. Dryja, “Technologia produkcji,” 188. 31. Dryja, “Technologia produkcji,” 202; Lustracja województwa krakowskiego 1564, part 1, ed. J. Małecki (Warsaw, 1962), 8–13. 32. S. Dryja and S. Sławiński, Krakowskie słodownie przełomu wieku XVI i XVII (Krakow, 2010), 149. 33. R. W. Unger, Beer in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Philadelphia, 2004), 118, 119. 34. Dryja and Sławiński, Krakowskie słodownie, 15. 35. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 3, no. 673, p. 24. 36. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1 (1568–1577), ed. K. Jelonek-Litewka, A. Litewka, and Ł. Walczy (Krakow, 1997), no. 172, p. 245. 37. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 2 (1578–1591), ed. K. Jelonek-Litewka, A. Litewka, and Ł. Walczy (Krakow, 1998), no. 233, p. 14. 38. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 107, pp. 176–77. 39. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 108, p. 177. 40. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 167, p. 241. 41. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 172, p. 245. 42. Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę, 60. 43. On malt production, see Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 3, no. 852, pp. 210–11; on beer, see Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 8, p. 35; the quotation is from Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 1, no. 149, p. 224. 44. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 2, no. 297, pp. 94–95.

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45. Lustracja dróg województwa krakowskiego z roku 1570, ed. B. Wyrozumska (Wrocław, 1971), 24, 58. 46. I. Hadelius and C. Velius, Skąd pochodzi nazwa Krakowa? Obrona przesławnego [ . . . ] Krakowa, trans. E. Buszewicz (Krakow, 1998), 1. 47. C. Buśko, “Zaplecze gospodarcze kamienicy mieszczańskiej: Urządzenia wodno-kanalizacyjne,” in Architektura Wrocławia, vol. 1, Dom, ed. J. Rozpędowski et al. (Wrocław, 1995), 97. 48. Księga wiertelnicza krakowska, part 2, no. 290, p. 85. 49. “Senatus consultum de ordine public conservando,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 1, issue 1, p. 301. 50. Z. Noga, “Rola samorządu w rozwoju miasta w XIII–XVIII wieku,” in Wyrozumski, Kraków: Nowe studia nad rozwojem miasta, 487–88. 51. “Pactum consulum Cracoviensium cum Stanislao Węgrzynek de luto et quisquiliis ex urbe evehendis,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1 (1587–1696), ed. F. Piekosiński (Krakow, 1890), 34–37. 52. “Senatus consultum de civitate emendanda,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 73. 53. “Publicatio senatus consulti de luto everrendo,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 232. 54. ANK, AmK, MS 3563, p. 207, 225, 227, 231, 235, 242. 55. Cembrzyński, Zaopatrzenie w wodę, 60. 56. Animal Manure Management, accessed March 2, 2018, https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/ wps/portal/nrcs/detail/national/technical/nra/rca/?cid=nrcs143_014211. 57. Rejestry gospód w Krakowie z lat 1632 i 1649: Ze zbiorów Biblioteki Naukowej PAU i PAN w Krakowie i Biblioteki Jagiellońskiej, ed. K. Follprecht (Krakow, 2005), 1–13, 118–33. 58. S. Tomkowicz, Domy i mieszkania w Krakowie w pierwszej połowie XVII wieku (Krakow, 1922), 7. 59. “Senatus consultum de ordine publico conservando,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 1, issue 1, p. 301. 60. “Promulgatio edicti regii de Securitate publica,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, (1587–1696), issue 1 (Krakow, 1890), 61. 61. “Publicatio senatus consulti de rebus urbanis in ordinem redigendis,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 230. 62. “Publicatio mandati, ne cives Cracovienses pecora in urbe alant,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 343. 63. “Publicatio senatus consulti de civibus ex locis peste infectis, domum redeuntibus,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 390. 64. Noga, “Rola samorządu,” 488; ANK, AmK, MS 1660, p. 123; and ANK, AmK, MS 2567, p. 17. 65. Tomkowicz, Domy i mieszkania w Krakowie, 10. 66. Tomkowicz, Domy i mieszkania w Krakowie, 10–11. 67. A. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem: Epidemie chorób zakaźnych w Rzeczypospolitej w XVI–XVIII wieku i ich następstwa demograficzne, społeczno-ekonomiczne i polityczne (Warsaw, 2000), 19.

NOTES TO PAGES 127–137

68. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem, 25. 69. Khotyn was the site of one of the major battles between the Polish-Lithuanian army and Ottoman forces. The Grand Hetman Jan Karol Chodkiewicz ordered that a fortified camp be built and there the forces of Sultan Osman II were held. The siege began on September 2, 1621, and was abandoned by the Turks on October 9, 1621, because of heavy losses and the first snowfalls. 70. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem, 30. 71. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem, 75–76. 72. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem, 83. 73. Karpiński, W walce z niewidzialnym wrogiem, 95 (sanitary cordon), 90 (barber surgeons), 92 (gravediggers). 74. “Sigismundus III. rex Poloniae consulibus Cracoviensibus mandat, ut proscipant, ne pestis Viennae grassans Cracoviam importaretur,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 61. 75. “Sigismundus III. rex Poloniae scribit consulibus Cracoviensibus, quomodo se peste grassante gerere debeant,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 30. 76. “Sigismund III. rex Poloniae proconsuli consulibusque Casimiriensibus mandate, ut vestes a hominibus peste mortuis relictas concremari faciant,” in Prawa, przywileje i statuta miasta Krakowa (1507–1795), vol. 2, issue 1, p. 31. 77. A brilliant case study of the disease of 1543 in Krakow was written by U. Sowina, “Kraków wobec zarazy z 1543 roku w świetle rachunków miejskich,” in Epidemie w dziejach Europy: Konsekwencje społeczne, gospodarcze i kulturowe, ed. K. Polek and Ł. Sroka, 169–85 (Krakow, 2016). 78. Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia,” 200, 202.

Chapter 6: Industrialization 1. B. Zbroja, “Monumentalne i eleganckie: Aleja Trzech Wieszczów,” in Modernizmy: architektura nowoczesności w II Rzeczypospolitej, vol. 1, Kraków i województwo krakowskie, ed. A. Szczerski (Krakow, 2013), 119. 2. Zbroja, “Monumentalne i eleganckie,” 123. 3. A. Szczerski, “Styl narodowy: Zakopane, Litawa, esperanto,” in Cztery nowoczesności: Teksty o sztuce i architekturze polskiej w XX wieku (Krakow, 2015), 35. 4. Szczerski, “Styl narodowy,” 35. 5. A. Delorme, “Stalinowska industrializacja przyczyną klęski ekologicznej Krakowa,” in Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa: Przyczyny, teraźniejszość, perspektywy ekorozwoju miasta, ed. M. Gumińska and A. Delorme (Krakow, 1990), 35. 6. See, for example, J. Wódz, “Społeczne skutki wywłaszczenia pod budowę Nowej Huty: Kilka socjologicznych refleksji dwadzieścia lat po badaniach empirycznych,” in M. Gumińska and A. Delorme, Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa, 100–102. 7. See, for example, D. Jarosz, “Modernisation through Contamination: Degradation of the Natural Environment in Poland (1945–1970) as Perceived by the Authorities and the Society,” Acta Poloniae Historica, no. 115 (2017): 5–35; See also Archiwum Akt Nowych, Biuro Listów i Inspekcji KC PZPR, sygn. XXVII/42 k. 128; Archiwum Narodowe w Kra-

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kowie—Oddział w Spytkowicach [hereafter: ANKr-OS], Wojewódzka Stacja Sanitarno-Epidemiologiczna w Krakowie [hereafter: WSSE Kr], sygn. 35: Sesja Wojewódzkiej Rady Narodowej “Człowiek a środowisko”—materiały i wystąpienia na sesje; and WSSE Kr, sygn. 342: Wysypiska odpadów komunalnych—protokoły z kontroli. 8. J. Adamczewski, S.O.S. dla Krakowa (Krakow, 1977), 68–69. 9. M. Szeliga, “Z widokiem na Skawinę,” in “Natura. Człowiek. Bunt,” special issue of Tygodnik Powszechny no. 16 (2011), ed. M. Olszewski, Ł. Kamiński, and W. Pięciak, 32. 10. T. Strzyżewski, Czarna księga cenzury PRL, vol. 1, Wydawnictwo Aneks (London, 1978), 41. 11. Strzyżewski, Czarna księga, 2:456–57. See also T. Strzyżewski, Wielka księga cenzury PRL w dokumentach (Warsaw, 2015), 247. 12. Strzyżewski, Wielka księga cenzury, 248. 13. Strzyżewski, Wielka księga cenzury, 250. 14. B. Kortus, “Ocena powojennego uprzemysłowienia w aspektach przestrzennym i ekologicznym,” in Gumińska and Delorme, Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa, 61. 15. D. Jarosz, “W poszukiwaniu początków dyskursu o degradacji środowiska w Polsce po II wojnie światowej,” paper presented at the conference “Historia zdrowia i choroby w Europie Środkowo-Wschodniej,” Warsaw, October 14–15, 2015. 16. Cz. Bywalec, “Industrializacja Krakowa: Przesłanki, przebieg i skutki,” in Gumińska and Delorme, Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa, 57. 17. Bywalec, “Industrializacja Krakowa,” 58. 18. Bywalec, “Industrializacja Krakowa,” 58. 19. Kortus, “Ocena powojennego uprzemysłowienia,” 61. 20. Kortus, “Ocena powojennego uprzemysłowienia,” 61. 21. Szeliga, “Z widokiem na Skawinę,” 32. 22. See Polski Klub Ekologiczny, Koło w Akademii Górniczo-Hutniczej im. Stanisława Staszica w Krakowie, Ocena stanu zdrowotnego mieszkańców województwa krakowskiego na tle warunków ekologicznych (Krakow, 1991). 23. Polski Klub Ekologiczny, Akademia Medyczna im. M. Kopernika w Krakowie, Ekologiczne zagrożenie zdrowia mieszkańców Krakowa: wybór materiałów z IV forum dyskusyjnego z cyklu Problemy ekologiczne Krakowa, Kraków, 2.VI.1981 (Krakow, 1981), 4–11. 24. See M. Litwińska, WiP kontra PRL: Ruch Wolność i Pokój 1985–1989 (Krakow, 2015); see also, accessed December 10, 2019, https://fundacjawip.wordpress.com/klub-kibica. 25. Polski Klub Ekologiczny, Koło w Akademii Górniczo-Hutniczej im. Stanisława Staszica w Krakowie, Stowarzyszenie Architektów Polskich Oddział w Krakowie, Quo vadis, Cracovia (jaki jest Kraków, a czym i jaki ma być w przyszłości?): Wybór materiałów V forum dyskusyjnego z cyklu “Problemy ekologiczne Krakowa” (Krakow, 1985), 11. 26. B. Domański, “Przemysłowe zagrożenia ekologiczne w oczach mieszkańców Krakowa i okolic,” in Gumińska and Delorme, Klęska ekologiczna Krakowa, 111–14. 27. Domański, “Przemysłowe zagrożenia ekologiczne,” 114.

Chapter 7: The History of Krakow Smog 1. B. Luckin, “‘The Heart and Home of Horror’: The Great London Fogs of the Late Nineteenth Century,” Social History 28, no. 1 (2003): 31–48; D. Laskin, “The Great London

NOTES TO PAGES 148–162

Smog,” Weatherwise 59, no. 6 (2006): 42–45; P. Thorsheim, Inventing Pollution: Coal, Smoke, and Culture in Britain since 1800 (Athens, OH, 2006); and W. M. Cavert, The Smoke of London: Energy and Environment in the Early Modern City (Cambridge, 2016). 2. B. Luckin, “Town, Country and Metropolis: The Formation of an Air Pollution Problem in London,” in Energie und Stadt in Europa: Von der vorindustriellen “Holznot” bis zur Ölkrise der 1970er Jahre, ed. D. Schott, 77–91 (Stuttgart, 1997); S. Mosley, The Chimney of the World: A History of Smoke Pollution in Victorian and Edwardian Manchester (Cambridge, 2001); and Thorsheim, Inventing Pollution. 3. On air pollution as a permanent feature of the modern city’s climate, see: A. Bokwa, “Klimat miasta a zanieczyszczenia powietrza,” Aura 9 (2016): 8–13; and A. Bokwa, “Smog jako element mezoklimatu Krakowa,” in Człowiek i jego działania: Spojrzenie geografa: Prace dedykowane Profesorowi Włodzimierzowi Kurkowi, ed. M. Drewnik and M. Mika, 61–69 (Krakow, 2017). 4. A. Palarz, “Zmienność inwersji temperatury powietrza nad Krakowem w świetle warunków cyrkulacyjnych,” Prace Geograficzne 138 (2014): 29–43. 5. S. Dryja and S. Sławiński, Krakowskie słodownie przełomu wieku XVI i XVII (Krakow, 2010), 18–19. 6. M. Friedberg, “Kraków w dobie odrodzenia (wiek XVI i pierwsza połowa XVII),” in Kraków: Studia nad rozwojem miasta, ed. J. Dąbrowski (Krakow, 1957), 192. 7. William Cavert, in a paper devoted to smog in early modern London, estimates that the level of air pollution in this city in the seventeenth century was comparable to the most polluted metropolises of modern Europe, Asia, or America. Cavert, Smoke of London, 32–39. 8. H. Josse, “Zima w Krakowie,” Nowa Reforma, no. 34 (1906): 2–3. 9. “Nieporządki na ulicy Rajskiej,” Nowa Reforma, no. 122 (1903): 2. 10. “Poranek po burzy,” Nowa Reforma, no. 248 (1915): 2. 11. “Towarzystwo dla Upiększania Miasta,” Nowa Reforma, no. 246 (1889): 3. 12. H. Josse, “Piece krakowskie,” Nowa Reforma, no. 261 (1904): 3. 13. For more on carbon monoxide, see “Alarm pożarny,” Nowa Reforma, no. 193 (1908): 1. 14. E. Śmiałowski, “Ogrzewanie budynków ropą,” Architekt, no. 4 (1904): 79. 15. The problem of smog was already appearing in the literature on environmental protection in the 1970s. See, for example, W. Bieroń, “Poselski alert pod Wawelem,” Aura, no. 1 (1976): 24–26; S. Dębska, “Kraków piękny i . . . brudny,” Aura, no. 8 (1976): 16–17. The problem of “poisoning the air” had even then been linked to industrial plants and exhaust emissions from cars and domestic stoves.

Chapter 8: The Power of Myth 1. P. Kubicki, Miasto w sieci znaczeń: Kraków i jego tożsamość (Krakow, 2010). 2. K. Frysztacki and Z. Mach, “Miasto—Kraków,” in O Krakowie raz jeszcze: Szkice do portretu miasta, ed. K. Frysztacki and Z. Mach (Krakow, 2008), 7. 3. P. Macnaghten and J. Urry, Alternatywne przyrody: Nowe myślenie o przyrodzie i społeczeństwie, trans. B. Baran (Warsaw, 2005), 27. 4. J. Torowska, Planty krakowskie i ich przestrzeń kulturowa (Krakow, 2012). Cf. also: F. Klein, Planty krakowskie (Krakow, 1914); and J. Radwański, Założenie plantacyj krakowskich

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przez Feliksa Radwańskiego a kończenie ich kosztem Rzeczypospolitej Krakowskiej przez Floryana Straszewskiego (Krakow, 1872). 5. J. Bieniarzówna and J. M. Małecki, Dzieje Krakowa, Vol. 3, Kraków w latach 1796–1918 (Krakow, 1985), 255–64. Cf. also S. Krzyżanowski et al., Kraków: Rozszerzenie granic 1909–1915 (Krakow, 1931). 6. J. Purchla, Jak powstał nowoczesny Kraków (Krakow, 1990), 26–72. 7. A. Grabowski, Historyczny opis miasta Krakowa i iego okolic (Krakow, 1822), 52–53. 8. S. Gieszkowski, Przewodnik krakowski na rok 1835 (Krakow, 1835), 250–51. 9. J. Mączyński, Pamiątka z Krakowa: Opis tego miasta i jego okolic, part 1 (Krakow, 1845), 179. 10. A. Napierkowski, Najnowszy ilustrowany przewodnik po Krakowie i okolicach (Krakow, 1883), 4. 11. Napierkowski, Najnowszy ilustrowany przewodnik, 6. 12. J. Jezierski, Józefa Jezerskiego ilustrowany przewodnik po Krakowie i okolicy [1913 reprint] (Łódź, 2009), 85. 13. H. d’Abancourt de Franqueville, Kraków i okolice: Przewodnik (Krakow, 1924), 179. 14. K. Estreicher, Kraków: Przewodnik dla zwiedzających miasto i jego okolice (Krakow, 1938), 64. 15. N. D. Wood, Becoming Metropolitan: Urban Selfhood and the Making of Modern Cracow (DeKalb, 2010), 182. 16. B. Stępniewska, Ogrody Krakowa (Krakow, 1977), 146–48. Cf. J. Torowska, Parki Krakowa, part 1 (Krakow, 2001), 55–72. 17. G. Lichończak-Nurek, “‘Ptasie królestwo,’ czyli bractwo kurkowe,” in Klejnoty i sekrety Krakowa: Teksty z antropologii miasta, ed. R. Goduli (Krakow, 1994), 196–98. 18. Torowska, Parki Krakowa, 60. 19. Torowska, Parki Krakowa, 47. 20. K. Żółciak and J. Żółciak, Park im. Wojciecha Bednarskiego (Krakow, 2007), 17–21. 21. A. Zachariasz, Park Krakowski (Krakow, 2009), 9–34. 22. J. Torowska, Park im. dra Henryka Jordana (Krakow, 2006). 23. Zachariasz, Park Krakowski, 11–12. 24. K. Bąkowski, Przewodnik po okolicach Krakowa (Krakow, 1909), 1. 25. A. Kozioł, Wielka Łąka czyli krótka historia krakowskich Błoń (Krakow, 2005). 26. J. Purchla in conversation with W. Kalwatem and J. Krawczykiem, “Na Błoniach i Plantach,” in Gry w miasto: Rozmowy z Jackiem Purchlą o jego Krakowie (Krakow, 2011), 243. 27. M. Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska, “Błonia,” in Poezje (Warsaw, 1958), 340. 28. A. Zagajewski, “Sycylia,” in Powrót (Krakow, 2003), 10. 29. “Miasta—ogrody,” Architekt, no. 8 (1912): 82. 30. “Za-mieszkiwanie 2012: Miasto ogrodów, miasto ogrodzeń, in W stulecie “Wystawy architektury i wnętrz w otoczeniu ogrodowem” [exhibition catalog] (Krakow, 2012), 41. 31. “Za-mieszkiwanie 2012,” 15. 32. P. Kubicki, “Symbolika Krakowa między nowoczesnością a ponowoczesnością,” in Frysztacki and Mach, O Krakowie raz jeszcze, 51. 33. S. Dębska, “Kraków piękny i . . . brudny,” Aura, no. 8 (1976): 16. 34. W. Bieroń, “Poselski alert pod Wawelem,” Aura, no. 1 (1976): 24.

NOTES TO PAGES 171–175

35. W. Krygowski, W moim Krakowie nad wczorajszą Wisłą (Krakow, 1980), 328. 36. S. Pagaczewski, “Zanurzeni w zieli,” in Witamy w Krakowie, ed. S. Peters (Krakow, 1959), 7–8. 37. E. Krzyżanowska-Kalkowska, Kraków: Spacery po mieście i okolicach (Krakow, 1978), 17. 38. Krzyżanowska-Kalkowska, Kraków, 50. 39. M. Mrowiec, Chcą upiększyć Krowodrzę dywanami z kwiatów, accessed April 9, 2020, http://www.dziennikpolski24.pl/artykul/3167964,chca-upiekszyc-krowodrze-dywanami-z-kwiatow,id,t.html. 40. “Miasto-ogród,” accessed April 9, 2020, http://www.okn.edu.pl/index.php/ propozycjekulturalne/ekologia/miasto-ogrod. 41. Website of Cecylia Malik, accessed April 9, 2020, http://www.cecyliamalik.pl/rzeki/ rz-opis.html. 42. M. Kurska, W. Pelowski, and R. Romanowski, Zrób to w Krakowie / Do It in Kraków, trans. A. Crestodlina (Warsaw, 2012), 147, 196–99. 43. Torowska, Parki Krakowa, 13.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

ARCHIVAL SOURCES Abbreviations AAN AmK AmKK ANK ANKr-OS APKr CPHAUL WMK WSEE Kr

Archiwum Akt Nowych Akta miasta Krakowa Archiwum miasta Kazimierza pod Krakowem Archiwum Narodowe w Krakowie Archiwum Narodowe w Krakowie—Oddział    w Spytkowicach Archiwum Państwowe w Krakowie Centralne Państwowe Historyczne Archiwum Ukra iny we Lwowie Wolne Miasto Krakow Wojewódzka Stacja Sanitarno-Epidemiologiczna w Krakowie

Manuscript Sources AAN, Biuro Listów i Inspekcji KC PZPR, sygn. XXVII/42 k. 128. ANK, AmK, 2166 (year 1651), 2167 (year 1653), 2169 (year 1655), 2173 (year 1658). ANK, AmK, Mag I 399 (Notice of 18.XII.1801). ANK, AmK, Mag I 399, p. 1133–1153—document of 24.II.1814. ANK, AmK, Mag I 399. ANK, AmK, Mag I 399. ANK, AmK, MS. 2627, 2628. ANK, AmKK, 744—Regestr wybierania accizy w Kazimierzu, ktora sie poczęła in anno praesenti 1658 . . . według constitutiey seymu generalnego warszawskiego . . . ANK, WMK V-144. ANK, WMK VI-65. ANKr-OS,WSSE Kr, sygn. 342: Wysypiska odpadów komunalnych—protokoły z kontroli. ANKr-OS,WSSE Kr, sygn. 35: Sesja Wojewódzkiej Rady Narodowej “Człowiek a środowisko”—materiały i wystąpienia na sesje. APKr, MS 1660. APKr, MS 3563. APKr., MS 2567. CPHAUL, f. 19, VIII 94. f. 19, VIII 121. Lwowska Naukowa Biblioteka im. W. Stefanyka NAN Ukrainy, Oddział Rękopisów, f. 141 (collection of Aleksander Czołowski), I 1539.

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CONTRIBUTORS

ANDRZEJ CHWALBA, a full professor in the Department of Historical Anthropology at the Institute of History of the Jagiellonian University, is the author of thirty books in several languages, including academic textbooks on Polish and general history of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and two volumes of the Dzieje Krakowa (History of Kraków). His recent publications focus on World War I. ADAM IZDEBSKI is a historian, an associate professor at the Institute of History of the Jagiellonian University, and the head of an independent research group working on environmental history at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena. He is interested in the social construction of landscapes, climate, economic and cultural history. He pioneers methods for the integrated use of natural scientific, archaeological and textual evidence in the study of the past. LESZEK KOWANETZ, a native of Krakow, is a senior lecturer in the Department of Climatology of the Institute of Geography and Spatial Management at the Jagiellonian University. His research interests include agro- and hydroclimatology, with a particular emphasis on the climatic water balance of mountain areas, and climate change during the instrumental period. PIOTR MIODUNKA is a historian (and graduate of law) and an assistant professor in the Department of Economic and Social History at the University of Economics in Krakow. His research focuses mainly on economic history, historical demography, and the history of small Polish towns from the late Middle Ages to the nineteenth century. He is the coauthor of monographs on cities (Pilzno, Wojnicz). Currently, as part a National Science Centre grant, he is working to determine the incidence, extent, and consequences of famine in southern Poland from the seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century. ALDONA MUELLER-BIENIEK is a biologist, archaeologist, and professor at the W. Szafer Institute of Botany of the Polish Academy of Sciences. She is 215

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interested in the role that plants have played in the development of societies in prehistoric and early historical times. In her work, she primarily uses the remains of fruits and seeds preserved in archaeological layers, including as a source for analyzing the proportions of stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes. For several years, her research has focused mainly on the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. MAŁGORZATA PRACZYK is a historian and professor at the Faculty of Historical Studies of the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań. She is interested in environmental history, posthuman studies, and studies on memory. Her research focuses on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Recently, she has studied the environmental history of Polish colonization of the former German lands after 1945, through the lens of settlers’ memoirs. RAFAŁ SZMYTKA, a historian and Netherlands specialist, is an assistant professor in the Department of Historical Anthropology at the Institute of History of the Jagiellonian University. He is interested in the history and culture of the Low Countries in the modern era, the history of image and iconography, the literary culture and social care of the cities of Brabant and Flanders. He has studied the influence of Olęder colonization on the environment of the Żuławy Wiślane fenlands. Since 2018, he has been tracing the fate of the inhabitants of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth lands in the Dutch East India Company. EWELINA SZPAK, a graduate of the Jagiellonian University, is an assistant professor at the T. Manteuffel Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Her research interests focus on the social and cultural history of the twentieth century, with a particular emphasis on the period after World War II. She has investigated the history of everyday life and the history of mentalities in the provincial areas of the Polish People’s Republic and is currently researching changes in health culture in Poland after 1945. KONRAD WNĘK is a historian and professor in the Department of Archives and Quantitative Methods at the Institute of History of the Jagiellonian University. He is interested in nineteenth- and twentieth-century economic, social, and environmental history as well as historical demography. In his work he makes extensive use of quantitative analysis methods and computer graphic representations of data. He also studies historical geography and the use of geographic information systems in historical research. He authored one of the first books on climate history in Poland focusing on the region of Krakow in 1848–1913.

INDEX

academies, institutes, schools, and universities: Academy of Mining and Metallurgy, 17; Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, 6; Accademia del Cimento, 29; AGH University of Science and Technology, 139, 159; Annales school, 5, 6; Charles University in Prague, 15; Institute of Geography of the modern Jagiellonian University, 28; Krakow Academy, 190n20; University of California in Santa Barbara, 3; University of Warsaw, 140; W. Szafer Institute of Botany of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Krakow, 70. See also Jagiellonian University; Polish Academy of Sciences; University of Krakow air pollution, 8, 24–25, 143, 147, 149, 158, 195n3; “air” mayors, 128; and epidemiological problems, 127–31; in London, 195n7; in Manchester, 8; problem of, 134, 151 aluminum works, 139, 140, 158 Anicia Juliana Codex. See Vienna, Dioscorides animal waste, 124–26, 128 arable land, 99–105 archaeobotanical research, 69, 71 Archaeological Museum, 20, 69 architects, 134, 157, 163, 165; Archi-

tecture and Interiors in Garden Surroundings, 170 astronomical observatory, 31, 32 atmospheric circulation, 24, 26, 31; and pollution, 134, 158 Austrian Empire, 6, 133, 151 Austrian Partition, 96, 133 bacteria, 65, 67, 127, 147 bakers, 91, 117, 149 Balthasar Behem Codex (Codex Picturatus), 114, 116, 117, 149, 150 barley, 99, 100, 101, 119, 188n29 Bednarski Park, 166, 169, 172; Wojciech Bednarski, 167 beer making, 44, 99–100, 128; production, 116, 118, 121, 188n29 Bereść, 55, 56 Białucha. See under Prądnik River Bielany, 35, 59, 63, 65, 66 black henbane (Hyoscyamus niger L.), 79, 81 blackspot hornpoppy (Glaucium corniculatum L. Rudolph), 81, 82 Błonia, 60, 65, 168–69, 172, 175 Bochnia, 21, 97 Bolesław the Chaste. See under royalty Borek, 134, 158 Botanical Garden, 20, 31 bread cereals, 100, 106 breweries, 90, 91, 100, 116–17, 131, 148, 217

218

INDEX

149, 151; and malt houses, 119, 121, 128. See also royal brewery brewing process, 119–20 Bronowice, 56, 102 buckwheat, 47, 99 Bujak, Franciszek, 5–6 butchers, 105, 109, 126–27

Czarna Wieś, 17, 102 Czechs, 13, 39, 181n2

carbon monoxide, 150, 156 Carpathian Mountains, 26, 53; Foothills, 19 carpology, 69, 70 carrots, 102; Daucus carota L., 83–86, 87 catnip, 79, 81 cattle routes, 104, 105, 106 celandine, 73, 74–75, 87, 185n22 cemeteries, 58, 65, 78, 80, 125, 128 censorship, 140, 142 cesspits. See privies charcoal, 90, 91–93, 95, 96, 187n3 city council, 50, 61, 63, 114–16, 121, 123–26, 131, 156 city gates, 20, 21, 60, 110, 119, 121, 129. See also individual names climate. See weather Cloth Halls, 108, 110 coal, 99, 107, 132, 159; bituminous, 91, 97, 134, 147; prices, 97, 98, 150, 157; smoke, 147, 148 Cobbler’s Gate, 112, 118, 123 convents, 109; of the Norbertine Sisters, 57; of the Reformed Franciscans, 45; Sacred Heart, 65. See also monasteries coopers, 90, 118 craftspeople, 47, 90, 148, 149 craftwork, 111, 113, 149 crayfish, 48, 51

ecological awareness, 3, 11, 137–38, 142–46, 163, 171 elemental disasters, 6, 10 emissions, 139, 140, 144, 145 environmental history, 3, 5, 6, 158, 179n14, 179n19; historians, 3, 7, 9 environmental justice, 11, 144, 158, 171 epidemics, 6, 53, 58, 65, 127, 128, 130. See also plague, the excise register, 95, 100, 101, 102, 104, 105. See also taxation

deadly nightshade seeds, 72, 74, 87 Dębnicki, 60, 62 Dobczyce, 91, 103 Dunajec River, 55, 103

factories, 47, 51, 136, 141, 149 factories and industrial plants: Bonarka Inorganic Industrial Plant, 136; chemical plants near Oświęcim, 49; electrolysis department at the aluminum works in Skawina, 144; Polfa Pharmaceutical Plant, 136; Puławy nitrogen plant, 140; shoe or agricultural machinery manufacturer, 145; soap and dyes manufacture, 90; Solvay Sodium Plant in Borek and the Bonarka Chemical Plant, 158; South Łódź Silk Industry Plant, 141 famines, 6, 35, 58–59, 77 firewood, 41, 91–93, 154 fishing, 48, 49, 50, 105 flooding, 35–36, 46, 52–63

INDEX

Florian Gate, 17, 20 fog, 25, 151. See also smoke forest management, 90, 92–93, 95, 96–97; deciduous forests, 188n15, 188n17; deforestation, 6, 10, 55 forges, 90, 91 fortifications, 56, 133–34, 162 Freedom and Peace Movement (Ruch Wolność i Pokój), 144, 145 fruit, 102, 104, 106 fuel, 4, 36, 92. See also charcoal; coal; firewood; wood Galicia, 58, 97, 99, 135; agricultural resources of, 103–7, 189n46; Galician Slaughter, 59 Garbary, 14, 111, 112, 113 garden cities, 133–35, 146, 163–64, 170, 172–73, 175 Garncarska (Potters’) Street. See Ulica Garncarska Gazeta Krakowska, 31, 32, 97. See also press, the Gdańsk, 20, 43, 90, 99, 103, 108 Germany, 13, 55, 135 glass production, 90–91, 95, 187n5 Gniezno. See Poznań Golden Age, 12, 16, 54 government: 125, 138, 147; Krakow Health Department, 145; local authorities, 140–42; Polish parliament, 141; Presidium of the Government, 140; Senate of the Free City of Krakow, 135 Grabowski, Ambroży, 97, 164 grains, 10, 54–55, 59, 69, 89, 99–101, 189n30; to process, 46, 113, 116 greater celandine. See celandine grinders, 19, 37, 47

groats, 47, 99, 113 guidebooks, 97, 164–65, 169, 172, 174–75 guilds, 50, 93, 113, 116, 118, 133 gutters, 110, 118–21, 125, 127 heavy metals, 19, 110, 111, 144 hemlock (Conium maculatum L.), 79, 81–82 Henryk Jordan Park. See Jordan Park historians: Paul Bairoch, 91; Jan Długosz, 48; from Europe, 5, 8; environmental, 3, 7, 9; Dariusz Jarosz, 141; Roderick Nash, 3; Christian Pfister, 38 historical data, 4, 6, 32, 35–37, 38–42, 180n29 historical meteorology, 31, 32, 39 hospitals, 58, 65 Howard, Ebenezer, 134, 163, 170 Hungary, 13, 21, 105 industrialization, 7, 9, 47, 135, 141 industrial pollution, 132, 138, 147 institutes. See academies, institutes, schools, and universities instrumental observations and measurements, 27, 28–35 Jagiellonian dynasty, 12, 15, 108 Jagiellonian University, 5, 28, 31–32, 65, 140 Jarosław, 55, 105 Jasło, 102, 105 Jordan Park, 166–68, 170, 172, 174 Josephine cadastre, the, 95, 96, 104, 105, 188n28

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INDEX

Kanonicza Street, 72–74, 76–78, 149 Katowice, 17; Steelworks, 142 Kawiory, 113, 126 Kazimierz, 20–21, 48, 61, 62, 104, 108, 115; the commune, 14, 16, 44, 50, 131; excise register, 95, 188n30; floods, 53, 55–57; and Krakow agglomeration, 91, 93, 99, 100, 108–10; and the Vistula, 63, 64, 112 Kazimierz the Great, 13, 15, 46 Khotyn, 128, 193n69 kings, 15, 46, 53, 55, 131; Sigismund Augustus, 114–15; Sigismund I, 108. See also Kazimierz the Great; Sigismund III Vasa; royalty Kleparz, 14, 16, 100, 108, 109–10, 125 Kobierzyn, 20, 104 Krakow Gate (Vistula Valley), 17, 19 Krakowski Park, 166, 167 Krowodrza, 20, 21, 172 Krupnicza Street, 47, 111, 123 Kryspinów, 20, 104 Krzemionki, 56, 57 Kurdwanów, 19, 104 Lanckorona, 89, 95 Lenin Steelworks. See Nowa Huta; Vladimir Lenin Steelworks Leo, Juliusz, 60, 133 lepers, 65, 113 Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel, 23, 24 Lesser Poland, 59, 89, 100, 102, 104, 112; and climate, 39, 41; and elemental disasters, 10, 21, 53, 54; plagues in, 128, 129–30; temperatures in, 39, 41, 154 Libertów, 104, 188n28 Lithuania, 6, 15, 128, 193n69.

See also Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth livestock, 104, 106, 128, 189nn45–46; cattle, 19, 90, 101, 126; in the city, 124–27; pigs, 105, 115–16, 128; sheep, 90, 96, 187n16, 188n16 Łobzów, 17, 102 Łódź, 137, 141, 175 London, 8, 91, 118, 147, 148, 151, 157, 195n7 Low Countries, the, 55, 150 Ludwinów, 56, 134 Lviv, 5, 16, 99, 102, 128 Magdeburg, 14, 20, 45, 89, 106 Main Market Square, 73–74, 78–87, 109, 110 Malik, Cecylia, 173–74, 175 malt houses, 47, 113, 116, 117, 119, 121, 128, 149 malting process, 116, 119 meadows, 55–56, 65, 80, 83, 103–4; city, 168, 169–70, 171, 175; and farming, 90, 96, 101 medicinal plants, 70, 81, 82, 84–86. See also celandine; St. John’s wort Medieval Climate Anomaly, 23, 41 medieval guilds. See guilds meteorology, 24, 28–29, 31–33, 38–39, 63, 154. See also weather Miechów Upland, 19, 20 mills, 19, 20, 46–47, 112, 116, 131, 174 Młynówka, 19, 21, 172; Królewska, 64 Modraszek Collective, 173, 174 Mogiła, 21, 45, 105, 121 Mogilany, 95, 97, 103, 188n28 monasteries, 45, 50, 66, 97. See also convents; Norbertine monastery

INDEX

monuments, 138–40 Myślenice, 21, 89, 91, 103 nettles (Urtica dioica L. and U. urens L.), 75, 81 New Gate, 120, 126 Nida River and valley, 89, 100 Nieciecza, 112, 115 Niepołomice forest, 19, 93, 97 nobles. See royalty and nobility Norbertine monastery, 48, 57, 62, 65 Nowa Huta, 136, 144, 170–71, 172, 175; steelworks, 17, 47, 137, 138, 142 Nowa Wieś, 17, 102 oats, 89, 101, 105 Odra River, 60, 140 Ojców royal estate, 97, 102; Ojców National Park, 140 Okół, 20, 71, 74–78, 81, 109, 131 Old Town, the, 55, 137, 138, 145, 154, 162 Olkusz Upland, 19, 47 Opatkowice, 102, 104 Orawa, 102, 103 Oświęcim, 17, 20, 49, 105 Ottoman Empire, 22, 193n69 Pagaczewski, Stanisław, 171–72 paleoclimatology, 38–39 palynology, 69, 70, 102 Paris, 8, 9, 58, 102, 157 particulate emissions, 138, 149, 156, 158 Partitions of Poland, 6, 16, 17 peas, 99, 102 People’s Republic of Poland, 132, 159, 172 Pfister, Christian, 24, 38

Piast dynasty, 12, 13, 15 PKE. See Polish Ecological Club (PKE) plague, the, 65, 109, 113, 126, 128–30 plants, 10, 75–77, 81, 102, 111; naming of, 185n23. See also under individual names Planty Park, 154, 162, 164–65, 168, 170, 172, 174–75 Płaszów, 21, 48, 55, 104, 105 Podgórze, 61, 133, 166, 172; floods in, 57, 58, 60; Society for Beautifying the City of, 167 Polish Academy of Sciences, 32, 70, 139 Polish Ecological Club (PKE), 143, 145 Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, 8, 12, 15, 31, 108, 109, 131, 149; dissolution of the, 6, 16, 67; epidemics in, 128–29 pollen, study, of, 70, 102 pollution, 8, 11, 17, 26, 140, 143, 158; Provincial Inspectorate for Environmental Protection, 49. See also emissions; fog; heavy metals; smoke potatoes, 58, 89, 100, 106 Poznań, 13, 128 Prądnik Fan, 20, 44, 45, 52 Prądnik River, 19, 43, 47, 48, 50, 173; known as “the Białucha,” 20, 45 precipitation, 24–29, 31, 34–36, 38–39. See also rainfall; snowfall; weather press, the, 22, 136–37, 141, 155–56; Central Press, Publications and Reports Office, 140; Gazeta Wyborcza, 174; journal for Krakow’s

221

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architects, 157; Krakow journal Aura, 158, 159, 171; newspapers, 22, 31, 51, 172; Nowa Reforma, 155; Polish Radio and magazines, 141 privies, 115–16, 121, 127, 131 Prokocim, 104, 145 Proszowice, 21, 96, 99, 100, 101 Proszowice Plateau, 17, 19, 100, 101 Prussia, 6, 17, 135 Prussian Silesia, 97, 98, 135 Raba River, 55, 96 radioactive dating methods, 39, 185n23 railways, 16, 59, 99, 105, 107, 135 rainfall, 26–27, 31, 34–36, 53, 56, 63, 101. See also precipitation rainwater, 38, 55, 110, 119, 131 religious orders and clerical hierarchy, 12, 13, 57, 66, 73, 121; Dominican Order, 46 Renaissance, the, 12, 70, 75, 86, 108 respiratory diseases, 111, 137, 144 Roman Empire, 13, 22 royal brewery, 44, 57 royal estates, 95, 96, 97, 102 Royal Millrace, 46, 63–65 royalty and nobility, 15, 20, 44, 45, 50, 96–97, 125; Bolesław the Chaste, 14, 45; at court, 93, 104; Grand Duke Ferdinand II, 29. See also kings Rudawa River, 20, 43–48, 64–65, 109, 111–16, 126; and mills, 19, 131 ruderal plants (“plant commoners”), 70, 81, 82 Russia, 6, 15, 16, 17, 100, 126, 133, 135 Ruthenia, 21, 104

rye, 47, 89, 99, 101, 106 Rzeszów, 21, 105 Sandomierz, 17, 21, 91 Sanok Lands, 104, 105 sawmills, 19, 47 scholars: from the Accademia del Cimento, 29; Sabine Barles, 9; Marcin Biem, 28; Czesław Bywalec, 141; William Cavert, 195n7; William Cronon, 9; Mieczysław Dąbrowski, 64; Jan Hadelius, 123; Andrzej Kozioł, 169; Paweł Kubicki, 170; Hubert Lamb, 23; Phil Macnaghten, 162; Czesław Miłosz, 12; M. Niezabitowski, 180n29; Jacek Purchla, 169; Władysław Szafer, 69–70; J. Szujski, 180n29; Wisława Szymborska, 12; John Urry, 162; Nathaniel D. Wood, 165 schools. See academies, institutes, schools, and universities scientists, 39, 86, 137, 139, 140; Ulf Büntgen, 39; Pedanius Dioscorides, 84–85; Roman Ingarden, 61; Józef Rostafiński, 75; Jan Śniadecki, 31; Tomasz Strzyżewski, 140 sewage, 49, 62, 63, 110, 131, 174; network, 111–19, 125, 126, 134 shingle making, 90, 95, 96 Sidzina, 101, 104 Siepraw, 97, 104, 105 Sigismund III Vasa, 12, 131 Silesia, 13, 20, 126, 137; Prussian, 97, 98, 135; Upper, 17, 47 6 Rivers project, 173, 174 Skałka, 48, 62, 112

INDEX

Skawa River, 95, 96 Skawina, 103, 104, 105, 136, 137, 139, 140, 158 Skotniki, 19, 90, 104 slaughterhouses, 126, 127, 128 Sławkowska, 109; Gate, 20, 115, 116 Small Market Square, 109, 111, 126 Śmiałowski, E., 157–58 smoke, 97, 111, 127, 137, 155, 171; coal, 147–49, 151; described, 156–57 snowfall, 26, 27, 34, 37, 38, 53, 193n69. See also precipitation soils, 17, 19, 39, 89, 101, 124; layers of, 71, 75, 81, 109–11; “night,” 102; pollution of, 141, 145 Soła River, 95–96 Stalinist period, 8, 132 Stalony-Dobrzański, Feliks, 140, 143 St. John’s wort (Hypericum perforatum L.), 78, 80 St. Nicholas Gate, 21, 117–18, 119 Stradom, 14, 57, 111 Strzelecki Park, 165, 169 Sucha, 91; Beskidzka, 95 Swedish Deluge, 108–9, 126 Szewska Gate. See Cobbler’s Gate Szewska Street. See Ulica Szewska tanneries, 109, 115, 128. See also Garbary tanners, 37, 44, 113–14, 116, 131 Tarnów, 21, 58, 105 Tatra Mountains, 39–41, 154 taxation, 53, 95–96, 108–9, 188n30. See also excise register temperature inversions, 25, 149 Tenczyński, 96, 97 thermal energy, 90–93 Thirty Years’ War, 127–28

three-field crop rotation, 99, 101, 188n27 timber floating, 93, 94 Town Hall, 86, 123 trade routes, 12, 19, 20, 21, 108 trams, 135, 151 tree rings, 38, 39 Ulica Garncarska (today Krupnicza), 45, 65, 123 Ulica Grodzka, 20, 109, 119 Ulica Reformacka, 110, 149 Ulica Retoryka, 64, 65 Ulica Szewska, 109, 125 Ulica Szpitalna, 126, 149 Ulicas, 125; Ulica Floriańska, 153; Ulica Franciszkańska, 57; Ulica Garbarska, 113; Ulica Gołębia, 149; Ulica Kanonicza, 149; Ulica Kosciuszki, 62; Ulica Krupnicza, 111; Ulica Poselska, 120; Ulica Scrofarum, 121; Ulica Świętego Jana, 110; Ulica Świętego Krzyża, 121; Ulica Świętego Marka, 126; Ulica Świętego Mikołaja, 121; Ulica Wenecja, 65 universities. See academies, institutes, schools, and universities University of Krakow, 28, 31, 123 urban heat islands, 25, 149 urban landscape, 9, 77, 87, 132 urban nature, 10, 146, 162, 166, 172 urban waste, 7, 9. See also waste management urbanization, 24–25, 52, 68, 91 Venice, 10, 37, 65 Vienna, 22, 60, 99, 102; Dioscorides, 85

223

224

INDEX

villages, 17, 19, 55, 56, 62, 95; and the steelworks, 137, 138 Vistulan Gate, 20, 57, 114, 123 Vistula Valley. See Krakow Gate Vladimir Lenin Steelworks, 136–37, 140, 141, 158 voivodeships, 100, 104, 123, 171 Von Thünen, Johann Heinrich, 88, 106 Warsaw, 17, 43, 99, 103, 128; Academy of Sciences in, 6; current capital, 12, 15; Duchy of, 134; and Florentine meteorological network, 29, 37; royal court transferred to, 12, 105, 131; University of, 140 wasteland, 55, 101 waste management, 47–48, 101, 123–26, 128, 131; dumps, 70, 75, 76, 109–11; from tanneries, 113, 115; urban, 7–9, 102, 119. See also privies water energy, 37, 106; waterwheels, 45, 47, 115 water management, 19, 44, 135, 143, 191n20; State Inspectorate for Water Protection, 141 waterworks, 45, 63, 65, 111–16, 131 Wawel, 19, 45, 63, 113; archeological finds at, 73, 74, 77, 81; hill, 12, 14, 15, 20, 44, 53, 71, 111; in Krakow, 109, 114, 131, 171; royal castle of, 10, 57, 108; Wawel Royal Castle Archaeological Laboratory, 69

weather, 23–24, 29, 31, 33, 42; anomalies, 35, 37, 40–41; “chronicles,” 28–29 Wedelicki, Piotr, 128, 190n20 Węgrzynek, Stanisław, 123, 124 wheat, 19, 47, 89, 99–101, 106 Wieliczka, 21, 56, 103, 104, 105, 106; salt mines, 96, 97 Wilga River, 19, 43 winters, 33, 34, 35, 36–37, 155, 157 wójt, the, 45–46, 48, 50 Wola Duchacka, 19, 104 Wolski Forest, 135, 172 wood, 39, 96, 97, 149, 187n10; for construction, 90, 93, 95; for heating, 91, 99 World War I period, 33, 65, 105 World War II period, 33, 170 writers: Klemens Bąkowski, 169; Antoni Baldacci, 97; Władysław Bieroń, 171; Paweł Czuj, 60; Stanisława Dębska, 171 Wrocław, 13, 137 yellow bittercress, 79, 80 Zielonki, 20, 102 Zwierzyniec, 45, 46, 55, 57, 58, 65, 105 Żywiec, 91, 95, 96, 188n15