Saint Catherine of Alexandria Church in Nowy Targ: A Gothic and Baroque Parish Church
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.8
- Popularity
- Low
- Country
- Poland
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Kingdom of Poland, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Church
On this page9 sections
History
Saint Catherine of Alexandria Church is a Roman Catholic parish church in Poland, founded in 1346 during the establishment of Nowy Targ under Magdeburg law. Built under King Casimir III the Great, it combines Gothic and Baroque elements and remains a central historic building in the town’s Old Town. The church belongs to the Nowy Targ deanery of the Archdiocese of Krakow and is dedicated to Saint Catherine of Alexandria, an early Christian martyr traditionally associated with Alexandria and venerated in the Catholic Church on 25 November.
Foundation and medieval endowment
The first church was established as part of the town’s foundation under a medieval municipal legal system that regulated civic administration and urban privileges. Its masonry presbytery was built during this initial phase, while the rest of the church was constructed in wood. In 1493, King John I Albert confirmed the church’s endowment, securing the material basis of its religious life.
Seventeenth-century destruction and rebuilding
A fire devastated Nowy Targ in 1601. Saint Catherine’s Church lost almost all of its fabric, while the presbytery and sacristy survived. The nave and tower were rebuilt in masonry in 1606, although 1611 is also given as the date of this reconstruction. The church was reconsecrated in September 1649 by Bishop Olbracht Lipnicki of Krakow, formally dedicating it again for worship.
The church suffered further violence during the Swedish Deluge, the seventeenth-century Swedish invasion and occupation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Swedish forces burned and looted it in 1656, and the building burned again in 1657. Bishop Mikołaj Oborski consecrated the restored altars in 1668. In 1634, between these destructive events, the townspeople had added the Chapel of Our Lady of the Rosary. From 1717, the chapel had its own priest, liturgical vessels, and vestments.
Eighteenth-century repairs and additions
Further fires damaged the church furnishings in 1710, 1719, and 1764. In 1765, parish priest Józef Kazimierz Sawicki organized a major renovation. The cemetery surrounding the church was enclosed, the roof was altered, and the walls were repaired. The church gate and the entrance to the sacristy received decorated stone or masonry frames, and the organ was enlarged. Bishop Franciszek Potkański reconsecrated the church in 1766.
Late in the eighteenth century, the succeeding parish priest, Szymon Zamojski, built a new rectory and utility buildings. A low porch was later added on the foundations of an earlier porch, which had burned in 1784. These works formed part of the church’s continuing adaptation after repeated fires and rebuilding.
Modern restoration and heritage protection
At the initiative of parish priest Michał Wawrzynowski, all the altars were restored in 1897. The interior was repainted, a new floor was laid, and the organ was reconstructed. In 1916, the bells were confiscated for melting down for wartime purposes, and the church underwent repairs in 1926. A Baroque altar dedicated to Saint Joseph was destroyed by fire in 1932 and restored in 1938.
A rosary garden with a spring at the foot of a grotto dedicated to the Immaculate Virgin Mary was established beside the church in 1989. Further repairs began in 1990 on the initiative of parish priest Mieczysław Łukaszczyk. The work restored the altars, pulpit, and choir, while new pews and confessionals were installed. Saint Catherine’s Church entered the heritage register as A-40 on 22 January 1970.
Remains
Layout and exterior
The surviving church is a brick building with a single nave, a transept crossing the nave to create a cross-shaped plan, and one tower. The masonry presbytery from the foundation phase remains, as does the sacristy that survived the fire of 1601. The nave and tower belong to the later masonry rebuilding dated to 1606 or, alternatively, 1611. A wall surrounds the church, and its gate incorporates a tower containing the belfry, the structure that houses the bells. Passage through the gate tower leads into the church courtyard.
The tower has a Baroque helmet roof, an elaborate roof form characteristic of the early modern Baroque style. Beneath the roof, fragments of a sgraffito frieze survive. Sgraffito is a decorative technique made by scratching through surface layers to expose contrasting material beneath, and the surviving decoration contains motifs associated with Podhale. Inside the belfry is a carved Crucifixion scene with the Virgin Mary and Saint John. A separate representation of Christ Crucified with two criminals occupies a niche in the exterior wall beside the clock tower.
Altars and religious art
The interior contains three altars, with most of the furnishings dating from the Baroque period. The presbytery contains Our Lady with the Pear, a painting of the Virgin and Child probably made in the fifteenth century. It belongs to the Lesser Poland school, a regional tradition of late-medieval religious painting associated with the historic Lesser Poland region. The painting hangs above the entrance to the sacristy and was transferred there from the wooden church dedicated to Saint Anne for safety reasons.
The high altar contains a painting of Saint Catherine made by Władysław Rossowski in 1892. It copies an earlier work by Leksicki, which had deteriorated beyond recovery. The altar dedicated to Saint Joseph belongs to the Baroque furnishings and was restored after a fire destroyed it in 1932.
Organ
The church organ has 20 stops, two manual keyboards, and a pedal. The present instrument was made by E. Weyland and brought from Germany in 2004 by Krzysztof Jakubowski’s company from Wieprz. It replaced a one-manual instrument by Biernacki. Andrzej Guziak changed two pedal stops in 2014, and Jan Jamróg of Ochodza inspected the organ in 2015. In 2024, Guziak replaced the zinc pipes of the Oktave 4′ stop with tin pipes, exchanged the Feldflöte 2′ stop for a Quinte 2 2/3′ stop, and changed the Mixtur 4 f. 1 1/3′ into a three-rank Mixtur.
