Saint Martin Church in Radziechowy: A Historic Roman Catholic Parish Church
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.7
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Poland
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg, Kingdom of Poland, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Church
On this page13 sections
History
Saint Martin Church in Radziechowy is a Roman Catholic parish church in Poland, dedicated to Martin of Tours, a fourth-century Christian bishop whose feast is celebrated on 11 November. The parish was founded in 1390, and its first church was a wooden building erected around the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Medieval and Early Modern Development
After the wooden church burned, it was replaced by a masonry building completed before 1590. The oldest surviving part is the presbytery, the area near the main altar traditionally associated with the clergy. A wooden belfry stood beside the church from 1589 until it was replaced by a masonry tower in 1800.
The Saint Isidore Chapel
In 1722, a chapel dedicated to Saint Isidore the Farmer was added for his confraternity, a religious association of lay members formed for shared devotional and charitable purposes. The project was undertaken at the initiative and expense of Grzegorz Pikulski, the parish priest of Radziechowy and founder of the confraternity. Andrzej Komoniecki, the local municipal head of Żywiec and author of the Żywiec Chronicle, recorded the chapel’s construction.
Protection and Conservation
The church is protected as a listed monument under registrations A-393, dated 13 January 1972, and A-183/77, dated 20 September 1977. Its attic has long supported a breeding colony of the endangered lesser horseshoe bat. Surveys carried out each June between 1992 and 2000 counted between 25 and 73 bats. To protect this population, the church was incorporated into Natura 2000, the European Union network of protected areas for threatened habitats and species. The site was designated a Site of Community Importance on 9 April 2008 and a Special Area of Conservation under the same name and code, PLH240007, on 29 August 2018.
Remains
Saint Martin Church is a single-nave masonry building, meaning that it has one principal worship space, with one tower and four altars. Its surviving fabric brings together the medieval presbytery, the later chapel, the masonry tower of 1800, and historic interior furnishings.
Church Structure
Presbytery and Tower
The presbytery forms the oldest part of the church and dates from the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The masonry tower, erected in 1800, occupies the position of the earlier wooden belfry that had stood at the site since 1589.
Chapel of Saint Isidore
The Chapel of Saint Isidore the Farmer was built of masonry in 1722 and covered with a small dome. At the recorded stage of its construction, the chapel had not yet been vaulted.
Interior and Furnishings
Altars and Pulpit
The interior contains a late-Baroque altar with a sculpture of Saint Martin. The pulpit is decorated with representations of the Evangelists, the traditional authors of the four Gospels.
Gothic Sculptures
Two Gothic sculptures from the church’s historic furnishings survive. One is a Madonna and Child dating from the second half of the fourteenth century, while the other is a Madonna from the end of the sixteenth century. Both sculptures can be viewed in the Diocesan Museum in Krakow.
Organ
The church organ has 18 stops, two manuals, and a pedal division. Stops are sets of pipes with related tonal characteristics, manuals are keyboards played by the hands, and the pedal division is played with the feet.
Protected Attic Habitat
The attic provides breeding habitat for the colony of lesser horseshoe bats. The protected habitat associated with the church covers 0.06 hectares.
