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Gate of the Ross Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, 2017, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius, photo Bartłomiej Gutowski, Public domain
Licencja: , Źródło: cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl
Fotografia przedstawiająca Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius
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ID: CM-000160-P

Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius

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ID: CM-000160-P

Rossa Cemetery in Vilnius

The cemetery is located in the Rossa (Rasų seniūnija) district between Rossa (Rasų gatve) and Listopadowa (Sukilėlių gatve) Streets, which separates the old part (so-called Old Rossa) and the new part (so-called New Rossa). Old Rossa, which stretches between Rossa and Listopadų Streets, is located on a hilly area between the so-called Hill of the Writers and the bank of the so-called Karpiška. In this part, there were catacombs, there is a cemetery chapel, numerous monuments to outstanding personalities and the most artistically interesting works have been preserved. It is preceded by a small military cemetery, separated from its space. It is a special place, where the heart of Marsh. Jozef Pilsudski was laid to rest there, surrounded by Polish soldiers killed in the battle for Vilnius. Nowa Rossa is located on the other side of Listopadowa Street. This part has taken shape since at least the beginning of the 20th century, in a disorderly manner. However, it has found an important place - the adjacent graves of Polish and Lithuanian soldiers. Those who died in the battle for Vilnius, standing on two different sides, are buried there. Above the cemetery of Polish soldiers is a column erected in 1930 with an inscription in Polish only: "Vilnius - to its defenders". All three parts form one necropolis - the Vilnius Rossa. The oldest monument in the Vilnius Rossa is a plaque dating from around 1630 from the Vilnius St. Casimir's Church, secondarily placed in the cemetery in the 1860s. In addition, the cemetery contains 18th century tombstones moved from the Evangelical cemetery after its liquidation in the 2nd half of the 20th century. The oldest objects, which were probably connected to the cemetery from the beginning, are the plaques dating from 1813 and 1816 - those of Katarzyna Gąsecka and Augustyn Roszkowski - originally probably located in the catacombs. Dating from around 1820, there is a characteristic tombstone monument in the shape of an urn on a column surrounded by a circular brick fence. This monument, probably dating back to Italian models, was fatally reconstructed in the 2nd half of the 20th century. The boulder on the grave of the Bécu family may be considered the oldest surviving monument on Ross. We do not know when exactly it was built; four people are buried under it: Catherine (died 1806) and August Bécu (died 1824), and Aleksandra and Jan Mianowski (both died 1832). The most famous person buried at Rossa is therefore August Bécu, stepfather of Juliusz Słowacki. His unusual death from ball lightning, which struck him while he was taking a nap in his own bed, has gone down in the annals of history and was recalled in Adam Mickiewicz's Dziady (Forefathers' Eve). This monument is therefore an example of the Romantic fashion that boulder-stele makers would later follow. A form that is not specific to the Vilnius cemetery, but by frequency certainly characteristic of the local environment. It is interesting to note that in its composition the focus was not on decoration, but primarily on the form of the inscription. Monuments, which we can describe as chapel-pillars, referring to folk traditions, are also part of the romantic trend. In total, tens of thousands of people were buried on Ross. Most were commemorated by wooden crosses, simple slabs or concrete bands. They are often anonymous, but on almost 9,000 graves names and surnames have been preserved, sometimes other information about the deceased. These traces are slowly fading into oblivion, the inscriptions fading away.

Variants of the name:
Cmentarz Misjonarzy a Rossie, lit. Rasų kapinės
Time of origin:
1801
Area:
10.8 ha (Old and New Rossa)
History:

The history of Vilnius Rossa dates back to 1801, when the city council decided to locate a cemetery on the outskirts of the city, in an area identified as the Rossa charmer. The preserved Funeral Metrics of Mount Saviour, the funeral books of the Missionary Church, indicate as the first burial in the new cemetery the mayor of Vilnius, Jan Müller, who was laid to rest there in 1801. They also show that the new cemetery quickly became a popular burial place. In fact, at that time it was the only suburban cemetery in Vilnius. Its popularity was also influenced by its good organisation - first of all, the construction of catacombs already in 1802, followed by a fence. The culmination of these works was the erection of the cemetery chapel. The now famous neo-Gothic building dates from the 1840s and 1850s, but its construction must have been planned from the very beginning. At first glance, the Ross Cemetery may look a bit chaotic, as it lacks the classical arrangement of alleys and sectors. It is, however, a well-thought-out layout, with a chapel dominating the central part and, originally, catacombs for particularly deserving residents, the layout of the main avenues subordinated to the cemetery's axes. This original layout was modified with the incorporation into the cemetery of the so-called Writers' Hill opposite the new gate. Over time, the centre of the whole establishment moved towards it. These changes in the organisation of the cemetery space were sealed by the creation of a "Professors' Alley". It was situated at the back of the military cemetery, in an area that had previously been of little significance. This insertion of the cemetery into the landscape was necessitated by the shape of the terrain; at the beginning of the 19th century, it was quite an innovative solution, predating, among other things, French realisations derived from the idea of English landscape parks with Père-Lachaise at the forefront.

As early as the 19th century, efforts were made to describe and catalogue the monuments in the cemetery. This work was started by Antoni Łazarowicz, who began listing the monuments of Vilnius Rossa as early as 1841. More systematic work was undertaken in the interwar period by Lucjan Uziębło and Wacław Wejtko, who created directories of the most important monuments. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, another inventory of monuments was made. On the other hand, a full inventory of Stara Rossa and a partial inventory of Nowa Rossa was carried out for the first time in 2013-2016 as part of a grant from the National Programme for the Development of the Humanities. It was conducted by a team led by Dr Anna Sylwia Czyż and Dr Bartłomiej Gutowski. The result of this work is an online catalogue containing record cards of monuments, a catalogue of unpreserved monuments from the files of Lucjan Uziębła and Wacław Wejtka and a study by Aleksander Śnieżka, as well as a monograph published by the Polonics Institute entitled 'The Ross Cemetery in Vilnius. History, Art, Nature'.

Active/inactive cemetery:
No
Bibliography:
  • „Cmentarz na Rossie w Wilnie, badania inwentaryzacyjne”, katalog on-line, opr. Anna Sylwia Czyż i Bartłomiej Gutowski, dostęp on-line http://cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl/.
  • Anna Sylwia Czyż, Bartłomiej Gutowski, „Cmentarz na Rossie w Wilnie. Niezachowane pomniki na podstawie kartotek Wacława Wejtki, Lucjana Uziębły i Aleksandra Śnieżki”, Warszawa 2021.
  • A. Śnieżko, „Rossa - miasto umarłych. Groby zasłużonych”, t. 1, Wrocław 1970, maszynopis w zbiorach PAU Kraków.
  • Edmund Małachowicz. „Cmentarz na Rossie w Wilnie”. Wrocław 1993.
  • Strona internetowa Społecznego Komitetu Opieki nad Starą Rossą, http://www.rossa.lt.
  • Bartłomiej Gutowski, „Najsłynniejsza z wileńskich nekropolii", „Mówią Wieki”, nr specjalny 2/2018.
  • Katalog osobowy, "Cmentarz na Rossie w Wilnie, badania inwentaryzacyjne", opr. Anna Sylwia Czyż i Bartłomiej Gutowski, dostęp on-line http://cmentarznarossie.uksw.edu.pl/.
Date of documentation:
2017
Author of the documentation sheet:
Bartłomiej Gutowski
Development / approval of the documentation sheet:
Bartłomiej Gutowski
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List of cemetery objects

6608
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8 24 72

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