Lutsk, one of the oldest cities in Volhynia, received a full inventory of the set of movable historical objects collected in its cathedral in mid-2019. The valuable heritage of Polish culture was surveyed.

Thanks to the development of trade and crafts, Lutsk, as the capital of Volhynia, was a flourishing city for many centuries. The end of the "prosperity" came with the Second World War. The war years left a bloody mark of bestiality all over Volhynia. In connection with the suppression of Catholicism by the Soviet authorities, many churches were closed, their interiors desecrated and plundered.

The Luck Roman Catholic Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul, located in a post-Jesuit 17th century church, was also extremely painfully affected by the acts of devastation. After the cathedral was closed in 1947, the Soviets arranged a coal depot there. The destruction was completed by the establishment of a museum of atheism in the church in 1981. Many priceless monuments of art were irretrievably destroyed, both from the cathedral and from other churches in Lutsk, which were then massacred by the authorities. Despite such harsh communist experiences in Volhynia, however, many art objects collected over the years and hidden high up in the galleries of the Lusk Cathedral have fortunately survived to this day.

These artifacts, originating both from the territory of the present-day Archdiocese of Lviv and the Diocese of Lutsk, were to constitute the beginnings of the Diocesan Museum in Lutsk, inaugurated on 1 October 2004, with Rev. Canon Augustyn Mednis (1932-2007) as its curator, appointed by Bishop Marcian Trofimiak. It is to these clergymen that the collection gathered in the Lutsk Cathedral owes its salvation and the first inventory work conducted and published by the scientists of the Institute of Art History of the Jagiellonian University with their consent ('The Collections of the Diocesan Museum in Lutsk', part 1, 'Sculpture', ed. A. Betlej, M. Biernat, M. Kurzej, W. Walanus, Kraków 2006).

In April 2019, commissioned by the National Institute of Polish Cultural Heritage Abroad POLONIKA, Polish art historians inventoried the entire historic fabric of movable objects. Based on an assessment of the state of preservation of this vast, hitherto disordered assemblage of artefacts, we are certainly dealing with objects that are extremely valuable and unique in their variety, quality and scale - many times distinguished by their outstanding artistic level.

The search resulted in the selection of the most valuable painting objects (23 pieces), liturgical paraments (80 pieces), textiles and vestments (114 pieces), old prints (several), sculptures or only their fragments (decorative elements and ornaments - 130 pieces). During the works carried out, the historic textiles (chasubles, dalmatics, capes, single britches, fabric fragments and tapes, gallons, small haberdashery) were temporarily cleaned and the most interesting and valuable objects exposed to destruction were secured. In the end, the researchers compiled a catalogue in the form of a computer database, containing more than 200 author's sheets of individual monuments collected in the former Lutsk Cathedral (including: dating, material and technique identification, description, style identification, state of preservation and conservation postulates).

The initial identification of the cathedral's historical material was carried out in November 2015 by Dr Dorota Piramidowicz and Dr Anna Olenska on behalf of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. The current full inventory, scientific and photographic documentation was conducted by a team of art historians consisting of Dr Dorota Piramidowicz, Dr Anna Oleńska, Katarzyna Uchowicz and Piotr Jamski. The project was implemented by the POLONIKA National Institute for Polish Cultural Heritage Abroad as part of the documentation of Polish cultural heritage in the former eastern lands of the Republic of Poland.

By virtue of its history, the entire Lutsk Cathedral, together with its movable historical objects, is by all means worthy of interest and special protection.