The largest Baroque church in Moravia and Bohemia houses a painting of the life of St. Hedwig of Silesia by Franz Eckstein. His works also adorn churches in Krakow and Lviv.

Velehrad Abbey and Basilica - some history

Velehrad is a town in the south-eastern part of Bohemia, near Uherské Hradiště, administratively part of the Zlin Region in Moravia. It is famous among Catholics, including Poles, especially for its monastery basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saints Cyril and Methodius. In April 1990, Pope John Paul II made a pilgrimage here. A cross and papal insignia commemorating this historic visit can still be found on the square in front of the entrance to the Velehrad basilica.

For Poles visiting Moravia, if only as tourists, this is an unusual place. For the basilica hides numerous Polish traces - Polonica - which are rarely found in this area. First of all, mention should be made of the Abbot of Velehrad, who significantly reformed and rebuilt the Cistercian monastery that had existed since the 13th century. This was Nicolaus Kromer of Biecz (1530-1572), the youngest brother of the eminent humanist, historian and Bishop of Warmia Martin Kromer. Thanks to the intercession of the Olomouc bishop Wilhelm Prusinowski and Cardinal Stanislaus Hosius, he was promoted to abbot of the Cistercian Order in Velehrad. He held this dignity from 1567 until his death in 1572.

Kromer's mission was to raise the abbey from its decline, which occurred in 1421 during the Hussite invasions, at a time of civil war in the Kingdom of Bohemia. The abbot established a Cistercian novitiate in Velehrad and began to rebuild the infrastructure of the medieval Cyril-Methodian monastery. In a letter to Brother Martin, he wrote that he was "building a new monastery, equipped with a dormitory, refectory, library, chapter house and infirmary, rooms that had not been in the abbey for 150 years".

Velehrad basilica - architecture and interior design

The current appearance of the Velehrad basilica bears little resemblance to the Cistercian monastery consecrated in 1228. Destruction by the Hussites in the 15th century forced a change to the original architecture. The most significant, which we recognise today by the basilica's Baroque style, took place in the 17th and 18th centuries, specifically between 1684-1689 and 1719-1735. What we see today is a late Baroque temple that has retained the spatial layout of a Gothic-Romanesque church.

The interior decoration of the seventeenth-century basilica was designed by Giovanni Pietro Tencalla, son of the court architect Wladyslaw IV Vasa, who was associated with the Habsburg court. His works can be seen in the Hofburg, and probably also in the Theresianum and the Palais Esterházy. The royal architect was also involved in the Baroque reconstruction of the Olomouc Bishop's Palace in Kroměřiž. This is important because the sculptures with mythological themes from the Lusthaus (Rotunda) building in the flower garden of the bishop's summer residence were made by the Danzig sculptor Michael Mandík. This sculptor also enriched the Velehrad basilica with his works. Between 1691 and 1692, the artist made eight statues (figures of saints), which stood in the front niches of the basilica until 1900.

After the church fire in 1719, Baltazar Fontana, an Italian stucco artist active in Malopolska and Moravia, became the architect responsible for the new interior design. He created the altars, both the main altar in the presbytery and the side altars in the arms of the transept and in the chapels of the basilica (he probably also created the magnificent Baroque pulpit).

At this time, new frescoes appeared in the church. The artist who executed them (between 1719 and 1722) was the Moravian painter Franz Gregor Eckstein (c. 1689-1741). He was one of the most famous and titled late-Baroque creators of church polychromies in Moravia, Silesia and the crown lands of the Republic; he died in Lvov while working on the painting decoration of the vault of the Jesuit church ). It is worth remembering that Franz Eckstein's monumental polychrome paintings can be seen both in the Piarist Church of the Transfiguration of Our Lord in Krakow, and in the former Jes uit church (now a garrison church of the Greek Catholic Church) of Saints Peter and Paul in Lviv (Ukraine).

Scenes from the life of St Jadwiga of Silesia - fresco cycle

For the monastery basilica in Velehrad, Eckstein painted a cycle of frescoes depicting scenes from the life of Saint Hedwig of Silesia. They are located in the right side aisle, just behind the painting by Jan Matejko. Their heroine was the wife of Henry I the Bearded, Duke of Wrocław and of the whole of Silesia and Greater Poland, and mother of Henry II the Pious (and six other children). After 28 years of married life, Jadwiga and Henry took a vow of chastity. Jadwiga experienced much suffering in her life. She survived the death of her husband and almost all of her children. The most famous of them, Prince Henry the Pious, was killed in the battle with the Tartars near Legnica (1241). After the death of her husband, Jadwiga joined a convent of Cistercian nuns in Trzebnica. She became famous for her piety, acts of mercy and fasting and mortification. She died in 1243.

Jadwiga was canonised by Pope Clement IV in 1267, and thanks to the intercession of King John III Sobieski, Pope Innocent XI introduced her cult into the universal Church (in 1680). Saint Jadwiga is venerated as the patron saint of Poland, Silesia, Europe; of refugees and of reconciliation and peace. In iconography, she is depicted as a young married woman wearing a long dress and a princely cloak with a diadem on her head, rarely in a Cistercian habit. Her attributes include a shoe in her hand (because she walked barefoot for mortification), a cross, a book, a statue of the Virgin Mary, a model of the church in her hands, and a rosary.