Franciscan martyrs of Vilnius
As told by the Bychowiec Chronicle, Voivode of Vilnius Petras Goštautas married a Polish lady from the House of Buczacki and converted to Catholicism.
Upon their return, Goštautas provided proper burial to the slain men and Algirdas ordered execution of 500 city residents.
[2] The story was repeated by Maciej Stryjkowski (1547–1593), Albert Wijuk Kojałowicz (1609–1677), and other historians who added and modified various details.
[1] Matters were so confused that some authors, including Kazimierz Biernacki and Antonius Melissanus de Macro, claimed that there were two separate incidents – one where 14 and another where 36 Franciscans were martyred.
[1] He described a monument – a column with a cross – that survived a major city fire that destroyed Vilnius Cathedral and Bishops' Palace in July 1530.
He also attributed full recovery of severely ill Jan Andruszewicz, future Bishop of Kiev, to the intercession of the martyrs.
[1] Inspired by these events, in 1543, Holszański built a Gothic Chapel of the Holy Cross where the martyrs were allegedly buried.
[3] Bishop Jerzy Tyszkiewicz started an official canonization case in 1649 and ordered a search of the remains of the martyrs.
[3] According to Jan Nepomucen Fijałek, the Three Crosses were also depicted on two silver portraits of St. Casimir that were made in 1636 and were present in Vilnius Cathedral until the first half of the 20th century.
Polish historian Kazimierz Chodynicki expressed doubts about Goštautas' marriage to a member of the House of Buczacki as the family came into prominence only after Algirdas' death.
[3] Viktoras Gidžiūnas was the first to note[5] that De Conformitate Vitae B. P. Francisco, finished in 1390 by Bartholomew Rinonico and published in 1513 in Milan, contains a story of five Franciscans murdered in Vilnius.
[3] English historian S. C. Rowell noted that the story in De Conformitate Vitae would fit in the context of a Lithuanian raid, possibly to avenge the murder of Yuri Koriatovich, into Moldavia in 1377.
Additionally, Franciscan Andrzej Jastrzębiec was the first bishop of both Siret and Vilnius and thus could have provided his first-hand knowledge of both events.
[2] Darius Baronas agreed with Rowell that the event did occur, but clarified that the author of the Bychowiec Chronicle did not know about either Chronica or De Conformitate Vitae as there are no textual similarities between the works.
Scholars proposed Grand Chancellor Albertas Goštautas, Bishop Paweł Holszański, and Duke Olelkovich.
[5] The chronicle also serves to increase prestige of Lithuanian Franciscans: it diminishes the role of the Poles in the christianization of Lithuania.
