James Louis Sobieski

With his father's election as King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania in 1674, the education of Prince Jakub Sobieski became a state matter.

Despite efforts by his parents at the Vienna court, they were unable to secure for Jakub rule over the Duchies of Legnica, Brzeg, Wołów, and Oława in Silesia after the Piast dynasty died out in 1675.

This led Jakub' father Jan III Sobieski to put a plan together to seize power in Ducal Prussia and elevate his son.

The Polish-French alliance had completely fallen apart by 1683 when some of the pro-French faction members within Poland were accused of plotting to overthrow Sobieski, and French ambassador Nicolas-Louis de l'Hospital, Bishop of Beauvais and Marquis of Vitry were forced to leave the country.

The first of the Cantemir dynasty on the Moldavian throne, Constantin was an illiterate from petty nobility who once served as an officer in the Polish Army whereas his predecessors had mostly been members of the powerful boyar families.

Sensing weakness, Polish King and Lithuanian Grand Duke John III Sobieski had the Commonwealth's troops enter Moldavia twice in 1686 and 1691 to try to put his son Jakub on the Moldavian throne, utilizing the Armenian monastery of Suceava as a base of operations.

In celebration of their wedding the opera Per goder in amor ci vuol costanza was created by librettist Giovanni Battista Lampugnani and composer Viviano Augustini.

The brothers remained in prison in Pleissenburg and Königstein for two years before finally being released after the Treaty of Altranstädt where he signed a formal agreement to never again make any attempt to become King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.

Jakub Sobieski received a favorable sentence during the Silent Sejm in 1717, which enabled him to return to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and recover his family property which had been confiscated by King Augustus.

After falling out of favor with Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI for allowing his daughter Maria Clementina Sobieska to marry James Francis Edward Stuart he lost the principality of Oława in 1719, but was able to regain his Silesian holdings in 1722.

The connection to the Polish-Lithuanian state which Sobieski's rule brought to Oława set this part of Lower Silesia on a different trajectory, and thanks to it the Polish language was preserved here long after Jakub' death in 1737.

In his book "Schlesien: eine Landeskunde für das deutsche Volk" published in 1896, outstanding German geographer Joseph Partsch expresses his surprise that: ...it is difficult to understand how it could have happened that on the west side of the Odra River, in the Oława district and in the vicinity of parts of Wrocław and Strzelin, that a completely dense territory of Polish-speaking residents could survive, in an area which contains many important roads that extends on all sides from the great transport center which is Wrocław [7]...After World War II German Silesia was ceded to the Polish People's Republic.

Portrait of Jakub Ludwik Sobieski with his father, c. 1680s by Jan Tricius
The Armenian monastery of Suceava was a base of operations in John III Sobieski 's failed efforts to secure the Moldavian throne for his son Jakub.
This painting was commissioned by Jakub Sobieski in 1697. It depicts his deceased father pointing to a book entitled Hac Lege lego and accompanied by Jakub and his wife, suggesting that Jakub ought to be the next King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.
Jakub Sobieski's return to Poland after 1717 and his subsequent reconciliation with Augustus II allowed him to regain property that the King-Grand Duke had confiscated in Olesko .
During the reign of Jakub Sobieski, Oława Castle received new interior furnishings and the library was enlarged. After the prince left Oława in 1734, the structure began to decline. The Prussians subsequently located a hospital and a bakery in the castle.