Teodor Rygier (9 October 1841, Warsaw – 18 December 1913, Rome) was a Polish sculptor known especially for his Adam Mickiewicz Monument (1898) in Kraków, Poland.

At the International competition of Moscow for the Monument to Alexander II, in October 1882, Rygier won 3rd prize for 3000 rubles.

[2] When the remains of Polish national bard Adam Mickiewicz were returned from Paris, a university youth proposed that a monument to the great poet be erected in his home town of Krakow.

Teodor Rygier took part in all three stages of the contest, and was awarded the rights to produce the monument by popular demand.

His work was commissioned ahead of that of more than 60 artists, including the renowned Cyprian Godebski, professor at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg from Paris, who had won first prize in the competition.

The poet is raised on the pedestal; four symbolic groups are represented on the base: Motherland i.e. Poland (front), Science and learning – an old man with a boy (side on Florianska Street), Poetry (side facing Church of St. Wojciech), and Patriotic love or Valour (facing Sukiennice Hall).

[3] Aside from his statue of Adam Mickiewicz at the Main Market Square in Kraków, Rygier also completed a sculpture in the Old Town district.