Rotunda of Saint Nicolas in Cieszyn

The structure was built in the 11th or the 12th century as a Western Christian castle chapel and stronghold (gord) church.

[1] When Princess Lucretia, the last of the Piast dynasty of Polish royalty, died in 1653 the rotunda ceased to be the castle chapel.

[4] During this period, the Rotunda was used as a tools repository for performance of the so-called orchards God's Judgements and sometimes also as an arms depot.

The level of the interior nave and the exterior area was raised (the building was almost halfway up rimmed by soil).

[5] The rotunda is built of flat limestone chops that create an internal and external front, with circular layout with a semicircular and oriented apse.

In the north part of the nave there are one-way stairs leading to the gallery - a balcony supported by columns and semi-columns (located from the western side) - placed in a wall that in this spot is 1.75 m thick.

A similar role was played by a niche in the south wall with a Gothic brick framework and three round holes for extinguishing candles below.

On the rainbow arch that separated the nave from the apse traces of a Romanesque painting from the second part of the 15th century was found with tracery.

[1] From the outside, where the stairs are located, the wall is thickened and creates a slightly protruding bay window hanged over cantilevers.

[6] Classicistic reconstruction in 1839 by the design of Joseph Kornhäusl involved walling out two semi-circular windows and plastering the façade.

In the document from 1223 in which a sacral object in Cieszyn is mentioned for the first time there is a following entry: ecclesia sancti Nicolai.

Conflict between Poland and Czech Republic concerning Cieszyn Silesia in 1919 - 1920 has contributed to progressive removal of St. Wenceslas as a Czech element, without paying attention to the fact that St. Wenceslas not only is the patron saint of Bohemia, but in 1436 he was established as one of the four major patrons saint of the Kingdom of Poland by cardinal Zbigniew Oleśnicki.