Department of Historical and Pedagogical Studies

Among the lecturers at the Lviv Polytechnic National University who joined the staff of Wrocław’s universities after the Second World War was Andrzej Frydecki – an architect from Sosnowiec, who spent more than 20 years of his life in Lviv working at the Lviv Polytechnic National University and as an active architect. In 1947 he was invited to Wrocław. The author of the article tries to answer the question how the years spent in Lviv, education at the Lviv Polytechnic National University and the acquired experience coloured the post-war professional career of Andrzej Frydecki, his designs and long teaching activity at the Faculty of Architecture at the Wrocław University of Science and Technology, as well as – more broadly – how the Lviv context influenced the beginnings of the post-war architecture in Wrocław.

The end of the Second World War and subsequent change of European borders were important demarcation lines in the history of many cities. That was also the case of Opole – a city that had been a part of Germany until 1945, became incorporated into Poland, co-creating so-called „Recovered Territories”. New Polish authorities had to rebuilt the city destroyed by war’s aftermath, discover and understand it, as well as create new narratives about Opole as an indigenously Polish city, brought back to its „Motherland” after Second World War. The city’s post-war identity was to be based on changed interpretations of preexisting heritage (such as architecture) as well as certain events in Opole’s post-war history. The aim of those actions was to create a brand new identity, alligned with the politics and propaganda of that period, and to foster the proccess of acclimating new inhabitants with the city. The issues relating to Opole’s post-war architectural and urban development have not yet been researched by art and architecture historians. The aim of the article is to fill this gap by presenting on a group of examples the issue of Opole’s development in the first five years after the end of Second World War (1945-1950) as a byproduct of tensions and tractions occuring between antagonistic pursuits, ideas and attitudes. Among those aformentioned binaries, which affected the city’s image and development, are: Wrocław and Katowice; Lower and Upper Silesia; big and small city; Polishness and Germanness; interruption and continuation; negation and acceptance. Tensions rising between those oppositions, which can be seen in Opole’s post-war history, turned Opole into a curious case of a city „in-between”.

English: The article aims to present the post-war restoration of the Market Square in Opole as a process of creating the city’s new history. The research subject included the tenement houses in the frontages of Opole’s Market Square, which were destroyed in 1945 and rebuilt in the 1950s. The article analyses the process of restoring Opole’s Market Square, which is presented in the context of Opole’s changed national affiliation and the ideological and identity issues, therefore, ultimately impacting the form of restored tenement houses. The archival materials analysed during the research process were: written materials, kept in the State Archive in Opole, and design projects, kept in the State Archive in Katowice. The research is complemented by subject literature, in which the topic of Old Town restoration was present, historical publications concerning Opole and local press. Our research established that Opole’s Market Square’s post-restoration image differs significantly from how it looked before World War II. The analysis of iconographical materials (pre-war postcards and photographs, as well as contemporary photographs) showed that, in the restoration process, the 19th-century tenement houses that differed from each other stylistically, became replaced with unified baroque-like buildings. The analysis of archival materials pertaining to the restoration of Opole’s Market Square proves that this process was not only meant to restore the Old Town’s spatial cohesion, reconstruct inner-city infrastructure and create new apartments, but also to present local authorities’ resourcefulness and to show that Opole has always been a Polish city, brought back to its Motherland in 1945. Stark differences between the pre- and post-war image of Opole’s Market Square provoke questions concerning identity in the context of restoration, values related to particular architectural styles and attempts to create a brand new vision of Opole’s history, in which “Polish” elements were displayed to legitimise incorporating the city into Poland and to constitute the city’s brand new identity.

Polish: Celem artykułu było zaprezentowanie powojennej odbudowy Rynku w Opolu jako kreacji nowej historii miasta. Przedmiotem prac były kamienice tworzące pierzeje Rynku w Opolu, które zostały zniszczone w wyniku działań wojennych w 1945 r. i odbudowane w latach 50. XX w. W artykule przedstawiono proces odbudowy opolskiego Rynku w kontekście zmienionej przynależności państwowej Opola i związanych z tym kwestii ideologicznych i tożsamościowych, które miały wpływ na ostateczną formę odbudowanych kamienic. Podczas badań dokonano analizy przede wszystkim materiałów archiwalnych: piśmienniczych, przechowywanych w Archiwum Państwowym w Opolu, oraz projektowych, znajdujących się w Archiwum Państwowym w Katowicach. Badania uzupełniła literatura przedmiotu, w której poruszany był temat odbudowy obszarów staromiejskich, publikacje historyczne poświęcone Opolu oraz lokalna prasa.
    W czasie prac udało się ustalić, że wygląd opolskiego Rynku po jego odbudowie znacznie różni się od tego, jak obszar ten prezentował się przed II wojną światową. Analiza materiałów ikonograficznych (przedwojennych pocztówek i fotografii oraz fotografii współczesnych) pozwoliła ukazać, że podczas odbudowy XIX-wieczne kamienice o zróżnicowanej szacie stylistycznej zastąpione zostały w dużej mierze przez zunifikowane barokizujące budowle. Analiza materiałów archiwalnych poświęconych odbudowie opolskiego Rynku wskazuje, że proces ten miał nie tylko przywrócić spójność przestrzenną obszarowi staromiejskiemu, odtworzyć śródmiejską infrastrukturę i zapewnić nowe mieszkania, ale także ukazać zaradność lokalnych władz i udowodnić, że Opole było miastem odwiecznie polskim, które w 1945 r. powróciło do Macierzy. Wyraźne różnice pomiędzy przedi powojennym wyglądem opolskiego Rynku każą zadawać pytania o tożsamościowe znaczenie procesu odbudowy, wartości wiązane z konkretnymi stylami architektonicznymi oraz próby kreacji zupełnie nowej wizji historii Opola, w której wątki „polskie” zostają wyeksponowane po to, by legitymizować włączenie miasta do granic Polski i ukonstytuować zupełnie nową tożsamość miasta.

The article presents the project of the Non-Consolidated Offices in Katowice, made by Andrzej Frydecki in 1947, which is a widely unknown concept and absent from research on post-war architecture in Poland and Upper Silesia. The proposed interpretation of this project takes into account the local historical and urban context as well as earlier and later works of Frydecki himself. The project discussed in this article is the architect’s conscious reference to the history of a specific place – the pre-war administrative and representative district of Katowice – and an attempt to visually restore a lost symbol of the city: the Silesian Museum. At the same time, this unrealized concept allows us to see other examples of the architect’s design activity in a new light, and raises questions about the ideas and principles that guided the architect’s creative process: attention to the historical and urban context, the use of a repertoire of proven motifs or treatments, and the return to pre-war aesthetics after World War II.

In 1945, Opole experienced a disruption in its history-a formerly German city had been incorporated into southwestern Poland during the change of European borders. In this new geopolitical situation Opole, along with other prewar Eastern outskirts of Germany, became a part of so-called Recovered Territories. The name itself implied that those lands were perceived as not only incorporated into the country but brought back as undeniably Polish. The process of establishing (or "regaining") the Polish identity of those cities, among them Opole, was intended to omit some elements of the recent German past and emphasize others deemed inherently Polish at that time. This occurrence was also tied to the issue of rewriting and reinventing the city's history, during which architecture and urban planning were used as one of the most powerful tools. The article presents how architecture and urban planning were used in the process of establishing Opole's new, Polish identity since 1945. The attempts to rewrite and reinvent Opole's history are exemplified by the restoration of the historic city centre, as well as by new, postwar architecture and urban development. The legacy of that process still lingers in the city's urban fabric. The strive to emphasise "Polish" elements of the city while omitting or repurposing the German ones makes one pose questions about the role of architecture (both historic and new), urban planning, and the narratives created around them in the process of rewriting and reinventing a city's past and identity.

The book is the 4th volume from of the Cuius Regio series. It comprises articles devoted to the cohesion of Silesia as a region in the years 1918-1945. During this period Silesia was partitioned among three nation-states (Czechoslovakia, Germany and Poland). As in all volumes of the series,
chapters in the book present research on administrative structures (Kruszewski), economy (Urbaniak), social groups (Przerwa), ethnic and national issues (Strauchold), and regional identity (Linek) as factors and forces both strengthening and weakening regional cohesion. A general outline of the relevant part of the region’s history shows conditions under which deep changes occurred in a relatively short period of time affecting every field of Silesians’ lives.

This collection of articles represents the output of the first stage of research on the history of the region of Silesia, conducted under the patronage of the European Science Foundation as part of the project 'Cuius regio. An analysis of the cohesive and disruptive forces determining the attachment and commitment of (groups of) persons to and cohesion within regions'. Silesia, one of the regions analyzed in the project, is an example of a borderland territory whose historical development was substantially influenced by various cultural traditions. The primary goal of the research on the Silesian history was to determine the factors that led to disintegration and subsequent recreation of the region, for there are arguments indicating that the history of the local community has been-and continues to be-the product of a dynamic process whose course was not determined solely by the factor of its constant existence within the limits demarcated within the 16 th-century Kingdom of Bohemia. We are hopeful that the book will inspire a discussion in the academic community on a new dimension of the social history of Silesia, on issues connected with the development of Europe's regions and on universal mechanisms present in the formation of regional social cohesion.

CUIUS IUS? ON THE ESSENCE OF GOVERNMENT — THE DEBATE BETWEEN THE LUXEMBOURGS AND THE PIAST DYNASTY OF SILESIA The article deals with the various viewpoints concerning the reception of the core of government as perceived by the Luxembourgs and by the Piasts of Silesia throughout the 14th century. On one hand, the feudal principle stands out clearly, on the other hand, it is the hereditary right that is dominant. However, neither Luxembourgs nor Silesian dukes applied the one legal principle rigorously. The selected examples show the situations where the above-mentioned principles were applied and how.

The contents of this volume may disappoint those readers who would wish to find simple answers to traditional questions about the moment at which the Silesion region came to life and the role played in it by different social groups. The results of research performed by historians prove that these questions are in fact anachronistic. The authors reject the deterministic concept of the region’s evolution from a polycentric community to a monocentric (with Wroclaw as its capital city) unit of state and Church administration. Indeed, phenomena which are typically recognized as elements of this process are highlighted, but attributed different meanings. The picture of the region provided in the course of research is very dynamic. The authors’ aim was not to discover the nature of phenomena taking place within ‘the region’, but rather to determine the true number of the many regions co-existing at the time, to examine the dynamics and factors behind the constantly-changing affiliations of...

Monografia przedstawia dzieje lokalnej spoleczności zamieszkującej doline rzeki Kaczawa na Dolnym Śląsku w granicach wspolczesnej gminy Świerzawa. Prezentowana ksiązka przedstawia dzieje miasta Świerzawa oraz związanych z nim osad wiejskich. Zgodnie z zalozeniami projektu badawczego „Śląsk ojczysty…”, w ramach monografii autorzy starali sie wskazac elementy swoiste dziejow wspolnoty lokalnej na tle dziejow regionu śląskiego. Znana nam dziś siec osadnicza uksztaltowala sie miedzy polową XIII w. a polową XIV w. w wyniku zainicjowanej przez ksiąząt śląskich akcji kolonizacyjnej . Pierwsze źrodlowe wzmianki o mieście Świerzawa (Schonau) pochodzą z polowy XIV w. Miasto bylo ściśle zalezne od okolicznego rycerstwa. Los Świerzawy jest przykladem dziejow miasta skazanego na trwanie w otoczeniu dominującej szlachty - von Zedlitzow, von Redernow, von Hochbergow. W XVI .w. poczucie wspolnoty lokalnej wzmacnialo powszechne przyjecie luteranizmu. Ludnośc katolicka pozostala liczna jedynie w Dobk...