5 famous people you see on Krakowskie Przedmieście Street
When walking along Krakowskie Przedmieście street, it’s easy to have your breath taken away by all the beautiful buildings you’ll see. But every once in a while, while strolling towards or away from the Royal Castle, you catch the eye of someone (quite famous) standing there. You’ll probably wonder who that person is. Well, we’re here to tell you!
Nicolaus Copernicus (Mikołaj Kopernik)
If you’re walking north from Nowy Świat street along the Royal Route towards the Royal Castle, the first person you’ll meet is Copernicus. Sitting on a chair, overlooking Krakowskie Przedmieście street, he seems lost in thought and calculations.
It’s no wonder, he was a brilliant astronomer. He was the one to have “stopped the sun and moved the earth” since he was the first to prove that it wasn’t the sun that revolved around the planets. He lived from 1473-1543 and was a true man of the Renaissance since he wasn’t only interested in astronomy, but also in mathematics, law, medicine, and economics (an economic theory of his about the transactional nature of a two currency economy is actually still valid to this day)!
He is most well-known for his work On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres, a copy of which he had even sent to the Pope, who was a patron of Copernicus. Legend says that the Pope received the work, was delighted to be mentioned, but never actually read it.
The monument itself was erected in 1830, sculpted by a quite famous Danish sculptor of the time, Thorvaldsen. Much like everything around him, Copernicus was quite damaged during World War II. The sculpture was taken to a scrap heap, but fortunately saved from there and restored.
2023 was declared the year of Copernicus in Poland since that was the year that Copernicus turned a very nice 550 years old!
Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński
Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński has quite the tough life since the majority of tourists who see him for the first time are convinced he’s Pope John Paul II. He’s not, but that doesn’t make him any less important to the history of Poland and Warsaw.
Wyszyński was a Catholic cardinal during the oppressive times of communism and was even sent to jail for three years at the beginning of the 1950s when the regime was focused on attacking the Church. He loved both his country and the Catholic Church and maneuvered both through communism with both empathy and a good political understanding of the times. Hundreds of thousands came to his funeral in June 1981, including church officials from Europe and the USA as well as the Polish communist heads of state.
Cardinal Wyszynski’s greatest accomplishment was engineering a fragile compromise between the Church and the communist regime that gave Poland more religious freedom than in any other of the communist satellite nations at that time.
Bolesław Prus
Before you get to the two gorgeous hotels on Krakowskie Przedmieście street, you’ll see that there’s a simple, elderly man walking out of the park that’s now there, lost in thought. This man is no other than Bolesław Prus, one of Poland’s famous writers. Or at least Bolesław Prus was his pen name; his real name was Aleksander Głowacki.
But Prus isn’t taking a stroll around the park. Back in his time, the park wasn’t even there. Instead there was a row of tenement buildings and one of them was the headquarters of the “Kurier Warszawski” (The Warsaw Courier). It was in this periodical that Prus published pieces of his popular novels.
At that time periodicals published all kinds of information including poems, short stories, and chapters of novels. So some people bought these papers not to find out what was happening in the world, but to find out what happened next in their favorite story!
Prince Józef Poniatowski
Prince Józef Poniatowski stands proudly in front of the Presidential Palace and he serves as quite the embodiment of what Polishness is made of (heroism, a love of life, and a pinch of scandal). He was the nephew of Polish king Stanisław August Poniatowski so he had the best education and opportunities that court could offer. The military quickly turned into his first and most long-lasting love and he quickly climbed up the ranks, becoming a commander at the age of 26.
But his military discipline seemed to evaporate when he had free time. He was quite the Prince Harry of his day, constantly being mentioned in the local press for his shenanigans (for example, he tried to cross the Vistula River naked and on his horse) and he sent all the young ladies’ hearts aflutter.
Just like the military was his life, it was also his death, because he died in the Battle of Leipzig in 1813, defending the retreat of the French army. Though no one knows for certain, historians generally agree that he was most likely a victim of friendly fire and shot by a French soldier.
Interestingly, Poniatowski’s monument was quite controversial in the beginning. People really didn’t like it because they thought that Poniatowski looked too Roman, and with no armor or uniform on, they called him “the prince in a bedsheet”. Although the Presidential Palace that Poniatowski is standing in front of survived the war intact, the statue didn’t (it was in front of the Saxon Palace from 1923 - 1944) and what you see is a copy made by the Danish.
Adam Mickiewicz
Seeing Adam Mickiewicz standing so proudly in Warsaw is a bit ironic because he personally hated the city and never once even visited it. Nevertheless, when you hold the title of National Poet, you’re going to have your very own statue placed everywhere. Mickiewicz is most well-known for his epic poem Pan Tadeusz (Sir Thaddeus).
This one was unveiled on December 24, 1898, on the 100th birthday of the poet. Due to the fact that Warsaw was under Russian rule at the time, the Russians didn’t want the unveiling of the monument to be a grand thing. With all of Poland torn apart by its three neighbors Prussia, Russia, and Austria, every well-known Pole became a symbol and an embodiment of natural virtue and patriotism and the Poles might rally around him and revolt. The Russians forbid any speeches and the whole unveiling ceremony lasted 15 minutes with everyone standing around and then walking back to their homes in silence.
We hope that these short explanations of the people you pass by on Krakowskie Przedmieście Street will enrich your experience of discovering Warsaw.
Want to learn even more about what you can see on Krakowskie Przedmieście? Join us for a walking tour around the historic heart of Warsaw!