Phase 1 – the middle of the 14th century

The castle founded by Casimir III the Great is a monumental fortress made of stone. A spacious irregular courtyard of 56 x 22 metres was encircled by seven-metre high curtain walls. The south part of the courtyard was followed by an artificially lowered hill-side hewn in limestone and ended with a one-storied residential building divided into two rooms and referred to as the Major House, with a quadrangular tower attached to its corner, overlooking the Vistula river. The courtyard of the castle was probably entered through a gate house, situated opposite the Major House, but so little was left of the foundations of the building due to land erosion and further development that it is impossible to determine its original form. In all likelihood, the castle in such shape was partly destroyed during the Lithuanian invasion in 1376.

Phase 2 – the 15th century

After the devastation, the castle’s ground floor is rebuild and crowned with a double strip of Gothic bricks that remain visible until today in the stone walls. Above it, a one-room story is erected (constituting today’s ground floor), connected from the outside with a south-west break – most probably a chapel with a double window ornamented with Gothic tracery. A quadrangular tower functioning as a passage to internal wooden stairs is built at the southern side of the Major House. The line of the curtain walls is also corrected – a north-eastern corner is erected and the courtyard becomes more regular, trapezium-shaped. In the courtyard, a quadrangular well is hewn in rock, over 60-metres deep and crowned with an oval stone casing. Nearby, at the eastern part of the curtain wall, a bath house is erected.

Phase 3 – the turn of the 15th century and the 16th century

The castle’s residential stories are regulated: after the courtyard area has been levelled, the former ground floor of the Major House becomes its basement and the building is raised by one more story – after the middle of the 16th century it is divided into two rooms and equipped with elevated and enlarged windows, decorated with new stone-work. More rooms with a vaulted basement are added to the south-western tower. Outside the part of the curtain wall overlooking the Vistula river, a brick tower for residential and defensive purposes is erected. The modernisation of the curtain walls is finished – in the corners of the north curtain wall watchtowers are erected at the side of a new gateway to the castle. Further stages of modernisation of the castle run at the end of the 16th century underlines its residential image – the gateway becomes more presentable, as it was depicted in Zygmunt Vogel’s watercolours, just as the interior front of the Major House with the first external staircase. New characteristic architectural elements appear – the front elevation of the Major House and the West Tower is crowned with a Renaissance roof parapet. Such a significant development of the castle in Kazimierz Dolny and the change of its image fall at the time when the estate in Kazimierz Dolny becomes the property of the Firlejs, a family of noblemen, in 1509. The estate remains in their possession until 1644.

Phase 4 - the turn of the 16th century

This is the period of continued development of the castle’s residential buildings. Overlooking the Vistula, a residential area, later referred to as the west wing is constructed between the south-west tower of the Major House and the West Tower outside the old curtain wall.

Phase 5 – the 1st half of the 17th century

This is the last stage of development of the castle in Kazimierz Dolny: the reconstructed story of the Major House is formed into a “piano nobile” of representative function that can be accessed with a new presentable outside staircase located in the corner of the courtyard and the last, newest building in the history of the castle is constructed between the west tower and the curtain wall overlooking the Vistula. The period of the construction of the castle as a defensive building is drawn to a close.

Further history

In 1655 the Swedish Deluge spreads over the town of Kazimierz Dolny and the castle. King Charles X Gustav of Sweden resides in the castle. These times were depicted in the oldest remaining image of Kazimierz Dolny and the castle complex by E.J. Dahlberg, who painted Janowiec and the Swedish army crossing the Vistula on 7 February 1656. The background shows a sketch of “Stadt Casimirz” and the defensive buildings dominating the town. In 1657 the Swedes burn the town of Kazimierz Dolny and destroy the castle.

There were attempts at rebuilding or renovating the castle after 1700, in the times of king Augustus II’s reign. Before the castle went to ruin in 1712 during the Great Northern War, tsar Peter the Great stayed there in 1707, followed by king Charles XII of Sweden in autumn. The close of the 18th century brought on final destruction of the castle during the Polish-Russian war of 1792. The remnants of the building from that time were depicted by two painters: Henryk Münz (1782) and Zygmunt Vogel (1792).

In 1806, the Austrian authorities ordered a demolition of the West Tower and the roof parapets of the Major House, due to a risk of collapse. The well was also filled up.

During the November Uprising (1830-1831), there was a short episode when “a hundred Polish soldiers in the old castle tower bravely forced back the Moskals” on 18 April 1831. However, at the end of the 19th century the castle lost its residential and defensive functions – it became dilapidated. The castle and the town became the property of the treasury in 1826. In 1892 the castle hill was turned into a common pasture by a decision of the commune. This idyllic landscape soon attracted the attention of artists – Jan Franciszek Piwarski, Adam Lerue, Napoleon Ordy, Kazimierz Stronczyński and Wojciech Gerson. At the verge of regaining independence, the Polish society started perceiving it as a monument. Before World War I, the Association for Protection of Monuments of the Past became interested in the castle. The Association created drawing documentation of the castle’s condition between 1913-1914 and conducted first works to secure the adjoining Tower. The castle ruins gained significance due to a settlement of artists that started developing in Kazimierz Dolny at the beginning of the 20th century and drew to the town numerous accomplished Polish painters of that era. The old ruins became a source of inspiration for the Bohemian groups of artists in Kazimierz Dolny. The castle along with the tower appears in many artistic works of that period, for instance by Wojciech Ślewiński, Kazimierz Rubczak, Tadeusz Pruszkowski, Antoni Michalak and others.

The historic storm of World War II did not significantly change the condition of the remnants of medieval defensive architecture dominating the town. Soon after the war had ended, a new period of research and renovation of the castle complex began.

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