Overview The history of the castle dates back to the 14th century when the first Castle Tower was constructed, and the fortified complex was initially used as the residence of the
Masovian dukes. In the early 1600s, it was designated to replace
Wawel Castle in
Kraków as the seat of the king,
Parliament (Chamber of Deputies and Senate), and the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The medieval
Gothic structure was remodeled into Italian
mannerism by architects
Matteo Castelli and
Giovanni Battista Trevano. The
Baroque easternmost wing was designed by
Gaetano Chiaveri and completed in 1747.
Castle in the Middle Ages In 1339, the
Papal Legate in
Warsaw On 25 May 1702 the Swedes re-seized the Royal Castle in Warsaw, creating a hospital with 500 beds, and into the Chamber of Deputies and ministers' rooms, they placed a stable. The new library building housed many books, gems, drawings, coins, maps and plans belonging to the monarch. The Royal Library's book collection amounted to 16 000 volumes of various works, 25,525 drawings, 44,842 etchings in 726 bound volumes, overall a number of 70,000 etchings—fancy dress balls were also held in this hall. In 1836, the voivodeships of Congress Poland were abolished and replaced by
guberniyas. During that time, the Royal Castle became the residence of the Tsar's governor
Ivan Paskievich. Paskievich charged Ludvik Corio – a Russian Colonel and architect – with designing new elevations and façades (the west, south, and east parts). However, the Russian authorities were not satisfied with the new designs, and Corio was told to prepare another design – one that would refer to Kubicki's solutions (and his co-workers Lelewel and Thomas). Finally, Corio rebuilt all the elevations and façades in the
neoclassical style, but the Saxon Elevation was left the same. After the death of Paskievich in 1856, all the next governors resided in the Royal Castle's Chamberlain's Room. The Russian officials occupied rooms on both floors of the west and north wings of the castle. The governors were heavily guarded by the
Russian army. Unfortunately, the living space that was assigned to these soldiers was the Parliamentary Hall, Library, and barracks under the castle. As a result, these were left devastated. After the
January Uprising in 1863, the Russian army totally destroyed the Royal garden on the Vistula side (which was transformed into the
military parade square), building a few barracks made of brick for stables and
Cossacks' barracks. In 1862–1863, some maintenance work was done in the Royal Castle under the supervision of Jerzy Orłowicz, Ludwik Gosławski and Potolov. In 1890, the Saxon Elevation was rebuilt under the supervision of a builder January Kiślański, when the arcades of both viewing galleries, dating back to the Augustus III period, were deformed. The last repair works, which cost 28,000
rubles, during the reign of Russia, were in 1902 in the rooms which had been occupied by the Russian army. During the
First World War, it was the residence of the German military governor. After Poland regained her independence in 1918, the castle became the residence of the
president of Poland. It was restored under the guidance of Kazimierz Skórewicz (1920–1928) and
Adolf Szyszko-Bohusz (until 1939). Under the terms of the peace treaty signed with
Soviet Russia at
Riga in 1920, works of art and other precious things, including all the castle furnishings, which had been taken away to Russia, were brought back to Poland. As a result, it was possible to restore the historic rooms to their appearance in the reign of
Stanisław II Augustus.
During World War II On 17 September 1939, the castle was shelled by German artillery. The roof and the turrets were destroyed by fire (they were partly restored by the castle's staff, but later deliberately removed by the Germans). The ceiling of the Ballroom collapsed, resulting in the destruction of
Marcello Bacciarelli's ceiling
fresco The Creation of the World and other rooms were slightly damaged. But immediately after the seizure of Warsaw by the Germans, their occupation troops set to demolish the castle. The more valuable objects, even including the central heating and ventilation installations, were dismantled and taken away to Germany. On 4 October 1939 in Berlin,
Adolf Hitler issued the order to blow up the Royal Castle. On 10 October 1939, special German units, under the supervision of history and art experts (Dr.
Dagobert Frey, an art historian at the
University of Breslau; Gustaw Barth, the director of museums in Breslau, and Dr. Joseph Mühlmann, an art historian from Vienna) started to demount floors, marbles, sculptures, and stone elements such as fireplaces or moulds. The artefacts were taken to Germany or stored in
Kraków's warehouses. Many of them were also seized by various
Nazi dignitaries who resided in Warsaw. The castle was totally emptied. Disobeying German orders, despite the danger of being shot, Polish museum staff and experts in
art restoration managed to save many of the works of art from the castle, as well as fragments of the
stucco-work, the parquet floors, the wood panelling, and more which were later used in the reconstruction. The great service done to Poland by Professor
Stanisław Lorentz, in leading this campaign to save the castle's treasures, is well known.
Wehrmacht sappers then bored tens of thousands of holes for dynamite charges in the stripped walls. In 1944, after the collapse of the
Warsaw Uprising, when hostilities had already ceased, the Germans blew up the castle's demolished walls. Leveling the Royal Castle was only a part of a larger plan – the Pabst Plan – the goal of which was to build a monumental Community Hall (ger.
Volkshalle) or an equally sizable Congress Hall of NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers Party – ger.
Parteivolkshalle) in the Royal Castle's place and to replace
Sigismund's Column with the Germania Monument. A pile of rubble, surmounted by only two fragments of walls, was all that was left of the six-hundred-year-old edifice. On one of these fragments part of the stucco decoration remained, this was a cartouche with the royal version of the motto of the
Order of the White Eagle — "
PRO FIDE, LEGE ET REGE" (for Faith, Law, and King).
Reconstruction Immediately after the end of war in 1945, work started on rescuing the surviving fragments of the castle's walls, foundations, and cellars as well as the fire-blackened walls of the
Copper-Roof Palace and the
Royal Library building, from further destruction. In 1949, the
Polish Parliament passed a bill to rebuild the castle as a monument to Polish history and culture. Meanwhile, special architectural designing offices, under Jan Dąbrowski, Piotr Biegański and
Jan Zachwatowicz, drew up blueprints for restoring the framework of the building and furnishing the historical rooms. The decision to start work was postponed several times, but was finally taken on 20 January 1971. A Civic Committee was set up. Amid universal applause, it was decided to rebuild the castle from voluntary contributions. Both in Poland and abroad, fund-raising committees were set up. By May 1975, the Fund had already reached the 500 million
zlotys. By the same date more than a thousand valuable works of art had been given to the castle by numerous Poles resident both in Poland and abroad. Official representatives of other countries have likewise presented to the castle works of art of great artistic and historic value. == Today ==