Little remains of the castle built by Przemysław II in the 13th century. The
reconstructed castle that now stands on the site houses the Museum of
Applied Art, which holds a collection of everyday objects, decorative
artifacts and religious items dating from the Middle Ages to the present.
The Baroque Franciscan church  on Ulica Góra Przemysła
dates from the early 18th century. Frescoes by the Franciscan painter Adam
Swach decorate the nave.

The National Museum is housed in what was originally the Prussian Friedrich
Museum, a Neo-Renaissance building of 1900–1903. Its collections of Polish
painting are among the best in Poland.

The Gallery of Polish Art includes medieval art of the 12th to 16th centuries
and 17th to 18th-century coffin portraits. The best examples of painting of
the Young Poland movement are the canvases of Jacek Malczewski (1854–1929).
The Gallery of European Art, which is housed in a new modern wing of the
museum, contains works from various collections, including that of Atanazy
Raczyński, brother of the philanthropist Count Edward Raczyński. The most
outstanding are by Dutch and Flemish painters including Joos van Cleve and
Quentin Massys. Italian, French and Spanish painters are also
represented.

With its façade of columns, the Raczyński Library combines grandeur with
elegance, and cannot be compared with any other building in Poznań. The idea
for a library was initiated by Count Edward Raczyński in 1829. The aim of
this visionary aristocrat was to turn Poznań into a “New Athens”; the
library was to be a centre of culture and “a shrine of knowledge”. Although
the library’s architect is unknown, it is thought to have been built by the
French architects and designers Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine. A
seated figure of Hygeia , the ancient Greek goddess of
health, with the features of Konstancja z Potockich, wife of Edward
Raczyński, was installed in front of the library in 1906.

Another element of the “New Athens” of Poznań was to be a gallery (now
non-existent) for the outstanding art collection owned by Edward Raczyński’s
brother, Atanazy.

After the Second Partition of Poland in 1793, Poznań came under Prussian
rule. In the second half of the 19th century, Prussia heightened its policy
of Germanization in Wielkopolska. One of its instruments was the Deutscher
Ostmarkenverein (“German Union of the Eastern Marches”), which the Poles
called the “Hakata” colonization commission from the acronym of the initials
of its founders. When the city’s ring of 19th-century fortifications was
demolished, a decision was made to use the new space for government
buildings. Designed by the German town planner Josef Stübben, they were
built in 1903–14 and today stand amid gardens, squares and avenues, with a
theatre, the colonization commission, a post office and the royal academy
(now the university). Dominating the scene is the Kaiserhaus, designed by
Franz Schwechten. The castle was rebuilt by the Germans, but little survives
of its original splendour apart from a marble imperial throne and the décor
of some of the rooms. The chairs from the Great Hall are now in the Sejm
(parliament) in Warsaw. Today the Kaiserhaus accommodates the Kaiserhaus
Cultural Centre.

Beside it, in Plac Mickiewicza, stands the Monument to the Victims of June
1956, which takes the form of two large crosses. The monument was unveiled
in 1981 to commemorate the violent suppression of the workers’ uprising in
Poznań in 1956.

The hill is said to be the spot where, 1,000 years ago, St Adalbert gave a
sermon before setting off on his campaign to evangelize the Prussians. On
the summit two churches face each other across a small square. One is the
Discalced Carmelites’ Church of St Joseph, built by Cristoforo Bonadura the
Elder and Jan Catenaci in 1658–67. It contains the tomb of Mikołaj Jan
Skrzetuski, who died in 1668 and on whom Henryk Sienkiewicz based the hero
of his historical saga With Fire and Sword .

The other is the small Gothic Church of St Adalbert, forming a pantheon with
practically the same function as the Pauline Church on the Rock
in Cracow. In the crypt are the remains of great figures in the history of
Wielkopolska. They include Józef Wybicki (1747–1822), who wrote the Polish
national anthem, and the Australian traveller and scientist Paweł Edmund
Strzelecki (1797–1873). A striking contrast to the rest of the building is
the ultramodern glass, concrete and stainless steel entrance to the crypt,
which was designed by Jerzy Gurawski in 1997.

Ostrów Tumski Island is the oldest part of Poznań. In the 10th century it was
the site of one of the first capital cities of the Polish state.

Today the island is dominated by the Gothic towers of the cathedral, which
contains many fine works of art. Near the cathedral stands the small Gothic
Church of St Mary  (Kościół halowy NMP), which was
built in the years 1431–48 for Bishop Andrzej Bniński by Hanusz Prusz, a
pupil of the notable late medieval architect Heinrich Brunsberg.

Also of interest is the Lubrański Academy , the first
institute of higher education to be established in Poznań. It was founded in
1518 by Bishop Jan Lubrański. Behind its inconspicuous façade lies a small
arcaded Renaissance courtyard. The academy acquired its greatest renown in
the early 16th century. One of its alumni was Jan Struś, a scientist and a
prominent physician during the years of the Polish Renaissance.

In the gardens on the other side of Ulica ks. l. Podsadzego stand a number of
canons’ and vicars’ houses which are charming in appearance – if a little
neglected. One of them contains the collections of the Archdiocesan Museum .

The late Gothic Psalter , which was built in around 1520 by
Bishop Jan Lubrański, is another of Ostrów Tumski Island’s notable
buildings. Its fine stepped and recessed gables are enclosed by ogee
arches.

The superb collection of religious art on display in the Archdiocesan Museum
includes examples of medieval painting and sculpture, pieces of Gothic
embroidery and some fine kontusz  sashes. The most
important pieces in the museum are probably the Madonna of
Ołobok , a Romanesque-Gothic statue dating from about 1310–29, and a
fascinating group of coffin portraits.