The designated borders of the historical rural complex of the Baszków village cover a coherent area with the preserved original spatial layout and the highest saturation of buildings with historic value. Good state of preservation of the individual elements of the spatial layout: village square, the so-called półwieś (nawsie), the road layout, land divisions, sacral and residential architecture, public utility and residential buildings makes Baszków village one of the most significant rural complexes located in Wielkopolska Voivodeship.

History

The village of Baszków, which first appeared in the sources in 1395, was probably founded under German law. Until the end of the 16th century the village was owned by the Włodycki and Baszkowski families, to whom the village owes its present name. Originally, the village consisted of two settlements: Włodyki (the older, western one) which is the centre of the current village layout, and Baszków settlement covering the area of the current palace-park and manor. At the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries the village was owned by the Konarski and Zborowski families. In 1614 Zofia Zborowska brought the village as a dowry to her marriage with Abraham Sieniuta. She was succeeded by her son Piotr Sieniuta and then by his son Krzysztof Aleksander Sieniuta. As a result of his heirless death in 1681, the Baszków estate passed to Andrzej Leszczyński, coat of arms Wieniawa, who in 1682 gave it to his cousins Bogusław and Rafał. Rafał Leszczyński, married to Anna Jabłonowska, gave Baszków to his son Stanislaw Leszczyński (king of Poland in 1704-1709 and 1733-1736) in 1696. From 1738, the village along with other royal estates, including Leszno and Rydzyna, was bought from Stanisław Leszczyński by prince Aleksander Józef Sułkowski In 1757 the lands of Włodyki and Baszków, after the purchase of the village unit, were merged and from then on functioned in sources as the village of Baszków After the death of A. J. Sułkowski in 1762, the Baszków estate was taken over by his son Aleksander, and after his death by his youngest son Antoni. In 1791 the Baszków estate was purchased from Antoni Sułkowski by Maksymilian Mielżyński, the owner of Pawłowice, great writer of the Crown and the richest man in Wielkopolska at that time. After his death in 1799 the estate was inherited by his sons Stanisław and Mikołaj. Mikołaj became an independent heir of Baszków, Zduny and Kobylin. In November 1805 Mikołaj Mielżyński married Brygida Szczaniecka. After his death their son Aleksander together with his wife Countess Katarzyna Potulicka settled in Baszków. After Aleksander Mielżyński left the country his property was sold off at subsequent auctions. In 1862, most of Aleksander’s possessions were bought by Prince Henry XII, from the younger line of von Reuss, married to Countess Anna, nee Hochberg-Fürstenstein (Fürstenstein, currently Książ, near Wałbrzych), with whom he had an only son. A year after Henry XII’s death (1866), his widow Anna married her late husband’s younger brother, prince Henry XIII, who died childless in Baszków in 1897. Since then, only princess Anna (who died in Dresden in 1916) is mentioned as the owner of the village. After World War I and the decisions of the Treaty of Versailles establishing the western border of the Republic of Poland, prince Olgierd Czartoryski, the owner of the nearby Sielc Stary, and his wife Mechtylda von Habsburg purchased the Baszków estate. The Czartoryski family owned the estate until 1939. From 1939 to 1945 the estate was under German administration and the palace housed a convalescent centre for German pilots. In 1945 Baszków became the property of the State Land Fund. In 1948, the Agricultural Production Cooperative was established. In 1961, a PKS Ostrów Wlkp. summer camp centre was established in the palace. In the years 1969-88, it was used by ZNTK in Ostrów Wlkp. Currently, it is the seat of an Adult Social Welfare Home.

Description of the structure

Baszków is situated approx. 5 km west of Zduny, approx. 10 km west of Krotoszyn and 35 km west of Ostrów, at the district road Zduny-Kobylin.

The evidence of the earliest medieval settlement layout of the village of Baszków (originally a settlement called Włodyki) is the village square (the so-called półwieś or nawsie) located in the central part of the village on the east-west axis and the system of roads leading towards Zduny, Kobylin and Bestwin. From the time of the town’s foundation, the buildings along the square were developed according to the open-field layout with a building lot, the so-called “siedliszcze”, at the front of the plot. Originally, there were ponds located within the village, which were a common property of the village inhabitants. Along with the village, land was separated at its eastern end, which was the knightly property of the Baszkowski and Włodycki families. In the 16th and 17th centuries there was a wooden fortification erected by the then owners of Baszków, the Konarski and the Zborowski families. Probably in the same period, a manor farm was established next to the residential settlement on the opposite side of the road leading towards Zduny. In the part of the village which originally constituted a settlement called Włodyki, there was a wooden parish church from the 15th century. At the turn of the 17th and 18th century, when Baszków belonged to Stanisław Leszczyński, on the place of the former defensive building, a two-storey half-timbered mansion with corner extensions surrounded by a regular garden in the Italian type was built. Another significant change in the spatial layout of the village was the construction of a brick palace between 1804-1808 by Aleksander Mielżyński, which was probably designed by David Gilly or one of his students. Together with the palace, probably within the manor farm complex, a classicist brewery building was erected, later a distillery. In the years 1828-1829 the Mielżyński family founded a classicist church built at the western end of the nave, on the axis of the previously erected palace. In 1830, Brygida Mielżyńska enlarged the area of the then residential complex and initiated the process of transforming the regular garden into a landscape park, which was completed in the second half of the 19th century with the construction of a water system with ponds. Significant changes also took place within the manor farm complex, which was enlarged with new buildings in the yard. At that time, the layout of the manor farm colony was formed, with farm hands’ living quarters located along the road leading towards Trzaski. The buildings that date back to the 1830s-50s include spacious living quarters in the village and in the manor farm colony, the village smithy (no longer exists), a cowshed with buttresses (also no longer exists), and an inn. In 1851, a wayside cross was placed by the manor farm complex. The next owner of the village, Henry XII von Reiss, in the years 1862-1866 extended the Mielżyński palace in French neo-renaissance style and built more farm buildings, including the gate building. At the turn of the 19th and 20th century, buildings of the current farmyard were built, including cowsheds, barns, sheepfold, granary, stables, a coach house, smithy, palace stables, the administrator’s house, the servants’ house with the palace kitchen (does not exist). Within the palace and park grounds a gardener’s house, a doorkeeper’s house and two entrance gates were built. Utility buildings erected in the second half of the 19th century in Baszków include an inn, now a store, and a post office, now a library. The following residential buildings from the second half of the 19th century have survived: no. 23, no. 55, no. 57, no. 61, no. 62, no. 70. From the early 20th century the following buildings have survived: no. 1, no. 2, no. 3, no. 4, no. 7, no. 9, no. 11, no. 14, no. 17, no. 24, no. 25, no. 56, no. 60, no. 63, no. 65, no. 68, no. 70, no. 72, no. 73, no. 75, no. 77, no. 78. Most of the buildings of the church complex come from the beginning of the 20th century: the rectory, the parish house, the organist’s house. The newest element of the residential complex is the neoclassical hunting lodge erected in 1929. The area of the present village of Baszków was formed over many centuries. Each stage of the town’s development - starting from the medieval settlement through the establishment of a residence and manor complex in the modern period and the later 19th and 20th century changes in the spatial structure and buildings - is clearly visible within the rural layout.

The designated borders of the historical rural complex of the Baszków village cover a coherent area with the preserved original spatial layout and the highest saturation of buildings with historic value. Good state of preservation of the individual elements of the spatial layout: village square, the so-called nawsie, the road layout, land divisions, sacral and residential architecture, public utility and residential buildings makes Baszków village one of the most significant rural complexes located in Wielkopolska Voivodeship. This is also evident through the accumulation of historic architecture and other elements of cultural significance, the most valuable of which have been individually listed in the register of historic monuments.

Visitor access: the site is open to visitors.

Complied by: Beata Marzęta, Regional Branch of the National Institute of Cultural Heritage in Poznań, 17.12.2017

Bibliography

• Anders Paweł, Województwo kaliskie, Warszawa-Poznań 1983, pp. 130-131
• Anders Paweł, Powiat krotoszyński, Poznań 2001,
• Katalog Zabytków Sztuki w Polsce, woj. poznańskie, Vol. V, z. 11, pow. krotoszyński, compiled by T. Ruszczyńska, A. Sławska, Warsaw 1973, pp. 1-3
• Libicki M., Libicki P., Dwory i pałace wiejskie w Wielkopolsce, Poznań 2003