History

The original manor house was erected in the early 19th century. The one-level structure was built of quarry limestone and had no basement. In 1886 the manor house was extended towards the east by adding a single-storey central section and a multi-storey east wing with full basement and built of brick on the axis perpendicular to the older part of the manor house. In 1930 the property belonged to Zofia Zgierska and later (until 1945) to Tadeusz Strumiłło. After the property was parcelled out in 1945, the manor house became the property of the state and was converted into lodgings for the most impoverished inhabitants of the village. For some time, there was a grocery store operating in the west part of the manor, and in the east part a day room and a library on the first floor. The property is free from style features. In the newer part, there are preserved stoves characteristic of the end of the 19th century. The designers of the manor house and its annexe are unknown.

Description

The village of Książniczki is located approximately 20 km north of Kraków, among the hills of the south part of the Miechów Upland. The manor house stands on the north edge of the village in a small landscape park (about 0.8 ha) by the local road from Michałowice to Kocmyrzów. 

The manor house is built on an L-shaped plan. The rooms have a two-bay layout. An entrance vestibule running across the east wing connects it with the body. Two-bay cellars are only under the east part of the house. The body of the building has three parts: the two-storey eastern part with basement, covered by a high gable roof with gables from the south and north; the one-storey central part without basement, covered by a gable roof; and the slightly lower, one-storey west part without basement, covered by a gable roof with the gable from the west. Five brick chimneys over the roofs. At the north wall of the narrower west part of the house, there is a brick annexe with a porch. The front entrance is through a wooden (once glazed) porch. On the east side, an entrance through a brick terrace. Both the porch and the terrace are covered by gable roofs supported on wooden poles. The staircase with wooden stairs to the first floor and the loft is located on the central axis of the east wing. Entrance to the basement is in the ground floor in the north wall of the wing.

The granary and the manager’s house are located several dozen metres west of the manor house on the other side of the road, once a utility road. 

The granary is located further to the south; it is a simple, one-storey, compact structure with full basement covered by a half-hipped roof. All external walls are plastered, thickened at the corners and in the middle sections. The lowermost level is separated from the ground floor by a flat brick apron running around the walls and covered with plaster. The east façade has a gate preceded by an entrance to a basement chamber sunken below the ground level. There is an entrance and a small window opening on the upper floor. Both openings are vaulted on segments. The north gable wall is limited, due to the higher ground level, to the part connected with the ground floor level; it has one axis and one window above the ground and one in the cropped gable. The west wall is without openings. The south gable wall has an entrance in the ground floor, on the sides of which there are two basement windows secured with iron bars. Above the entrance, there is a ground floor window and an attic window. The manager’s house is further to the south. It is built on a rectangular plan, with a three-axis, two-bay interior layout of the ground floor, three rooms in the south bay of the basement and an open space loft. On the north side, there is a small rectangular porch; on the south side, a slightly larger vestibule extension.

The facility is covered by a gable roof, its panels inclined at an angle of approx. 30˚. The porch is covered with a double-sloped roof; the annexe has a flat ceiling.

The buildings are accessible from the outside. The manor house is fenced and partially visible from the road. The granary and manager’s house are not fenced. The manager’s house is used for residential purposes.

Author of the note Grzegorz Młynarczyk, Regional Branch of the National Institute of Cultural Heritage in Kraków 08/2015

Bibliography

• A.B.Krupiński, Karty ewidencyjne zabytków, Kraków 1990
• P.Libicki, Dwory i pałace wiejskie w małopolsce i na podkarpaciu, Poznań 2012, p. 227