The Rąbiń cemetery has become the final resting place for many members of the Chłapowski family - including general Dezydery Chłapowski - which has earned great renown in the annals of the region. The entire ecclesiastical complex in Rąbiń is of great artistic and architectural value.

History

The church, erected between the 15th and the 16th century, incorporates the remains of an earlier, 13th-century Romanesque structure. The two side chapels were added in 1648. Somewhere in the mid- 16th century, the façade received its tall stepped gable, designed in a mixture of the Gothic and Renaissance style. In years 1904-05, the old chancel was demolished to give way to a new one. In 1970, the church was renovated by Stanisław and Teodor Szukała.

Description

The parish Church of St Peter and Paul in Rąbiń is located on an irregular plot of land in the south-eastern part of the village. The church, oriented towards the east, follows a single-nave layout. It is a brick building, with the fragment of the northern wall of the nave, made of granite blocks, being the remnant of the older, Romanesque church. The chancel, designed in the Gothic Revival style, features a semi-hexagonal termination, its width matching that of the nave. The two Baroque chapels adjoining the church to the north and the south were designed on a rectangular floor plan and are covered with sail vaults; unlike the rest of the church, they also feature plastered walls. The sacristy and the porch can be found in the northern part of the church. The walls of the nave are supported by buttresses and feature rectangular windows topped with semicircular arches. The stepped gable in the west was added during the 16th century; designed in a mixture of Gothic and Renaissance style, it is divided vertically and horizontally with lesenes and cornices respectively, with plastered fields between the divisions. Each step of the gable features a semicircular coping. The eastern gable of the nave follows a similar design. The nave features a gable roof clad with roof tiles. The chapels are covered with squat pavilion roofs topped with roof lanterns. The interior of the church features three Late Baroque altarpieces from the 2nd half of the 18th century as well as a Late Renaissance pulpit originating from the second quarter of the 17th century. In the chancel, one can admire two Late Renaissance gravestones of the Rąbiński family, dating back to ca. 1614, adorned with semi-reclining figures of the deceased in full suits of armour. The 6th and 7th station of the Way of Sorrows from Kopaszewo are incorporated into the external walls of the church. The church is circumscribed by a wall erected in the 19th century, featuring a Gothic Revival gate doubling as a free-standing belfry, built in 1843, as well as three wicket gates.

The church cemetery is the final resting place of a number of eminent personages, including general Dezydery Chłapowski and his family and Joanna Grudzińska, the Princess of Łowicz (the wife of Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich of Russia).

The site is accessible to visitors.

compiled by Beata Marzęta, Regional Branch of the National Heritage Board of Poland in Poznań, 17-10-2014.

Bibliography

• Gotyckie kościoły w Wielkopolsce, 2008, s. 224
• Katalog Zabytków Sztuki w Polsce, woj. poznańskie, t. V, z. 10, pow. kościański, s. 92-95.
• Kasprzak K., Raszka B., Park Krajobrazowy im. Dezyderego Chłapowskiego, Poznań 2007, s. 224-227