The Spire of the Warsaw Jesuit Church in the Light of Iconographic Sources

Abstract

The Jesuit church in Warsaw built in the years 1609-1626 in its plan and mass presents a type that is different from the model of Il Gesú. It is a confirmation of the thesis put forward by Jerzy Paszenda concerning a weak influence of the Roman Jesuit church on the buildings raised by that order in other countries. A characteristic feature of the space arrangement of the Warsaw church is the semi-oval in plan and in cross-section dome over the presbytery and the tall spire adjoining it. These two elements – the dome and spire – form a characteristic accent in the view of Warsaw from the east, beyond the Vistula.

Initially the spire was covered with a globular cupola of several segments; the spire was one storey lower. The appearance of the cupola was shown in Abraham Boot’s drawing of 1627, an engraving by Wilhelm Houdius of 1649 and many other iconographic sources. In 1695 the cupola was taken off and one more storey was built in the form of gloriette and covered, probably provisionally, with a conical roof. Views of 1697, 1701 and 1735 show the spire in this form. In the years 17370-1740 there was a plan of putting a slender cupola in the form of obelisk on the spire but it was not put into effect, which is proven by paintings by Bernardo Bellotto Canaletto of 1770 and 1772.

It is assumed that the present cupola with a concave-protuberant form with a lantern was made after 1790. However, in Canaletto’s painting of 1774 the very cupola tops the Jesuit spire. Hence it was built around this date, probably after the order had been suppressed (1773), when the Warsaw church was taken over by the Commission for National Education for school use. It seems that it was on the Commission’s initiative that the spire received today’s cap. The Jesuit church, situated near the former St John collegiate, now the cathedral, with its shape and the tall spire clearly competes with the Gothic building. As a vertical accent in the centre of the town the Jesuit spire replaced the medieval belfry of the collegiate, pulled down in 1602. In the years 1688-1697 near the collegiate a tall campanile was built. Also the Jesuit spire was made taller at the same time. If it were covered with a tall cupola, which was probably planned, its height would be equal to the height of the new campanile. In these constructing activities an aspiration can be felt to equal the scale of the neighbouring church and to clearly stress the Jesuit church in the town view. Perhaps then it was not always – as Paszenda argues – that the Jesuits did not care if their church was seen in the town view clearly enough.