Denomination Relations in the Cracow Diocese in the Middle of the 18th Century of the Basis of the Inspections and Records Made by Bishop A. S. Załuski

Abstract

The present paper is a contribution to the study of denominational relations in Poland in the middle of the 18th century. It focuses on the territory of Little Poland and precisely on the territory of the diocese of Cracow which, in fact, covers the territory of Little Poland proper. The paper is based on the data recorded in the records and inspection reports made in the years 1747 to 1749. These are the basic but not the only sources used by the author, who, because of some incompleteness of the material, used some other source material like the 1776 census of the population and parishes in the part of the Cracow diocese which was annexed to Austria after the 1st partition of Poland and the census of the population in the part of the diocese which was left in Poland after the 1st partition made by Bishop M. J. Poniatowski in 1787. The „Number of Jewish Heads in the Crown Lands in the Tariff of 1765” was used as an additional material.

The data found in the source materials is actually invaluable for the study in denominational relations. Their incompleteness, however, diminishes the value of the demographical data. The aim of this paper, hence, is to fill up the missing information and to calculate the population of particular denominations. The author used the statistic-demographical method.

It has been calculated that in the middle of the I8th century there were 90.8 per cent of Roman Catholics, 0.5 % Uniates (Greek Catholics), 5.34 % Jews and only 0.36 % Protestants (Lutherans and Calvinists) in the Cracow diocese. Thus, the Catholics constituted the majority. From among the minorities the belivers of the Judaic faith were a comparatively important group of settlers.