User:Rdorczak

Salwator – a small residential estate from the beginning of the 20th c., situated to the west of Krakow's centre, at the end of a long ridge sloping down to where the Rudawa (a small river in Krakow) flows into the Vistula. It is located in the area of an ancient village Zwierzyniec and is currently a part of Krakow's District No VII Zwierzyniec but is not an auxiliary administrative unit of lower rank. The settlement covers the uppermost part of Sikornik, the easternmost hill of the Sowiniec Ridge. The Salwator estate is made up of houses located on Blessed Bronislava St., Anczyca St. and Gontyna St.

History
Traces of settlements in the area of Salwator date back to the Middle Paleolithic (115,000 – 40,000 BC) and to the Upper Paleolithic (40,000 – 10,000 BC) when mammoth hunters built their huts on the hill surrounded then with waters which guaranteed them safety.

Much later, a village with a pagan temple is believed to have existed here. Those times are recalled by the name of one of the most picturesque streets of today's Salwator – Gontyna, which is an archaic Polish word for a pagan shrine. According to certain archaeologists the existing Sacred Salvator Church could have been one of the first Christian temples in Poland.

At that time, Zwierzyniec, a village near Krakow, belonged to the dukes residing in the Wawel castle. From the second half of the 12th c. it was owned by the nuns of the Order of Canons Regular of Prémontré, also known as the Norbertines, the nuns of St. Norbert or by the Krakow's people the Zwierzyniec Maidens. They founded a school and a hospital there and cared for the economic development of the settlement. The nuns owned Zwierzyniec until 1910, when as an initiative of Julius Leo, the then president of Krakow, the village was incorporated into the city.

Between 1866 and 1867 the Austrian army constructed on the hill one of the edifices of the Krakow Fortress – sconce FS-30, divided then into two smaller fortifications. In the beginning of the 20th c., after the demolition of the sconces, the Society of Administration Professionals decided to create a residential quarter there. An architectural design competition was held, whose winner in 1909 was Tadeusz Niedzielski. Finally, though, the design that was realized was that of Roman Durski, who designed also a few villas for the new quarter.

In 1911 semicurcular branch-streets from the Blessed Bronislava St. - Gontyna St. and Anczyca St. were laid out.

The estate was called Salwator in 1912, after the invocation of the church in the neighbourhood. It is made up of 30 villas designed by Roman Bandurski, Alfred Kramarski and in the interwar period by Ferdynad Liebling, Henryk Jasieński and Ludwik Wojtyczko. The last house was erected in 1955.

The estate is considered a symbol of a garden city.

Despite its small size and less then 100 years of history, the estate was home for very many people of distinction. Ca. 50 of them appear in printed encyclopaedias and lexicons, people such as Feliks Konieczny, prof. Emanuel Rostworowski, Marek Rostworowski, Hugon Kowarzyk and Alfred Kramarski among others lived here. Recently, for commercial reasons the name of Salwator is streched over a much larger territory, as an equivalent for a significant part of the former Zwierzyniec District, which included Półwsie Zwierzynieckie apart from Zwierzyniec itself.

Monuments and points of interest:

 * Sacred Salvator Church surrounded by an old cemetery
 * St. Margaret and St. Judith Chapel with a statue of the pope John Paul II (erected on the slope in front of the chapel at the end of March in 2008). The chapel is surrounded by an old plague cemetery.
 * A walking path to the Kościuszko Mound leads through Salwator, along the St. Bronislava Street and Washington Avenue. The path goes further towards the Wolski Forest, the Zoo and the Bielany district and is very popular, particularly at weekends
 * The Emaus fair is traditionally held every year at Easter at the bottom of Salwator, on both banks of the Rudawa river, by the Norbertines Church and in Półwsie Zwierzynieckie
 * Some of the villas which are historical monuments

In the neighbourhood of Salwator there are also:
 * Salwator Cemetery
 * St. Augustin and St. John the Baptist Church with the Norbertines' monastery

Public transport in Salwator:

 * tram lines ending at the Salwator tram loop: 1, 2, 6
 * bus lines ending at the Salwator loop or passing via Salwator: 100, 109, 209, 229, 239, 249, 259, 269, 279, 289, 409 (auxiliary line)
 * couch lines, Mal-buses, Super-buses and other private buses.