Metadata: Archive of Free City of Krakow. Minutes of Senate meetings
Collection
- Country:
- Poland
- Holding institution:
- National Archives in Krakow
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archiwum Narodowe w Krakowie
- Postal address:
- ul. Sienna 16, 30-960 Kraków
- Phone number:
- (+48 12) 4224094
- Web address:
- http://ank.gov.pl/
- Email:
- sekretariat@ank.gov.pl
- Reference number:
- 29/200/4.1.1 WMK-IV
- Title:
- Archive of Free City of Krakow. Minutes of Senate meetings
- Title (official language):
- Archiwum Wolnego Miasta Krakowa. Protokoły Obrad Senatu
- Creator/accumulator:
- Senate of the Free City of Krakow
- Date(s):
- 1815/1846
- Date note:
- 1815-1846, 1838-1843, 1844-1846
- Language:
- Polish
- German
- French
- Extent:
- 36 units
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The Minutes of the Meetings of the Senate of the Free City of Krakow are an integral part of the larger repository that is the Archive of the Free City of Krakow (WMK). They consist of books containing minutes of meetings and resolutions of the Senate (so-called sentencjonarze), ordinary minutes of meetings of the Senate and of the Administrative Council, as well as minutes of meetings of the Senate requiring consultation with residents. The majority of the records deal with administrative and economic matters, including determination of nationality, tax lease agreements, recognition of parenthood, applications for permission to conduct business activities.
The collection covers Krakow and less often Chrzanów and Trzebinia. The most interesting Jewish-related records include contracts for the lease of taxes, electoral materials of members of the Jewish committees of the Chrzanów and Kazimierz districts, as well as budgetary matters of the Jewish communities in Chrzanów and Trzebinia, materials regarding Jewish hospitals and cemeteries, especially in Krakow, and Jewish censuses of Kazimierz.
WMK IV-1: Jewish spirits excise tax, issues related to kosher tax and its lease, Berek Szmul [Berek Sonnenberg] salt supplier in the Kingdom of Poland, license to sell vodka; draft regulation regarding licenses to sell spirits in Krakow, materials regarding the status of Jews in the Free City of Krakow.
WMK IV-3 Modifications to the statute on Jews; auctioning of income from Jewish baths, requests by Jews to issue permission (konsens) for a taproom on the outskirts of Krakow, penalties for embezzlement of income from the sale of kosher meat, vodka and liqueurs, permission for mead production in mead distilleries of the Canons Regular of the Lateran canons, a request for permission to trade in spices in their own home, an application for running a canteen, permission to employ a Hebrew translator, protest of Kazimierz Christians against the provisions of the Jewish statute favourable to Jews.
WMK IV-7 resolution on the measurement of the walls of the Jewish City, auctioning of income from kosher meat, accounts of the Kazimierz rabbi, draft budget of the Jewish hospital, candidates for positions as doctors in the Jewish hospital, the matter of arrears of the salary of the rabbi and servants in the synagogue in Trzebinia; a request from a Jewish bookseller not to censor his prints.
WMK IV-13 cases regarding establishing nationality, bills for medicines issued from a pharmacy to the Jewish hospital, a request for release from custody, a request by Jews for permission to reside in the city, a request to rescind a fine for opening a shop on a Christian holiday; postponement of a penalty for a secret marriage; complaint about imposed arrests, request for permission to retain Christian servants; application for recognition of daughters, contract for the rent of an apartment in the Kazimierz town hall, a request for payment of an overdue tax in instalments, a list of Jewish taxpayers who should be granted concessions, requests for tax leases, subsidies for the Jewish hospital, bill for medicines for the Jewish hospital, widower's request for exemption from a test in reading and writing in Polish or German (required when getting married), subsidy for the Jewish hospital; appointment of a new rabbi in Trzebinia, accounts from the Jewish fund of the Chrzanów district; a request for permission to run a tannery, real estate purchase and sale transactions in the Jewish Town, a contract for a market lease; elections of Jewish committee members of the Chrzanów district; request for the return of goods requisitioned by the customs chamber, cost estimate for the reconstruction of the Jewish hospital, extortion of donations by the rabbi of Opatów, contract for the supply of hospital equipment, request for restoration of a business concession.
WMK IV-17 request to extend the deadline of the stamp fee for a mead tavern; request for a liqueur bar license; request from the Jewish Committee of the Chrzanów district for a subsidy - for the purchase of coal for the poor; Jews escaping from military service in the Austrian army, request to write an intercession, list of Jews in Kazimierz; falsification of marriage certificates, materials about the Jewish school in Kazimierz, certificate of haberdashery craft skills; application by a Dominican monastery for payment of overdue interest by the Kazimierz Jewish community, matter of a pay raise for the rabbi in Trzebinia, request for funding for the construction of a house of prayer for Jewish women, engagement of administrators and cashiers for six synagogues in Kazimierz, materials regarding the Burial Society in Kazimierz, charges against neophyte Dobrowolski, a translator from the Hebrew language for the rabbi of Kazimierz district, a permission template for Jewish teachers wanting to give private lessons.
- Archival history:
- The Senate Central Archive was created in 1816. The records of the Senate of the Free City of Krakow were stored at Grodzka st. in the city in the church of St. Peter. They remained there until 1856, after which they were transferred to the Carmelite monastery on Sand (na Piasku). The records were absorbed into the collection of the imperial and royal (kaiserlich und königlich) Starostwo in Krakow in 1870, at which point some of them were lost. Then the files were transferred to the archives in the Spiski Palace on the Main Square. Some of them were taken by the Austrians to Vienna (Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv). In 1900, the records of the Free City of Krakow (the so-called Senate Archives) were transferred to Holy Cross church. In 1906, the records were absorbed into the Archive of Historical Records of the City of Krakow.
- Administrative/biographical history:
-
The Free City of Krakow together with the surrounding district (okręg) was created in 1815 during the Congress of Vienna by Austria, Prussia and Russia and was popularly called the Republic of Krakow. It included the capital, that is Krakow, as well as the towns of Chrzanów, Trzebinia and Nowa Góra and 224 villages. The Free City of Krakow operated on the basis of constitutions of 1815, 1818 and 1833 with amendments, organic statutes and transitional laws regulating citizens' lives, the economy, etc.
The government of the Free City of Krakow established the Senate, which carried out the orders of the residents of the governing powers. The Senate was composed of the president together with life-long and temporary senators appointed by election. There were 13 senators in the Senate (including the president), as of 1833 there were only 7 senators and the president. Jews had two religious communities, those of Krakow and Chrzanów. Rabbis were paid from the treasury of the Free City of Krakow.
- Access points: persons/families:
- Dobrowolski
- Sonnenberg, Berek
- Szmul, Berek
- System of arrangement:
-
29/200/0 / 4.1.1 / 76-29 / 200/0 / 4.1.1 / 109 Registers of resolutions and meetings (Sentencjonarze) of the Ruling Senate (1815-1845)
29/200/0 / 4.1.1 / 110 1. Minutes of the Senate proceedings ... January 2 - March 5, 1846 2. Minutes of the Civil Administrative Council meetings ... March 6 - December 30, 1846
29/200/0 / 4.1.1 / 111 Minutes of the Senate proceedings regarding discussions with the Residents Conference ... (1838-1843)
29/200/0 / 4.1.1 / 112 Minutes of proceedings of the Senate on matters requiring consultation with Residents (1844-1846)
- Finding aids:
-
W. Bartel, Ustrój i prawo Wolnego Miasta Krakowa, Kraków 1976.
A. Jakimyszyn, Żydzi krakowscy w dobie Rzeczypospolitej Krakowskiej. Statut prawny, przeobrażenia gminy, system edukacyjny, Kraków 2008.
Digital finding aids are available.
- Links to finding aids:
- http://www.respoliticae.ujd.edu.pl/media/domeny/149/static/dokumenty/from-the-history-of-the-free-city-of-cracow-selected-political-and-legal-aspects-Content-File-PDF.pdf
- http://mbc.malopolska.pl/Content/94576/KRA_23_MBC.pdf
- https://szukajwarchiwach.pl/29/200/0/4.1.1#tabJednostki
- https://www.archiwa.gov.pl/images/docs/archeion/archeion_tom_xxii.pdf
- http://mec.edu.pl/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wolne_miasto_krakow.pdf
- Yerusha Network member:
- The Taube Department of Jewish Studies of the University of Wrocław
- Author of the description:
- Przemysław Zarubin, Kraków, 2019