Metadata: Minutes of interrogations before the town council in Kraków, the Criminalia [Old Polish criminal registers in the town of Kraków]
Collection
- Country:
- Poland
- Holding institution:
- National Archives in Krakow
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archiwum Narodowe w Krakowie
- Postal address:
- Oddział III, ul. Sienna 16, 30–960 Kraków
- Phone number:
- +48 12 4224094
- Web address:
- http://ank.gov.pl/
- Email:
- sekretariat@ank.gov.pl
- Reference number:
- 29/33/1.4.11
- Title:
- Minutes of interrogations before the town council in Kraków, the Criminalia [Old Polish criminal registers in the town of Kraków]
- Title (official language):
- Protocolla causarum criminalium officii consularis Cracoviensis [protokoły przesłuchań przed urzędem radzieckim krakowskim], tzw. Criminalia [staropolskie księgi kryminalne miasta Krakowa]
- Creator/accumulator:
- Kraków municipal prosecutor; city council of Kraków
- Date(s):
- 1362/1802
- Date note:
- 1362-1422; 1554-1625; 1589-1604; 1630-1633; 1679-1690; 1691-1719; 1721-1729; 1734-1736; 1736-1769, 1774-1802
- Language:
- Polish
- Latin
- Extent:
- 35 units; size of the collection unknown
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
This collection is part of the larger collection of Records of the City of Kraków (strictly: Old Polish Archives of the City of Kraków 1300-1795). Due to the diverse origins of the criminals, some of the materials also apply to Jews from other towns, mainly from Małopolska and Silesia, e.g., Nowe Miasto Korczyn, Nowy Wiśnicz, Olkusz, Wrocław. Most of the material consists of interrogations of the accused questioned by the Kraków municipal public prosecutor. It is the most important group for investigating Jewish crime in the Old Polish period due to the detail of the preserved interrogation protocols. It allows one to analyse the categories of crimes committed by Jews: crimes against property (theft, burglary, bootlegging), against life and health (murders, assaults), against religion and the Church (apostasy, sacrilege), economic crimes (counterfeiting coins, weights and measures). It also makes it possible to capture certain social processes related to the Jewish population, i.e., conversions, migration, and pauperisation. There are also cases concerning Jews as the injured party (mainly Jewish leaseholders of inns and mills). The collection is also important for the study of the old Polish legal culture and the legal status of Jews in royal cities.
Ref. no. 869 (1691-1697) case regarding Jews who were beaten.
Ref. no. 870 (1697-1699) testimonies about Jews acting as fences for stolen goods (including Lewek from Pilica).
Ref. 871 (1700-1708) testimonies about Jews as fences for stolen goods, Jews involved in thefts from churches.
Ref. no. 872 (1709-1716) testimonies about Jews who acted as fences (including selling stolen gold and silver to Jews, stolen liturgical items), testimony about a Jewish innkeeper from Tuszów near Sandomierz, the case of the theft of vodka from a brewery owned by a Jewish woman in Węglówka; 29 October 1716, an attack on a Jewish inn in Dobra.
Ref. no. 873 (1717-1719) selling stolen church items to a Jew.
Ref. no. 874 (1721-1729) testimonies regarding the theft of cloth from a Jew, theft of a snuffbox pledged from a Jew, testimony of Lewek Wekslarz, a pledge of silver spoons from a Jewish fence, refusal by Jews from Kazimierz to buy stolen items from a certain Brodowski, Maierhoffer selling stolen furs to Jews.
Ref. no. 875 (1734-1736) testimony regarding commercial transactions with various Jews (including Jakub from Mysłowice).
Ref. no. 877 (1740-1743) testimony given in 1742 (a de facto biography) of Jan Jakub Szydłowski (former rabbi in Szydłów, son of the rabbi of the Kraków-Sandomierz lands), convert to Judaism; testimony of the burgher Oracewicz, Cichońska, Gierczyńska regarding Szydłowski, a decree on the case between Niegowiecki and Szydłowski, testimony regarding the sale to Jews of items from the church in Ludźmierz, testimony of Borkowski regarding the sale of stolen goods to a Jew, Icek; Kowalski - a Jew allegedly asked him to hold onto some sheet metal (illegal); testimony on the safekeeping of the stolen sheet metal by a Jew.
Ref.no. 881 (1753-1757) testimony of Barbara Krzyżanowska, a convert (formerly the wife of a rabbi in Tarnów), testimony regarding a Jew who acted as a fence for stolen goods.
Ref. no. 882 (1757-1763) Testimony of a peasant who said that a Jew allegedly tried to persuade him to commit a crime; testimony regarding a lien against a Jew; testimony of the neophyte Antoni Dobrowolski (innkeeper from Stradom), who claimed that he had persuaded the neophyte Anna Dąbrowska to return to the Jews (1759); a poacher's testimony regarding his sale to a Jew in the Ojców brewery of illegally killed game; testimony in the case of the Jew Czapnik, who accepted a stolen żupan [a type of caftan] as a pledge; testimony of members of a criminal gang regarding the procedure for selling stolen goods to Jews, testimony of the sale of cowhides to a Jewish tanner in Piasek, testimony regarding the theft of a cow from a Jew in Sierosławice.
Ref. no. 883 (1763-1769) testimony in the case of the Jew who purportedly assisted in an abortion, testimony of the neophyte Krzyżańska, on whom "Jews purportedly cast a spell " and then she allegedly committed a theft, the refusal by a Jew to purchase a stolen shooting bag from Kraków thieves.
Ref. no. 884 (1774-1776) trial records from courts in Kraków regarding a gang of Jewish thieves and fences of stolen goods specialising in robberies of churches in the vicinity of Kraków, information on their baptism and execution.
- Archival history:
- The registers were stored on an ongoing basis in the city archives located in the city hall (the old Polish archives of the Kraków city authorities until 1794; from 1816 the Archives of the Free City of Kraków). After 1887, when the Archive of Historical Records of the City of Kraków was established, the books began to be organised, preserved and processed, and made available for research by 1915. From 1936, the books were kept in the State Archives in Kraków. During the war, the records of the city of Krakow were placed under German supervision. In 1944, the records were temporarily stored in the Benedictine abbey in Tyniec. From 1952, the records were stored in the Provincial State Archives (now the National Archives in Kraków). Some records were lost. Materials from the years 1605-1629, 1634-1678, 1730-1733 are missing.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The municipal prosecutor was a court clerk acting as a public prosecutor, who also carried out police duties (bringing the accused to court, collecting evidence, participating in forensic examination of the victim). This office was established at the end of the 16th century and operated on the basis of the Magdeburg Law. The office holder was appointed by the city council. His main duties were to conduct investigations, and in particular to conduct interrogations. In private criminal cases, he was supposed to support the injured party's motion. He cooperated with the city executioner in the legal execution of torture and punishment. He conducted interrogations on the basis of prepared forms. Most often, Jews accused of the most serious crimes committed in the city of Kraków (murders, thefts, crimes against religion, fences for stolen property) were brought before the municipal prosecutor. This office disappeared at the beginning of the 19th century.
- Access points: persons/families:
- Krzyżanowska, Barbara
- Szydłowski, Jan Jakub
- System of arrangement:
-
The collection comprises the following sub-series:
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 863 Books of proscription 1362-1422
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 864-9 / 33/0 / 1.4.11 / 875, 9/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 877-29 / 33/0 / 1.4.11 / 894 Criminal cases 1554- 1736, 1740-1793
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 876 Protocol of the incarcerated 1736-1740
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 895 Protocol of sentences in criminal cases 1790-1794
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 896 Book of voluntary statements from the accused and sworn testimonies 1793-1794
29/33/0 / 1.4.11 / 897 Protocol of accused parties brought before the Austrian court 1797-1802.
- Access, restrictions:
- Scans and microfilms are made available first of all. Access to originals requires permission from the head of the Branch.
- Finding aids:
- Finding aids are available online.
- Links to finding aids:
- https://szukajwarchiwach.pl/29/33/0/1.4.11/str/1/15#tabJednostki
- http://mbc.malopolska.pl/dlibra/doccontent?id=61816
- https://www.szukajwarchiwach.gov.pl/en/seria?p_p_id=Seria&p_p_lifecycle=0&p_p_state=normal&p_p_mode=view&_Seria_delta=20&_Seria_nameofjsp=jednostki&_Seria_resetCur=false&_Seria_id_serii=294005&_Seria_cur=1
- Yerusha Network member:
- The Taube Department of Jewish Studies of the University of Wrocław
- Author of the description:
- Przemysław Zarubin, Kraków, 2020