page_title: Jagiellonian tapestries
section_title: History and components
hierarchical_section_title: Jagiellonian tapestries / History and components
context_page_description: The Jagiellonian tapestries, are a collection of tapestries woven in the Netherlands and Flanders, which originally consisted of 365 pieces assembled by the Jagiellons to decorate the interiors of the royal Wawel Castle in Kraków, Poland. The collection is also collectively known as the Wawel Arrasses, as the majority of the preserved fabrics are in the possession of the Wawel Castle Museum and the French city of Arras, which was once a manufacturing centre of this kind of wall decoration in the beginning of the 16th century. The works became state property of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland according to the will of Sigismund II Augustus.
context_section_description: The first tapestries were brought by Queen Bona Sforza as her wedding dowry. Then in 1526 and 1533, Sigismund I the Old ordered 108 fabrics in Antwerp and Bruges. Most of the tapestries, however, were commissioned by king Sigismund II Augustus in Brussels in the workshops of Willem and Jan de Kempeneer, Jan van Tieghem and Nicolas Leyniers between 1550-1565. Initially, there were about 170 tapestries in the royal collection, among them 84 black-and-white tapestries with the royal crest and the letters SA, 8 tapestries which Sigismund I the Old had been received from the Emperor Maximilian I, and others, gifts from foreign delegations. The gifts include one tapestry with the Polish eagle bearing the date 1560, the royal initials and the letters CKCH (Christophorus Krupski Capitaneus Horodlo) next to the Korczak coat of arms and the inscription SCABELLVM PEDVM TVORVM (the footstool under your feet, from Psalm 110 (A Psalm of David)), a gift from Krzysztof Krupski, starost of Horodło for Sigismund Augustus. The tapestries had been displayed publicly for the first time during the wedding of king Sigismund Augustus with Catherine of Austria. To this day, preserved about 138 of which exposed are about 30. They were matched in size to the walls and some of them reach the size of 5 × 9 m (5.47 × 9.84 yd). The tapestries were made of wool strands, silk and gold and woven on looms with a density of about 8 - 10 warp threads per centimeter.
  This series consists of the following subjects:
  Biblical scenes - scenes from the Story of the First Parents, the Story of Noah and the Story of Tower of Babel (inventory number of the Wawel Museum 1 - 18), the Story of Moses, the Story of Absalom the Story of Nebuchadnezzar and the Story of Saul (scattered), created according to design by Michiel Coxie - biblical scenes, fillets by an unknown artist from the circle of painters Cornelis Floris and Cornelis Bos,
  Mythological scenes - scenes from the Trojan War, the Military expeditions of the Persian king Cyrus, the Story of Romulus and Remus, the Story of Scipio, the Story of Hannibal, the Story of Julius Caesar and the Story of Octavian Augustus (scattered),
  landscape and animal scenes (verdure) (inventory number of the Wawel Museum 19 - 78) created around 1560, according to design by an unknown artist from the circle of Pieter Coecke van Aelst (sometimes associated with Willem Tons),
  grotesque scenes with the coats of arms of Poland and Lithuania and the royal initials (inventory number of the Wawel Museum 79 - 134/2) created around 1560, according to design by an unknown artist from the circle of painters Cornelis Floris and Cornelis Bos, three grotesque (inventory number 92, 93, 94) were based on drawings by Cornelis Bos.
  Biblical tapestries are exhibited in rotation in the chambers on the second floor of the castle, and the tapestries with animals, as well as grotesques with monograms and coats of arms on both floors.
  This is the largest collection of tapestries ever commissioned by one ruler.
  According to the will of the last Jagiellonian king the Flemish Arrases in gold or figured, together with those of simpler kind were given to the king's three sisters and after their death, they had become the property of the State Treasury, under the custody of the Commonwealth's parliament to serve the public good of the Commonwealth and not for private benefit of future kings (fragment of the Diet's resolution).
  Unfortunately, the not quite precise will became a cause of many conflicts over ownership of the tapestries between the kings and nobles. The whole collection was only together for a short time at the Castle in Tykocin until 1572. Then the king's sisters scattered it between their residences in Kraków, Niepołomice, Warsaw, Vilnius and Hrodna, and even sent some to Sweden. The king Sigismund III Vasa brought back 30 pieces that Anna Jagiellon sent to Stockholm to her sister Catherine (Sigismund's mother). In 1633, three of the tapestries with scenes from the Story of Moses, were presented by Jerzy Ossoliński, on behalf of king Władysław IV V
caption: Verdure Dragon fighting with a panther (detail), design by the circle of Pieter Coecke van Aelst.
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