The article’s goal is to show the role of expatriates from the region of Vilnius in post-war Barczewo and also to capture the worlds saved in human memory – the one that was left behind the eastern border of Poland, the one in former East Prussia and also one that was created in Barczewo’s multicultural mosaic. In the article there are presented the characteristics of people who came from these eastern borderlands. There is also shown the relationship between the indigenous population and the migrant population. The basis of the article is the relations of the Kresowiak family - today’s inhabitants of Barczewo. A few preserved in family archival documents, written relations of people already dead, as well as published biographical studies.
The collection of the State Archive in Olsztyn holds a highly unusual item: a decorative inscription concerning the monks and donors of the Franciscan Observants monastery in Barczewo. It is a 200 by 100 cm, oil-on-canvas painting, whose textual part is composed of a decorative title, an outline of the monastery’s history, the list of donators, as well as of the deceased fathers and friars covering the period between 1599 and 1817. The fundamental content is organised into five columns. The painting was decorated with a composition of a geometrical ornament, a vine, and a bordure of skull and bones suspended on a ribbon. The dissolution of the order, which took place in 1830, led to the dispersal of the Franciscan legacy. In view of a small number of extant sources from the suppressed monastery, the plaque seems all the more valuable. The inscription, due to a poor state of preservation, has not been made available for research so far, a situation which the restoration works currently in progress will help to change.
The collection of antique books of the sixteenth century of the Library of Hosianum, the Seminary of the Archdiocese of Warmia in Olsztyn includes 1559 publications. This is not a homogeneous collection, as the library collected vintage books from all over the Diocese of Warmia after World War II. Most publications come from Braniewo, Dobre Miasto, Barczewo and Frombork. They were released in 89 print centers, by 497 publishers. Most were written in Latin. Among the works in the Polish language, there are two copies of the Leopolite Bible, postils, sermons, religious literature and state publications. In the sixteenth-century book collection of the Library „Hosianum” 25 publications are works of ancient writers. An essential part of the literature of that period was represented by religious works. A Patristic period is represented by works of: Tertullian, Origen, St. Cyprian, St. Athanasius, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, St Cyril of Alexandria, Theodoret of Cyrus, Cassiodorus, St. Gregory the Great, St. Isidore of Seville, St. Leo I the Great. The theology of the Middle Ages is represented by works of: St. Anselm of Canterbury, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Peter Lombard, St. Albert the Great, St. Bonaventure, St. Thomas Aquinas, Nicholas of Lyra, St. Antoninus of Florence. There are the work of reformers: Erasmus of Rotterdam, Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, John Calvin, John Bugenhagen, and counter reformers: St. John Fisher, John Eck, Peter Soto, Melchior Cano, St. Robert Bellarmine and Johannes Cochlaeusa. Martin Luther is the most often represented author in the sixteenth-century book collection in the Library „Hosianum”(41 works). There are also plenty of books by the authors from the Society of Jesus: St. Peter Canisius, St. Francis Suarez and many others - more or less known. Sixteen works are written by Louis of Granada – a very popular Dominican mystic. In addition, there are works of eminent bishops of Warmia who held important church and state positions: John Dantiscus, Stanislaus Hosius, Marcin Kromer. The collection includes the works of native authors – priests of Warmia, canons and Jesuits working in Braniewo: John Benedict Solfa, Anthony Possevino, Thomas Treter, Fabian Kwadrantyn (Quadrantinus), Frederic Bartsch. There are also the poems of the fi rst humanist poet, born in Warmia, Eustace Knobelsdorf. In the collection we can also fi nd the works of other famous Polish authors, such as: Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski, Mikołaj Rej, Jakub Górski, Rev. Piotr Skarga, Stanisław Reszka. The sixteenth-century book collection of the Library „Hosianum” contains many editions of the Bible (26), liturgical books (among them Missals and agendas of Warmia and the agenda of Cracow of 1517), martyrologies, sermons, codes of civil and canon law. There are the works of the poet Francis Petrarch, works on philosophy, rhetoric, history, literature, astronomy, biology, medicine, economics, geography, and among them the works of the eminent cartographer at a Spanish court – Abraham Ortelius. Some volumes are bound in elaborate sixteenth-century bindings, others have a beautiful decoration in the form of woodcut and copperplate illustrations. The atlas Theatrum orbis terrarum by Abraham Ortelius of 1592 is a masterpiece of decorative art. The analysis of the collection of the Library „Hosianum” in Olsztyn refl ects the high intellectual culture of historical Warmia. The value of this library is increased thanks to publications belonging to the representatives of the social and religious life, including bishops of Warmia, who held important public positions in Poland and abroad, as well as the Canons of Warmia, who through studies and travels in Europe, became the owners of valuable and interesting books.