Greening of historical market squares before 1945 in Silesia in the context of contemporary activities
53
the monument to General Blücher in the middle of the
market square in Chojnów (around 1930 it was stripped
of its trees and recomposed). In the market square in Za-
widów (Fig. 6c), the fountain planted with four trees was
supplemented around 1905 by hedge borders – they formed
a variation on the theme of the Renaissance garden quar-
ter in a compartimentary arrangement; the war memorial
erected in the same market square (from the 1880s) was
composed with a mini-greenhouse, whose trees formed the
background for the monument. The green area with trees
on the Bolków market square compositionally merged the
fountain, the war memorial and the façade of the town hall.
In Lądek-Zdrój, a string of three trees was planted on the
lawn next to the Holy Trinity obelisk on the side of the
town hall as a pendant to an analogous triad on the opposite
side of the town hall.
4. Climbers on façades:
a) town halls (standing in the market square) – a solution
that became popular in the end of the 19
th
century, hitherto
overlooked in historico-urban and historico- architectural
research, documented in photographs in many Silesian
towns: Kożuchów, Lwówek Śląski, Bolesławiec, Trzebni-
ca, Strzelin, Brzeg, Opole, Paczków (Fig. 5d), Otmuchów,
Prudnik, Głubczyce, Radków. The genesis of this phenom-
enon and the potential impact of the previously mentioned
creepers from the Wrocław Town Hall have not been deter-
mined at this stage of the research,
b) residential buildings in old town districts – a pheno-
menon documented in numerous photographs, but at this
stage of research it is dicult to assess its scale. Façades
co vered with climbing plants are known, for example, from
Brzeg (buildings near the castle church, building on Mo-
niusz ki Street), Jawor and Ziębice (building in the mid-mar-
ket block), Lubin (Hotel Zum grünen Baum in the market
square), Złotniki Lubańskie and Sulików (market houses).
5. Greens with lawn parterres and tree planting in mar-
ket areas – a solution known from several small Silesian
towns with relatively large market squares (Szlichtyngowa
[Fig. 5e], Chobienia [Fig. 5h], Lewin Kłodzki, Głuchoła-
zy [Fig. 6c], Bolesławów, Chełmsko Śląskie – with the use
of old trees surrounding a monument, Złotniki Lubańskie
– with a grass surface only). This represented the most “rad-
ical” expression of the trend to transform a former market
square into a recreational and formal zone. Solutions within
the formula of the “architectural layout” (architektonische
Grünanlage) were used, characterised by a geometric ap-
proach to the layout of trac routes, planting and accents.
For small-town residents, the market square green was
a substitute for a city park. Isolated projects from county
towns included a small wooded and fenced-o square with-
in the mid-market block in Jawor and the planting of sever-
al dozen trees on the square in Kamienna Góra around the
monument to Count Eberhard von Stollberg-Wernigerode
(1879). The square-shaped ornamental garden separated
by a fence from the market space in Dobromierz (arranged
around 1910, reconstructed before 1930 [Fig. 6d]), was an
exceptional solution.
6. Flower or lawn parterres in the vicinity of buildings:
a) a green within a market square next to a public build -
ing – a sporadically encountered solution, recorded in Klucz -
bork (Fig. 5f), where an extensive grassy parterre with dec-
orative trees and owerbeds was arranged. An analogous
green space existed in Brzeg in the square in front of St
Nicholas’ Church (on the site of the former church cem-
etery). In both cases, the “park and garden” rather than
“promenade” standard was built – coniferous trees were
planted, which are not noted in the space of other old town
streets and squares in Silesia,
b) a strip of lawn (lawn owerbed) in the line of a row
of trees within the market square – an occasional solution,
used, e.g., in Strzelin (on the western side of the mid-mar-
ket block), Bolesławiec and Pyskowice (on the edge of the
town hall), Kąty Wrocławskie (extensive grassy surround-
ings of the mid-market block as a substitute for a green). An
exceptional case is the market square in Wleń, where the
lawn edging around the town hall was planted with shrubs
– as if by a villa or country manor,
c) Flowerbed composition as a surrounding of a fountain
or a monument – used rather rarely, e.g., in Lewin Brzeski
(at the war memorial [Fig. 5g]), Grodków and Mirsk (at
the monuments to Kaiser Wilhelm I), in Bystrzyca Kłodz-
ka (at the Holy Trinity Column), in Toszek and Olesno (at
the monuments to St. John of Nepomuk), in Duszniki (at
a fountain – only a lawn).
7. Individual trees:
a) a solitaire tree with monumental function within its
square – this is usually a “peace oak” (Friedenseiche), one
of many planted throughout Germany to commemorate the
end of the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871). In Silesia,
such oak trees grew in the market squares of Strzelin and
Chobienia (Fig. 5h; a tree preserved to this day),
b) next to buildings in the market space. In large cities,
they occurred sporadically (e.g., in Nysa – planted by the
Triton fountain around 1890). Perhaps they were main-
tained to cultivate place-based traditions – for example, in
Wołów, trees at the corners of the market square are shown
on prints from 1661, on Werner’s drawing from the mid-18
th
century and on photographs from before 1945. In the small-
est towns, trees that grew in front of the house façade in an
area used as a front garden did not interfere with pedestrian
trac (e.g., in Bolesławów, Złotniki Lubańskie),
c) shading a water reservoir – a solution known from
Mirsk (the so-called lion fountain, in the 1930s additionally
provided with a owerbed border). In the market square in
Korfantów, three trees planted by the town well had a sim-
ilar function.
8. Bedding plants or trees in pots within the market
place – an occasional solution, probably seasonal or peri-
odic, documented in photographs from the interwar period,
e.g., examples include Bystrzyca Kłodzka (a row of con-
tainers along the western frontage of the square, in the line
of the retaining wall), Kietrz (trees temporarily placed by
the Marian column, after the trees growing in the ground
had been removed), Lubawka (coniferous trees in pots dis-
played in the market place by the façade of the town hall
and the arcades of the town houses), Bytom Odrzański
(ower pots decorating the balustrades of the fountain).
9. Flower decorations in boxes and pots on the façades
of houses (on window sills) in an old-town district – in the
light of the iconographic accounts in Silesia – occurred
