POZNAN (18 images)
We stopped in Poznan for one night while on our tour of the country and I remember very little other than it was a pretty little city with a very beautiful church. Nearby was an island archeological site where the 10th century birthplace of the first king of Poland was being excavated. Poland was unique in the world in that it was a kingdom, yet the king was elected for a specific time. Most of the kings were nobility from other countries. The greatest king of Poland was King Jan Sobieski who led the cavalry against the Ottoman empire warriors at the gates of Vienna. The ruler of Vienna had considered the battle lost and had fled before King Jan arrived with his Polish cavalry to defeat the Turks. That battle was important because it stopped the westward movement of the Ottoman empire and kept Europe Christian rather than Muslim. When the ruler of Vienna returned after the battle, he had to compete with the people's memory of the bravery of the Polish king. He wasted no time in making a law that no statue or monument could ever be erected to honor a Polish king. That law still is on the books.
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