Dąbrówka Starzeńska Castle

The castle in Dąbrówka Starzeńska, in the municipality of the same name in south-eastern Poland, began as a Gothic manor used by members of the Polish nobility and was recorded as a manor house in 1500; the associated village was first mentioned in 1436.

Early ownership included the Kmita family, with Piotr Kmita Lunak in possession until 1430 and later association with Jan Kmita Tępy. After 1465 Stanisław Denowski sold the property to Paweł Nabrzuch; sixteenth-century purchasers included Jan Bobola (1523) and Stanisław Stadnicki (1527). In the first half of the sixteenth century the residence was enlarged with a southern building of about 35 metres and a masonry gate on the western side.

Violent events marked the early seventeenth century: the manor was set on fire in 1617 by the Sienieńscy. The standing castle phase dates to 1624–1633 and is described in records as the Stadnicki castle. Between 1626 and 1629 Stanisław Stadnicki, known as Diablątko, laid out a defensive enclosure on an approximately quadrangular plan of about 95 by 91 metres and added two square corner bastions.

Ownership continued to change and military action shaped the site. Marianna ze Stadnickich, wife of Michał Zebrzydowski, held the estate from 1630 until 1663; in 1657 the castle was spared destruction during the campaign of George II Rákóczi after negotiations by Michał Zebrzydowski. From 1663 the property belonged to Jan Czartoryski and from 1689 to Grzegorz Antoni Ogiński. The castle successfully repelled a Tatar raid in 1672.

In later centuries the estate passed to Adam Parys in 1779 and to Piotr Starzeński in 1789; the Starzeński family retained ownership until 1945. In the nineteenth century they made adaptations including a single-storey manor between the western bastions, conversion of the north bastion into apartments and use of the south bastion for archive and granary. The castle housed a notable library and art collection, and eastern and southern wings were used for economic purposes. During the January Uprising of 1863 generals Marian Langiewicz and Ludwik Mierosławski stayed at the castle. Around 1900 the Starzeńskis built a family burial chapel nearby.

The twentieth century brought repeated occupations and destruction. After 17 September 1939 the Red Army occupied the complex, burned the library and looted the premises. German forces were stationed there after 1941 and Soviet troops returned in 1944–1945. In 1947 a unit of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army under Mychajło Duda, known as Hromenko, burned the castle; the burned structure was later dismantled and has remained a ruin. The ruins, the Starzeński chapel and the surrounding park were entered in the register of monuments in 1968.