Bilokrynytsia Castle - Castles on Waymarking.com

Bilokrynytsia Castle

According to official records of 1545, this town and region belonged to Bohdan Bilokrynytskyi, of whom the town is named after. By the mid-16th century, the region came under the ownership of the Zbaraski family who built a two-storey renaissance castle. Despite its considerable defensive potential, it was occupied and destroyed by the Tatars in 1603. The castle was restored three years later without any perceptible changes to its appearance.

Jerzy Zbaraski, the last of the Zbaraski clan, died in 1631. The Zbaraski estate was passed to their closest male relative Jeremi Wisniowiecki who was Crown Equerry. Jeremi would build an empire that would encompass 38,000 homesteads inhabited by 230,000 of his subjects. He would be the Prince of Ruthenia and the father of the future Polish King Michal I. He was immortalized in the novel “With Fire And Sword” written by Henryk Sienkiewicz and made into a movie in 1975.

Ursula Wisniowiecki, the daughter of the last male Wisniowiecki and granddaughter of the famous Cossack hetman Ivan Mazepa, was born in this castle. She would become the first female Polish playwright with at least 16 plays to her name. In 1725 Ursula would marry Michal Radzivill “Rybenko” and her estate became a part of the vast Radzivill holdings. No longer of defensive importance, the castle in Bilokrynytsia was neglected and fell into disrepair.

In the early 19th century the Kollona-Chosnovskyi family purchased the castle and attempted to make repairs, but a fire in 1806 burned all their work down. All that remains is a wonderful park engineered by Dionysius Mikler. Finally Aleksandr Chosnovskyi constructed a new Anglo-Gothic palace. He incorporated the only surviving eastern wall of the ancient castle in the construction of the palace and tore down the defensive wall to use as construction material for his new palace. Unfortunately he ran out of funds, got sick and died before he completed the project.

The Russian philanthropist O. Voronin then purchased the palace and completed the project. Being near death himself, he willed the palace and 80,000 rubles to the town to build a school of plough and handicraft for poor children. Today the palace is still being used for educational purposes as a functioning Forestry Engineering College with 600 students.

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