The 17th century: a journey in the footsteps of a monk

The ‘Good Brothers’ Hospitalliers, whose official name is the ‘Order of the Hospitallers of St. John of God’, are most famous for their vows to serve the sick. According to legend, the Brothers Hospitalliers’ Monastery was built on the burial site of martyred Franciscans. The monastery’s premises were able to treat 14 sick men at a time, mostly suffering from mental disorders. The monastery can therefore be called the pioneer of hospitals in Vilnius. The monks worked here as nurses, and the first surgeons were barbers, hired because they knew how to withdraw blood for the therapeutic process of bloodletting. It is not for nothing that Brothers Hospitalliers were called ‘szpitalniki’, or hospital workers; they worked in nursing or care homes for the poor or sick that were attached to churches. Holy Cross Church was also known for its healing powers: near the entrance, a spring flowed whose water was believed to cure eye diseases. The image of the Virgin Mary of the Snows in the form of a fresco on the façade echoes the painting in the church.

Today, when walking down Šv. Ignoto Street, the first things to catch one’s eye are the anchors outside St. Ignatius’ Church. These symbols of hope did not appear here by chance. Today, St. Ignatius’ Church is the main church of the Lithuanian Armed Forces, and the surviving buildings of the novitiate built in the early 17th century belong to the library of the General Jonas Žemaitis Military Academy. It was once a training centre for Jesuit ordinands, of whom there were usually between 69 and 114. It was not an easy task to become a monk; they had to study for two years before they could become seminarians. But this was only the first step – the formation of a Jesuit monk could take as long as 17 years. Next to the monastery there was a library with a collection of almost 3,000 books. But the monks were not only thinking about heavenly graces; they also worked hard. There was a brewery and a pharmacy on the premises, a large farm adjacent to the monastery, and a workshop for craftsmen with high standards of workmanship. However, in the 18th century, a spate of disasters struck the novitiate one after the other, and eventually the buildings were sold as the military barracks, which remained there until the early 20th century. Nevertheless, the building has retained its special architecture to this day.

In the courtyard of the library, you will be greeted by impressive covered arches, the only Renaissance defensive wall of an estate in Vilnius with gun ports, and the façade of a one-storey Gothic house facing the street. Once inside, you’ll also see an impressive spotlight, preserved decorations and, in the current reading room, impressive fragments of paintings.

While Jesuit monks could often be seen on the street, it was unusual to see the black habits of Benedictine nuns on the streets of Vilnius – they did not leave the monastery, which was attached to St. Catherine’s Church, without good reason. However, even today, when the old apple trees are in bloom, you can still feel their spirit in the garden of the now abandoned monastery garden next to S. Neris gymnasium. Around 40 nuns – from the Pacas, the Radziwiłł, the Tiesenhausen and other noble families – would have walked through the labyrinth of corridors and vaulted passageways of one of the richest monasteries in Vilnius; they lived within the confines of thick walls. They also brought large ‘spiritual dowries’ to the convent. Although the nuns were from noble families, they were not exempt from following the strict rules of their order, including fasting. If they broke the rules, they had to sit on the cold floor of the dining room and eat only bread with water. It was possible to become a Benedictine nun from the age of 15, but once you entered the cloistered life, you could not return to secular life. However, the nuns did not lose contact with the world: the convent buildings housed a school for girls of the nobility, a dormitory, a widows’ house where a parson and servants lived. The library collection accumulated by the Benedictines has been preserved in the National Martynas Mažvydas Library.

You can still see the white hooded Dominican abbot on the streets of Vilnius today. The Dominican monastery was founded in the 16th century when Duke Alexander gave the Dominicans the parish church of the Holy Spirit, funded by Vytautas the Great. The Dominican monks were renowned for their intellectualism, good education, and for studying philosophy.

The abandoned building of the Church of the Holy Spirit, steeped in legend, has stirred the imagination: hundreds of mummified bodies preserved by the dry air were found in the church’s cellars, including the remains of various notable figures, Napoleonic soldiers, plague victims, and monks. A few decades ago, it was still possible to visit them. When the monastery was closed down by the Tsarist Russians, its buildings were converted into apartments, and a prison was opened, where one of the most famous leaders of the uprising, Konstantinas Kalinauskas, was imprisoned in 1863. The monastery is currently abandoned and undergoing restoration works, so the Dominican monks were forced to move to the Vilnius Church of St. Philip and St. Jacob.

Although the Jesuits settled in Vilnius and founded Vilnius University as early as the 16th century, there were only 34 Jesuits in Vilnius at that time. In the 17th century, however, they founded two more monasteries in the city and became the largest monastic order in Vilnius, with more than three hundred members. The lifestyle of the Jesuit Society was very different from that of other monasteries: they travelled extensively, gave theatrical sermons in city squares, and dedicated to education. The Jesuits did not wear the monk’s habit, as was customary for monks, and they lived in rooms rather than cells. To become a Jesuit, it took up to ten years of study. We know a lot about the Jesuits’ contribution to education, but did you know that they did not only think about heavenly things or theoretical sciences? The Jesuits also contributed to the hygiene of the city by installing a sewage system to remove liquid effluence pollution. Of course, the university was the most important centre of Jesuit knowledge with the first observatory in the region, a botanical garden; the aim being to attract the most renowned European scientists and scholars of the time to teach and lecture there. It is therefore not surprising that a tour of the monasteries should start with the Jesuits.

The Sisters of Charity never became an official religious order, and although they lived as nuns, wearing the habit and taking vows, they were not isolated from the world. They were therefore able to actively care for the sick and the homeless. They came from France to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the 17th century at the invitation of Queen Louis Marie Gonzaga. The missionaries also invited the Polish Sisters of Charity to help nurse the sick in Vilnius. In the palace donated by Archbishop Bogusław Gosievski, the charity could treat up to 200 sick men and women at a time. Convents created large complexes to shelter all those who were poor, disabled, or abandoned. The Sisters of Mercy also ran the first hospital in Vilnius – St. Jacob’s Hospital – which operated from the 19th century. The Sisters of Mercy also cared for the orphaned children – the Orphanage of the Child Jesus was established at Subačiaus g. 20, where children were taught how to write, read, and learn a trade. It can be considered the first vocational training institution in Vilnius.

The Visitationists came to Poland at the invitation of Queen Ludwika Gonzaga; however, their trip was rather long and initially not very successful. On the voyage from France to Poland, they were attacked at sea and changed course, ending up in England. Once back in France, they set sail again, finally arriving in Gdansk. When the novitiate of the Visitation was established in Poland, the Lithuanians also travelled there. The first six Visitationists were invited to Vilnius and generously provided for by a wealthy widow, Ona Varškėtaitė-Karosienė-Dezelštienė, whose daughter was studying in the novitiate in Warsaw. In selecting new members to join their community, the Visitationists were not as discerning as the well-known and popular convents of the time, and accepted older women, sick women, or widows. Although when the Visitationists first arrived in Vilnius, they were primarily concerned with the care of the sick, eventually they became one of the main institutions for the education of noble girls, accommodating up to 40 girls at a time. They were taught not only religion and good manners, but also geography, arithmetic, history, French, German, drawing, and music.

Did the barefoot Carmelites really walk barefoot in Vilnius? Perhaps not all of them, but this monastic order was nonetheless renowned for its asceticism and piety. The monastery and the first small wooden church of St. Teresa, nestled next to the Chapel of Gates of Dawn, began operating in the second half of the 17th century, and was later replaced by the brick church we know today. The present interior of the church was created in the second half of the 18th century. When the Pacas family funded the construction of the monastery buildings, they were erected on the city’s defensive wall in the area of three residential quarters. While most of the world’s Catholics must have heard of the icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Mercy at the shrine of the Gates of Dawn, few people know that it was the barefoot Carmelites who began to make it famous in the second half of the 17th century. By the way, before Halės Market existed, trade took place in the so-called ‘Basokai’ Market, located between Visų Šventųjų, Karmelitų and Arklių Streets. The square came into being after the demolition of the Church of St. Joseph the Betrothed and the Convent of the Barefoot Carmelites during the rule of the Russian Empire. The square would have housed nearly 100 wooden stalls where people could buy food and poultry.

Away from everyone’s eyes, on Aušros Vartų Street, the Basilian Monastery can be found by accessing the path through the famous ‘Basilian Gate’ designed by the architect Johann Christoph Glaubitz. The monastery was founded in the 17th century on ‘Trinity Hill’, famous for being the place where the three first Christian martyrs of Lithuania – John, Anthony, and Eustathius – met their end. The Vilnius Basilian Monastery became the centre of the Uniate Church, where novices were trained and monks published books in Latin, Belorusian, Ukrainian, Polish, and Lithuanian. They also established schools that did not use physical punishments, which in those days, was a highly unconventional approach to discipline. The most important representative of the Vilnius Basilians, Josaphat Kuntsevych, lived here; he was later canonised and buried in St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Incidentally, during Tsarist Russia, a prison was set up in the men’s wing of the monastery, where Adam Mickiewicz was also imprisoned. He described the place of his imprisonment in the poem ‘Dziady’ [All Souls’ Day]: “His cell is secluded and it leans against the side of the church; no one will hear us, even when they come close. “

The distinctive dome of St. Casimir’s Church, crowned with a ducal crown, can be seen from quite a distance. Conceived as the most important Jesuit church in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, it was built after the canonisation of St. Casimir in 1604. It was the home of the professed where only those Jesuit brothers who had walked the whole monastic path and taken their final solemn vows lived. From here, they were assigned to missions or to serve as clergy at the manors of the rulers. While they lived at home, they preached in church, heard confessions, and visited those in the Town Hall Prison who had been sentenced to death. The place of executions was close to the façade of the Church of St. Casimir, because in the 17th century, the main entrance of the Town Hall faced a different direction to the one it does now, forming a square. Over the years, the Church of St. Casimir has also been St. Nicholas’ Church and the home of the Lutherans during the First World War. Today, the Church of St. Casimir and the House of the Professed Monks are again owned by the Jesuits. Incidentally, the relics of St. Andrzej Bobola (c. 1591-1657), a Jesuit priest, monk, and martyr, are preserved here.

Long ago, Vilnius used to host another city that belonged to the Franciscans who had their own governor (appointed by the Duke and known as ‘vaitas’), judge, and Franciscan chief of the monastery (now called the abbot). Their oldest home is the Franciscan monastery founded in the 14th century near the then Trakai Road. However, in the 16th century, all the monks died during the plague, and for a while the monastery stood empty, ravaged by fires. For these reasons, the current monastery building has changed considerably.

Musical aptitude was essential for those joining the Franciscan Order. The monks paid great attention not only to music but also to science and art. The monastery was famous as the intellectual centre of Vilnius, and in the 17th century there was a school, a printing house, and even theological conferences for the nobility and the townspeople. The monastery library contained several thousand volumes of books and manuscripts. The first Lithuanian school was also established on its premises. Many famous people, such as Jonas Basanavičius and Józef Montwiłł, lived there. In the Franciscan Church, you can still see the 17th-18th century sculpture of the pregnant Mother of God, which has been preserved against the odds having suffered numerous disasters – it was famous for the miracles bestowed on couples hoping to have children.