The Racovian Academy ( Latin : Gymnasium Bonarum Artium ) was a Socinian school operated from 1602 to 1638 by the Polish Brethren in Raków , Sandomierz Voivodeship of Lesser Poland . The communitarian Arian settlement of Raków was founded in 1569 by Jan Sienieński [ pl ] . The academy was founded in 1602 by his son, Jakub Sienieński . The zenith of the academy was 1616–1630. It was contemporaneous with the Calvinist Pińczów Academy , which was known "as the Sarmatian Athens ". It numbered more than 1,000 students, including many foreigners. At this point it is estimated that ten to twenty percent of Polish intellectuals were Arians.
5-458: The end of the Academy in 1638 was occasioned by the pretext of the alleged destruction of a roadside cross, by several students of the Academy, while on tour accompanied by a teacher Paludiusa Solomon. Jakub Zadzik , bishop of Kraków , Jerzy Ossoliński , voivode of Sandomierz, and Honorato Visconti, papal nuncio , forced the closure of the Academy and the destruction of all buildings by sentence of
10-777: The Polish-Swedish War , and the Treaty of Polanów with Russia in 1634, ending the Smolensk War . He was a dedicated Catholic and a supporter of the Counter-Reformation . In 1638 he succeeded in closing the Polish Brethren center in Raków . He often opposed Władysław IV Waza , especially his actions designed to regain the throne of Sweden and strengthen the powers of the monarchy by means of military action. Zadzik sponsored
15-671: The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth . His coat of arms was Korab . He was born in Drużbin, Poddębice County, Poland. In 1626, Jakub Zadzik was instrumental in convincing the Sejm in Toruń to increase taxes in order to generate funds for the war against Sweden and to create a commission for reformation of the military treasury. He negotiated the Treaty of Altmark in 1629 and the Treaty of Sztumska Wieś in 1635 with Sweden, which ended
20-817: The Sejm in April 1638. Most of the teaching staff and students went into exile in Transylvania or the Netherlands . Rectors: Teaching staff, in alphabetical order: Notable students at the academy, who became writers in the exile: The Racovian Academy served as a centre for the propagation of Socinian belief in both western and eastern Europe, in particular the Arian mission to the University of Altdorf near Nuremberg (1615), Dutch Remonstrants , Unitarians in Transylvania , even Muscovite sympathizers with Judaism. The publications of
25-616: The Academy till 1639, and of those of the teachers of the Academy in exile after 1640, are known to have influenced many English Unitarians such as Bartholomew Legatt (1575?-1612), Edward Wightman (1566-1612) and Gilbert Clerke (1626–c.1697) as well as Isaac Newton (1643–1727), and Voltaire (1694–1778), Jakub Zadzik Jakub Zadzik (1582 – 17 March 1642) was a Polish Great Crown Secretary from 1613 to 1627, bishop of Chełmno from 1624, Crown Deputy Chancellor from 1627, Great Crown Chancellor from 1628 to 1635, bishop of Kraków from 1635, diplomat , szlachcic , magnate in
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