On the southern and partly western wall of the parish church dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, there is a highly valuable group of epitaphs from the 16th and 17th centuries. At that time, epitaphs were a very popular form of commemorating the deaths of people.
The creation of this type of bas-relief was, of course, associated with fairly high costs, which is why the founders of the individual tombs were mostly people who were wealthy and had rendered services to the city. They included Georg Albrecht, Anton Schwarcz, Romulos Schelendorf, Hans Seidel, Johann Suessenbach and Matthaeus Buchwalder.
The most valuable, though not the oldest, epitaph is a Baroque tomb monument, built into the eastern side of the church’s main entrance, dedicated to KASPAR KIRCHNER, undoubtedly a person worthy of such a beautiful work.
Kirchner was born in Bolesławiec in 1592. Thanks to the humanistic education he received in his native city and beyond, he became a respected poet. Until 1621, he held the position of cantor at the parish church. During this period, he became the teacher of Martin Opitz, later a famous German poet and secretary to the Polish king Władysław IV. In 1622, he became a ducal councillor in Legnica. In 1624, following the death in Madrid of Archduke Charles, Bishop of Wrocław, the Silesian dukes and estates sent Kaspar Kirchner as a delegate to Vienna, where he obtained the title of imperial councillor.
Like Opitz, he was honoured with the poetic laurel, the most significant title among poets. However, he enjoyed it for only two years, as he died on 16 June 1627. Kirchner’s Baroque epitaph is the work of a highly skilled workshop, as is clearly visible in the perfection of the floral ornamentation, the figures of little angels carrying the poet, the Muses and the family coat of arms placed beneath the marble plaque, on which a short text dedicated to the poet by the city’s inhabitants, harassed by the Thirty Years’ War then underway, was carved.
Here it is:
CASPARO KIRCHNERO VIRO AMPLISSIMO POETAE ET PHI-LOSOPHO DOCTISSIMO, QUO NEMO PLURES ARTES DIDICIT, NEMO PAUCIORES IACTAVIT, ORNAMENTO HUIUS URBIS, IN QUA NATUS SEPELIRI QUOQUE VOLUIT.
QUID BELLI NON IRA TUIS, CARPERE, SILESIS ABSTULIT! EN PATRIAM QUAERIMUS IN PATRIA MUSAE RESTABANT, SED ET HAE, CLARISSIME VATUM VIVERE VIX ULTRA TE MORIENTE QUEUNT.
This may be translated as follows: To Kaspar Kirchner, a most distinguished man, the wisest poet and philosopher, before whom no one cultivated so many arts, nor did anyone abandon so few of them, the jewel of this city, in which he was born and wished also to be buried.
HAS WAR, KASPAR, NOT TAKEN EVERYTHING FROM YOUR SILESIA! BEHOLD, WE SEEK OUR HOMELAND IN OUR HOMELAND; THE MUSES SURVIVED, BUT EVEN THEY CAN HARDLY LIVE ON AFTER YOUR DEATH, MOST ILLUSTRIOUS OF POETS.