Nauji duomenys apie Liachovičių pilies statybą
New material on the construction of the Lachowicze Castle

Summary/Abstract: Jan Karol Chodkiewicz (1560–1621), the great hetman of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, was not only a great soldier and an important political figure of the Duchy, but also a generous patron of the arts and a rich client who owned several estates in Samogitia, Belarus and Livonia, including the Lachowicze (Belarusian Ляхавічы) castle in the Nowogrudek province. The town of Lachowicze came under the rule of the Chodkiewicz family in 1572. It is not precisely known when Jan Karol Chodkiewicz started rebuilding the old Lachowicze fortifications, but it is considered that the work started in 1602. The surviving letter-report (which is presented for the first time) written to the hetman by a Chodkiewicz estate official who was sent to Königsberg to settle the nobleman’s household matters shows the construction of the fortress to be already at the halfway or the final point in 1615. This source also reveals some circumstances of the construction of the Lachowicze castle. For example, window moldings of sandstone, which had undoubtedly been intended for the mansion, were commissioned to be done according to the specified dimensions at the workshop of the stonecutter and sculptor Hans Donoplof in Königsberg. Scandinavian sandstone for the construction of the castle was shipped from Königsberg as well. Chodkiewicz’s representatives gathered information on the prices of stone imported to Königsberg and other ports (Riga, Elbląg) and searched for cheaper building materials and craftsmen for the work at the Lachowicze castle.

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