1. About us
2. Regions
3. Brest
4. Ruzhany

Ruzhany

Description of the Coat of Arms:  On June 20, 1637, under the King of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania Vladislav IV, Ruzhany, situated within the Grand Duchy of Lithuania at that time, received the Magdeburg right and the coat of arms. The coat of arms features Saint Casimir placed in the center of a wreath of red roses. This saint, as emphasized in the royal privilege, was the patron of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the city of Vilno. Casimir, the second son of the King of Poland and the Grand Duke of Lithuania Casimir IV Jagiellonchik and Alzbieta Rakushanka, was born on October 5, 1458. Most of his life he had lived in Vilno, where he gained the respect of the townspeople with his piety and charity. For a long time he had suffered from consumption. On the coat of arms he holds a golden cross and a white lily, which is a symbol of innocence and purity. In heraldry, a lily is a royal flower.

                                                Napoleon Orda:Palace and Park Ensemble of the Sapegas in Ruzhany (1863)

The history of the town of Ruzhany is closely connected with the personality of Lev Sapega and his descendants.

It is thanks to Leo Sapega that almost the best code of laws appeared in the then Europe - the Statute of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania of 1588. One of the first in the world, he declared the separation of powers into legislative, executive and judicial. At the same time, he released for his money the first four thousand copies of the Statute. A year later, Lev Sapega was already Chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the second wealth after the king.

Lev Sapega decided to make Ruzhany his residence and ordered a castle to be built of a high hill. That was a two-storied brick building in the shape of a cross with three tetrahedral towers. In the central part there was a front hall and an entrance hall with a staircase that rose on either side of the entrance. In the lateral parts of the castle living rooms, classrooms, a library were arranged. Archival documents, an arsenal of ammunition, and delicious food were stored in two-storied cellars. Within the time he had lived in Ruzhany the town grew into a prosperous place: there were more than 400 yards, small enterprises - brick and tile factories, a Basilian school, 2 monasteries, Peter and Paul Uniate church and St. Trinity cathedral. The production of cloth, carpets and many other products was established. The bulk of the population of Ruzhany was Jews - skilled craftsmen and successful merchants. Every Monday, a fair was organized in in the town and merchants from all around came to the famous Ruzhany fairs. Lev Sapega died in 1633. Then the castle passed from hand to hand, the eldest son of Leo Sapega died two years after the death of his father. Then the owner became his brother - Casimir Lev Sapega. For his time, he was a very educated person: he studied at four universities - in Padua, Bologna, the Netherlands and Ingalstadadsk, knew eight foreign languages. It was under him that Ruzhany got the Magdeburg right that is the right of self-government. The Town Hall was built for the work of the magistrate and the town received its Coat of Arms. In Ruzhany, the youngest son of Lev Sapega received the Polish king Vladislav IV Waza and his wife Cicilia Renata of Austria. They even drank from the Sapega heirloom - a goblet made of whole crystal. The three-liter bowl was called "Ivan" and was offered only to distinguished guests.

Subsequent owners did not do much for the prosperity of the estate. Moreover Kazimitr Pavel Sapega was waging constant wars with representatives of other famous clans that is, with the Radziwills, the Oginskiyes and the Vishnevetskiyes in his attempt to get the throne. The latter united into Confederation and in the spring of 1700, in the bloody massacre near the village of Alkeniki, in Oshmyanyshchyna, the Sapega troops were completely defeated by the twenty thousandth Confederate army. They plundered Ruzhany and destroyed the castle. And at the height of the Northern War, the Swedish king Charles XII entered Ruzhany.

For quite a while that castle laid in ruins. It was Alexander Mikhail Sapega, the Chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from 1772 to 1793, who took up the restoration of the castle. For this purpose he invited the famous architect from Scotland Jan Samuel Becker. He designed a surprisingly beautiful palace and park complex, one of the most magnificent in Europe in those days. So the castle was rebuilt to become a palace. Among the premises there was an archaeological museum, and a rich library, and even a small, “home” chapel. In the western building there was an art gallery, and in the - the arena and theater, which was considered one of the largest in Belarus. In 1784, Alexander Sapega again received honored guests - King Stanislav Augustus Poniatowskiy. In 1795, according to the third section of the Commonwealth, Ruzhany went to Russia; Alexander Sapega rents the palace and factories to the entrepreneur Morduhu Pines. For the participation of the Sapegas  in the uprising of 1830-1831. Ruzhany possessions were confiscated in favor of the Empire and turned by new owners into cloth factories.

Since then wars and neglect continued ruining the palace and it was only in 2008 that the restoration of the palace and other valuable architectural monument was launched in Ruzhany and great job had been already made.

Interesting facts about Ruzhany:

• An Israeli politician and the seventh Prime Minister of Israel, Shamir Itskakh serving two terms, 1983–84 and 1986–1992 was born in Ruzhany. 

Learn more about the sights of Ruzhany and Ruzhany district: