Princess Izabela Czartoryska

Princess Izabela Czartoryska ("née" Countess Fleming) (1746–1835) was a Polish noble lady, writer, art collector, and founder of the first Polish museum, the Czartoryski Museum in Kraków.

Life

She was the daughter of Count Jerzy Detloff Fleming and Princess Antonina Czartoryska.

On November 18, 1761, in Wołczyn, she married Prince Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski.

She was rumored to have had an affair with the Russian ambassador to Poland, Nikolai Vasilyevich Repnin, who was alleged to have fathered Adam Jerzy Czartoryski. [http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&vid=ISBN0195161009&id=oMpmAjRFh88C&pg=PA210&lpg=PA210&dq=repnin+Czartoryski&vq=Repnin+illegitimate+son&sig=wcrYcFQ3pRoLjA_WFYokW4nTv7M] .

In Paris in 1772 she met Benjamin Franklin, a subsequent leader of the American Revolution, and the French philosophers Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Voltaire, who were bringing new ideas to the old order.

In 1775 she completely transformed (together with her husband) the Czartoryski Palace at Puławy into an intellectual and political meeting place.

Izabela discovered the talent of the young painter Aleksander Orłowski and financed him.

In 1784 she joined the Patriotic Party. After the suppression of the Kościuszko Uprising, her sons Adam Jerzy and Konstanty Adam were taken as political hostages by Russia's Tsarina Catherine II.

In 1796 Izabela ordered the rebuilding of the ruined palace at Puławy and began a museum. Among the first objects to be included were Turkish trophies that had been seized by Polish King Jan III Sobieski's forces at the 1683 Battle of Vienna. Also included were Polish royal treasures and historic Polish family heirlooms.

In 1801 Izabela opened the first museum in Poland, called "The Temple of Memory." It contained objects of sentimental importance pertaining to the glories and miseries of human life.

During the November Uprising in 1830, the museum was closed and all objects evacuated. Her grandson Władysław Czartoryski re-opened the museum in 1878 in Kraków.

Works

* "Myśli różne o sposobie zakładania ogrodów" (1805)
* "Pielgrzym w Dobromilu, czyli nauki wiejskie" (ca. 1818)

ee also

* Czartoryski Museum
* Royal Casket
* "Mold of the Earth"

External links

* [http://www.muzeum-czartoryskich.krakow.pl/ Czartoryski Museum website]