The Aviators Square, until 1945 known as the Augusta Square, is an

urban square A town square (or public square, urban square, city square or simply square), also called a plaza or piazza, is an open public space commonly found in the heart of a traditional town or city, and which is used for community gatherings. Relat ...

Szczecin Szczecin ( , , ; ; ; or ) is the capital city, capital and largest city of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in northwestern Poland. Located near the Baltic Sea and the Poland-Germany border, German border, it is a major port, seaport, the la ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. It is located in the neighbourhood of Centrum, within the

Downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in American and Canadian English to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business district ( ...

district, and forms a

roundabout A roundabout, a rotary and a traffic circle are types of circular intersection or junction in which road traffic is permitted to flow in one direction around a central island, and priority is typically given to traffic already in the junct ...

at the intersection of Pope John Paul II Avenue, Jagiellońska Street, Kaszubska Street, Małopolska Street, and Mazurska Street. It was opened in the 1890s.

History

The urban square was constructed in the 1890s, as an recreational area. It has a form of a square at the street intersection, with paver flooring and urban green areas. It was surrounded by

tenement A tenement is a type of building shared by multiple dwellings, typically with flats or apartments on each floor and with shared entrance stairway access. They are common on the British Isles, particularly in Scotland. In the medieval Old Town, E ...

s.''Encyklopedia Szczecina'', vol. 1: ''A–O''. Szczecin: University of Szczecin, 1999, p. 552–553. ISBN 83-87341-45-2. (in Polish) It was named ''Augusta Square'' (German: ''Augustaplatz''; Polish: ''Plac Augusty''), after

Augusta of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach Augusta of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach (Born ''Princess'' ''Maria Luise Augusta Katharina of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach''; 30 September 1811 – 7 January 1890), was Queen of Prussia and the first German Empress as the wife of William I, German Emperor. A ...

, the Queen of Prussia and the first German Empress. One of the intersecting roads, the Emperor William Street (now Pope John Paul II Avenue), was named after her husband,

William I William I may refer to: Kings * William the Conqueror (–1087), also known as William I, King of England * William I of Sicily (died 1166) * William I of Scotland (died 1214), known as William the Lion * William I of the Netherlands and Luxembour ...

, the emperor of Germany. In 1945, it was renamed to the ''Aviators Square''. In the 1950s, around the square was constructed portion of the Downtown Residential District, consisting of several socialist-realist multifamily residential buildings. The square itself was also renovated and remodeled.B.Kozińska: ''Rozwój przestrzenny Szczecina od początku XIX wieku do II wojny światowej''. Szczecin: Stowarzyszenie Historyków Sztuki Oddział Szczeciński, 2002. On 21 August 2002, at the square was placed the

equestrian statue An equestrian statue is a statue of a rider mounted on a horse, from the Latin ''eques'', meaning 'knight', deriving from ''equus'', meaning 'horse'. A statue of a riderless horse is strictly an equine statue. A full-sized equestrian statue is a ...

dedicated to

Bartolomeo Colleoni Bartolomeo Colleoni (; 1400 – 2 November 1475) was an Italian condottiero who served as the captain-general of the Republic of Venice. Colleoni gained a reputation as one of the foremost tacticians and disciplinarians of the 15th century.'' ...

, a 15-century mercenary and a captain general in service of the

Republic of Venice The Republic of Venice, officially the Most Serene Republic of Venice and traditionally known as La Serenissima, was a sovereign state and Maritime republics, maritime republic with its capital in Venice. Founded, according to tradition, in 697 ...

. It was ceremonially unveiled on 31 August 2002. The monument was originally made in 1909, as a copy of the

statue A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or Casting (metalworking), cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to ...

Venice Venice ( ; ; , formerly ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are li ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

, originally designed by

Andrea del Verrocchio Andrea del Verrocchio ( , , ; born Andrea di Michele di Francesco de' Cioni; – 1488) was an Italian sculpture, sculptor, List of Italian painters, painter and goldsmith who was a master of an important workshop in Florence. He apparently bec ...

, and relocated from Szczecin to

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

in 1948, before being returned in 2002.

Characteristics

0907 Colleoni Monument in Szczecin SZN 2

It has a form of a small square surrounded by road, which forms an intersection of Pope John Paul II Avenue, Jagiellońska Street, Kaszubska Street, Małopolska Street, and Mazurska Street. Its centre has paver flooring, while the outer portion consists of urban green area. It connects via a pathway with the Grunwald Square to the north, and the Paweł Adamowicz Square to the south. There is placed the

monument A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, historical ...

dedicated to

, a 15-century mercenary and a captain general in service of the

, dating to 1909.

Notes

References

{{Authority control Squares in Szczecin 1890s establishments in Germany Infrastructure completed in the 1890s Centrum, Szczecin Roundabouts and traffic circles in Poland