Saint Stanislaus, Bishop and Martyr

Stanislaus was born about 1030 at Szczepanów near Kraków and became bishop of Kraków in 1072. He came into conflict with King Bolesław II the Bold. On 11 April 1079 he was killed; according to the tradition, the king himself struck him down while he was celebrating Mass in the church on the Skałka outside the city, after Stanislaus had excommunicated him.

The causes of the quarrel are disputed: the later Lives tell that the bishop rebuked the king’s cruelty and immorality, while the earliest chronicler, Gallus Anonymus, calls him a traitor, and some historians think he took part in a plot of the nobles. Bolesław was soon driven into exile. Stanislaus was canonized in 1253 and is a patron of Poland.