WILNA (Vilna, Wilno), Archdiocese of. – A city and archdiocese in Poland. It covers an area of 56,679 sq. km., with a population of 2,325,000, of whom 1,056,000 are Catholics, distributed across 442 parishes, served by 548 diocesan priests and 13 regular clergy; it has two seminaries, 13 male religious communities and 14 female (*Ann. Pont. 1953*, p. 454).
The city is situated at the confluence of the Wilejka and the Wilna rivers, in an amphitheater of hills on which the suburbs have developed. It first belonged to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, then, from 1386, was united with Poland; the city was devastated by fires in 1610 and 1706 and by Russian occupation.
WILNA, Archdiocese of. – Image of the Virgin *Ostrobrama* and *Aušros Vartai*, painted on wood (15th cent.), preserved in the sanctuary built above the ancient *Aquile* Gate (1506) – Wilna.
The diocese was founded in the time of Ladislaus II Jagellon, who in 1387 sent Dobrogost, Bishop of Poznań, to petition Pope Urban VI for the erection of the diocese, which was granted by the said Pope with a bull of 12 March 1388, as a suffragan of Gniezno. The first bishop was the Conventual Minor Andreas Wasil. Bishop Matthias of Troki (1422–53) also founded many churches and sent a representative to the Council of Basel; A. Tabor invited the Dominicans to Wilna, entrusting them with the church of the Holy Spirit. It suffered from Calvinism; Bishop Valerian Protasewicz Suszkowski (1556–80) invited the Jesuits, among whom shone forth Fr. Peter Skarga; under King Stephen Báthory, G. Radziwiłł (1581–91), later a cardinal and translated to Cracow, founded in Wilna the Academy and the Seminary, under Jesuit direction; B. Wojnicki (1600–15) worked for the canonization of King Casimir of Poland and began the construction of a church in his honor in 1604. E. Wollowicz (1616–30) invited the Canons Regular of the Lateran to Wilna; A. Wogina invited the Brothers Hospitallers. A. Sapieha (1666–71) founded the church of SS. Peter and Paul, its construction inspired by that of St. Peter’s in the Vatican. Pope Pius XI, with the apostolic constitution *Vixdum Poloniae unitas* of 26 June 1925, by which he established new boundaries for the dioceses of Latin rite in Poland, placed Wilna at the head of the third ecclesiastical province of Poland, elevating it to a metropolitan see, fixing its territory, and assigning as its suffragans the dioceses of Łomża and Pińsk (AAS, 17 [1925], pp. 51–28).
The Cathedral is dedicated to SS. Stanislaus and Ladislaus. It was burned down in 1399; the Duke Witold rebuilt it in Gothic style the same year. It suffered serious damage in 1531 and 1662; its restoration in Neoclassical style begun by L. Gucwicz in 1769 was completed in 1801. Notable are the chapels of the Immaculate Conception and of St. Casimir. The church of the Holy Cross was founded in the 14th century; there in 1366 fourteen Franciscans were martyred; the church of St. Martin dates from 1380; St. Anne was erected in 1392 by Anna, wife of Witold; St. John the Evangelist in 1386 and received privileges from Leo X; the church of the *Corpus
WILNA - WILSON WOODROW
milde in der Katakombe des hl. Petrus und Marcellinus (1891); seguirono l'illustrazione delle pitture della cosiddetta Cappella greca, dove egli aveva identificato la Fraccio panis (doppia ed., tede, e franc., 1894); Le pitture delle Cappelle, dette dei Sacramenti (1897).
La sua opera fondamentale è costituita da Le pitture delle catacombe romane (2 voll., testo e tavole, doppia ed. ital. e tede., Roma e Friburgo in Br. 1903). Per l'esattezza della descrizione degli affreschi, per lo studio del vestiario, dei gesti, per la fedeltà delle riproduzioni, l'opera fu meritatamente apprezzata, anche se studi posteriori modificarono in parte alcune delle sue datazioni, fondate, in genere, su quelle di G. B. De Rossi. Seguirono per importanza: Die römischen Mosaiken und Malereien der kirchlichen Bauten vom IV. bis XIII. Jahrhunderth (4 voll., 2 di testo e 2 di tavole illustrati l'arte delle basiliche cristiane della Roma costantiniana, post-costantiniana e medievale nei suoi cicli musivi e pittorici [Friburgo in Br. 1916]). Finalmente I sarcofagi cristiani antichi (5 voll., I e II, Roma 1929; III e IV, Città del Vaticano 1932; V, ivi 1936).
Notevoli i suoi Topographische Studien über die christlichen Monumente der Appia und der Ardeatina (in Röm. Quart., 15 [1901], pp. 32-49) e Neue Studien zur Katakombe des hl. Kallistius (ibid., pp. 50-69); Zur Entdeckung der Crypta Damasi (ibid., 17 [1903], pp. 72-75); La scoperta delle basiliche cimiteriali dei SS. Marco. Marcelliano e Damaso (in Nuovo bull. arch. crist., 9 [1903], pp. 43-58); Scavi nel cimitero dei SS. Marco, Marcelliano e Damaso (ibid., pp. 315-19). Di speciale importanza La cripta dei Papi e la cappella di S. Cecilia nel cimitero di S. Callisto (doppia ed., ital. e tede., Roma e Friburgo in Br. 1910). Per la sua identificazione del sepolcro di Damaso sorse una polemica tra lui e O. Marucchi, donde i suoi Beiträge zur christlichen Archäologie (in Röm. Quart., 22 [1908], pp. 73-195).
Besides the Römische Quartalschrift, from its very first year (1887) he contributed to: Nuovo bollettino di archeologia cristiana, Rivista di archeologia cristiana, Bessarione, L’arte by A. Venturi (in which appeared Storia del vestiario and studies on the Acheropita and on S. Maria Antiqua), Byzantinische Zeitschrift, Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, Historisches Jahrbuch, Bullettino della Commissione archeologica comunale di Roma, Studi Romani, Analecta Tarraconensia, etc.; and as a member since 1892 of the Pontifical Roman Academy of Archaeology, he contributed notable writings both to its Atti and to its Rendiconti; noteworthy among these is the one in honor of G. B. De Rossi on the paintings of the hypogeum of Aurelio Felicissimo along the viale Manzoni in Rome. His volume: Erlebnisse und Ergebnisse im Dienste der christlichen Archäologie (1930), dedicated to his friend P. Franchi de’ Cavalieri, contains, in autobiographical form, a compendium of his works, presented in six lectures he was to deliver in 1928 at Harvard University. His love for the Roman Faith and its institutions is demonstrated by the series of studies on S. Peter, from the first, on his bronze statue (1886), to the last (1937): Pietro fondatore della Chiesa di Roma e successore di Cristo come vescovo, secondo le sculture del sarcofago 174 e il Catalogo Filocaliano, and also by his popular work: La fede nella Chiesa nascente, secondo i monumenti dell’arte funeraria antica, Città del Vaticano 1938.