Roman Catholic Church Of St Casimir

This guide to the Church of St Casimir in Warsaw begins in August 1944, when German commanders threatened to burn the church unless the Benedictine sisters sheltering wounded uprising fighters in its crypt were handed over. It traces the nuns' refusal and the strike that followed, then steps back to 1683, when Queen Marie Casimire commissioned the Greek-cross church to mark her husband's victory over the Ottomans outside Vienna. Architect Tylman van Gameren read meaning into every column, from plain Doric to ornate composite.