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The Polish Wentzl Family is a branch of a prominent Bohemian and Austrian family, owners of silver mines, bankers, landowners and merchants.

 

The Family were humanists and generous sponsors of the arts during the Renaissance and later years.​

 

The first records in Bohemia regarding the Vencelík barons from Vrchoviště, related to the Smíšek family, with whom they also had a common basic heraldic symbol in their coat of arms - a white unicorn on a blue field - dating back to the times of the Přemyslid Dynasty. The family came to the Kutné Mountains, where the silver mining industry flourished, and shortly thereafter members of the family became Masters of the Imperial Mint (and managers of their own silver mines). Václav Vencelík acquired the castle in Žirovnice in 1485. The family rebuilt it significantly. In 1492, Václav Vencelík and his brothers Michael and John II Knap received the status of 'říšských pánů' (Barons of the Holy Roman Empire, stylized as Reichsfreiherr von Sarabitz (z Sarabie)) from the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III. Václav Vencelík died in Třešt in 1515, but was buried in Žirovnice. Other properties in the Czech Republic that once belonged to the ​​Vencelíks include Nova Včelnice and Stráž nad Nežárkou.

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Václav Vencelík from Vrchoviště had two brothers: Jan Smíšek (died around 1497) (ancestor of the Smíšek family from Vrchoviště, a wealthy merchant trading in iron ore and copper, owner of a mine, owner of Hrádek Castle (which currently houses the Czech Silver Museum) and several tenement houses in Kutná Hora) and Michael (1483-1511) (ancestor of the Libenicky family from Vrchoviště, Steward (Hofmeistera) of Kutná Hora, who also owned the Hrádek castle). On this page you can see a beautiful gradual of the Smišek family, commissioned by Michał Smišek, currently in the collection of the Austrian National Library in Vienna.

 

A line of this Family are the Freiherrs (Austrian barons) Wenzel (or Wentzl) von Sternbach zu Stock und Luttach, owners of silver mines in the Tyrol and bankers to the Austrian State. They received their crest in 1571. The house was raised to knight status in 1664 with the predicate "von Sternbach"; in 1689 it was raised to the status of baron. The Stock Estate in Uttenheim near Gais was acquired in 1619 and it is still owned by the family and is where much of the family archive is kept, with the oldest document dating back to 1290. Ferdinand von Wenzel-Sternbach (1815-1897) inherited the domain of Třešť and Landštejn following a court dispute. The Castle of Třešt is now the home of the Czech Academy of Sciences and is reputed to be the subject of Franz Kafka's unfinished final work 'The Castle'. The play 'Die Räuber' (The Robbers) (1781) by Friedrich Schiller was set in the forests surrounding Castle Landštejn.

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In 1545, the Malovec family took possession of Kamnice nad Lipou, which remained in their hands for 76 years. Under their rule, the palace was rebuilt (mainly in the years 1580-1583). In 1610 Zikmund Matěj Vencelík from Vrchoviště, Commissioner of the Bechyně district, who took part in the uprising of the estates against Ferdinand II, became the owner of the domain through his marriage to Anna Magdalena Malovcova. All of his property was confiscated in 1622.

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Johann Wenzel Vencelík von Vrchoviště (d. 1606) was known to have had a collection of works by Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon and other early Reformation thinkers kept in his library in Třešt. Among the supporters of reforms, the Vencelík family were considered moderates.

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In 1490 Václav Vencelík from Vrchoviště acquired the Castle in Třešt from Zdeněk Šternberk of Šternberk, together with the village of Třešť and the adjacent estate and villages Jezdovice and Buková as a gift to his son, Matěj Vencelík from Vrchoviště. Třešť belonged to the barons Vencelík from Vrchoviště and Sarabitz from 1490 to 1626, when those who supported the Protestant creed had their property confiscated (the last owner of the property fought on the losing side in the Battle of The White Mountain - as a result, four-fifths of the Czech nobility were expelled and forced to emigrate).

 

The last family member by the name Vencelík to own Třešť was Kryštof Adam Vencelík (d. 1626), who was married to Regina von Dietrichstein (1 voto von Herberstein) (d. 1630), whose great-grandmother was Barbara von Rottal (1500-1550), illegitimate daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Maksymilian I (1486-1519), wife of Sigmund von Dietrichstein auf Hollenburg (1484-1533), whom the Emperor treated as his son. Their wedding was celebrated in the presence of the Emperor in Vienna in 1515. In the 16th Century the family founded the (Lutheran) Church of St. Kateřina Sienská - Třešť. The graves of Jan Václav Vencelík and Regina von Dietrichstein can be seen there. Regina was a close relative of Cardinal Prince Franz Seraph von Dietrichstein (1570-1636), who played a leading role in the Counter-Reformation in Bohemia.

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Members of the family came to Poland. Maksymilian Wentzel (1750-1813) (son of Johann) and his wife Tekla Wierzchanowska (1764-1841) had four sons: Jan Kanty Wentzel (1784-1866), Antoni Wentzel (1785-1855), Maciej Szymon Wentzel (1788-1868) and Józef Maciej Wentzel (c.1796-1857) and two daughters, Salomea Marianna Wentzl (1782-1848), who married a Krakow merchant Jan Fischer, and Tekla Agnieszka Barbara Wentzl (1792-1866). Tekla Wentzl married John the Baptist Stummer (Sztummer) (1784-1845) (adopted into the Masovian nobility with the Radzisław coat of arms), chief physician of the Polish Army, president of the Medical Council of the Kingdom of Poland, awarded the Golden Cross of the Army of the Duchy of Warsaw.

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Jan Kanty Wentzl (1784-1866) was a merchant and restauranteur, operating under the name "J. Wentzl". After marrying Marianna Haller (1796-1880), daughter of Balcer Haller, Jan Wentzl and his wife purchased the Pod Obrazem tenement house from the Haller family, at number 19 on the Main Market Square, where on the ground floor he ran a restaurant founded in 1792. The restaurant operated under the name "Restauracja Pod Obrazem”, while the family, until the death of Anna Wentzl Laskowska in 1936, lived on the first floor. Over time, this place became one of the most famous restaurants in Krakow. In 1826, Jan Wentzl was also listed as a tenant of five shops and three cellars in the building at number 35 on the Main Market Square (known as "Krzysztofory").

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The Hallers were a wealthy Krakow family of merchants and patricians, descending from Jan (Johann) Haller (1463-1525), merchant and one of the first printers in Poland. In the publishing house he founded between 1505 and 1525, he printed approximately 250 items, including works by Erasmus of Rotterdam and Nicolaus Copernicus.

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The tenement house at number 19 on the Main Square, together with the business conducted there (including the restaurant), passed from Jan Kanty Wentzl to his son Konrad Wentzl (1820-1897), who married Józefa Brzeska (1833-1901), and then through Konrad's sons - Ignacy Karol Wentzel (1866-1926) (respected architect, whose son Maciej (1903-1924) died prematurely) and Maciej Marian Wentzl (1870-1932) to their sister, Anna Laskowska (née Wentzl) (1884-1936), who married Franciszek Laskowski. Their marriage was childless.

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In 1935, Anna and Franciszek Laskowski donated to the National Museum in Krakow a considerable legacy of Anna's brother, Maciej Wentzl, which included glassware, ceramics, jewelry (including some of a patriotic nature), watches and snuff boxes. After Anna Wentzl's death, the executors of her Testament sold some items from the house, including the stone fireplace, which was acquired by the Jagiellonian University in Kraków for its Senate House.

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Maksymilian Douglas Wentzel's second son, Antoni Wentzl (1785-1855), who married Karolina Zychoniowa (1792-1850), was a Head of Department at the Bank of Poland, as was his son, Amilkar Wentzl (1813-1881). They also had a second son, Jan Wentzl (1825-1867) and two daughters, Aniela Wentzl (1810-1890) and Karolina Wentzl (1826-1896).

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Maksymilian's third son, Maciej Szymon Wentzl (1788-1868) (Order of Saint Stanislaus, 2nd Class) had an extensive commercial education, and his hobbies were traveling and adventure - he was once imprisoned by Turkish pirates. Later, for many years he served as a Director of the Bank of Poland (in the years 1840-1865), becoming its Senior Director. In 1845, Maciej Wentzl and his descendants received the title of nobility and were accepted into the Masovian nobility with the Zbroja coat of arms. Maciej married Maria Zuzanna Bayer (Bajer) (1795-1876), daughter of Franciszek Bayer and Justyna Morbitzer from a prominent family of Krakow merchants (Antoni Morbitzer was the chairman of the Krakow City Council (1812-1815, the last years of the Duchy of Warsaw) - he supervised a significant program of investments in the development of the city, its efficient functioning and modernisation and development as a commercial center during the Napoleonic Wars with Russia in 1812 and the two-year Russian occupation; he was supported in his work by Konrad Wentzl). They had a son, Adolf Maciej Bayer Wentzl (1819-1892) and two daughters: Wilhelmina Justyna Tekla Wentzl (1818-1908), who married Michał Rostafiński (1807-1881), a Director of the Polish Bank in the years 1865-1874 (their son, Professor Józef Rostafiński (1850-1928), became a famous botanist), and Bertha Wentzl (1828-1907).

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At a young age, Adolf Wentz'l belonged to a patriotic underground organization. The family sent him to Trieste, to his mother's brother, Julian Bayer (1806-1873) (Clerk of the Bank of Poland, Professor of the Main School in Warsaw), where Adolf worked in his uncle's company, learning English and Italian (he also knew French, German, Greek, Latin, Polish and Russian). When the Bank of Poland decided to establish a Mint in London, Adolf was offered the position of its manager. Adolf Wentz'l married an Englishwoman of Protestant denomination named Anna Maria Hewlins (primo voto Eachus). After the Mint closed, Adolf Wentz'l became the London agent of the trading house of Baron Anton Fraenkel, financier and founder of Credit Foncier. Later he moved with his family to Paris, where for some time he was Baron Fraenkel's private secretary. Eventually he returned to Poland, where he purchased an estate near Błonia, Kraśnicza Wola (40 włókas, approx. 420 acres), not far from Grodzisk Mazowiecki and near Wilhelmina's sister, who married Michał Rostafiński and lived in Kludno.

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Adolf and Anna had three children: Adolf (Adolphe) Maciej Bayer Wentzl II (1852-1892), who married Maria Plebańska (childless marriage), Tadeusz (died at the age of 6) and a daughter, Maria Waleria Wentzl (1854-1937), who married Ludwik Antoni Moczarski (Head of Department (Chief Cashier) at Bank Polski) and had a son, the eminent Prof. Zygmunt Moczarski (animal geneticist and zoologist, Poznan University), and daughters Maria Waleria, Helena and Wanda. The ancestor of this Mazovian noble family was among the knights who accompanied Bolesław The Brave (the first King of Poland) when he came from the Czech lands in 998 AD. This family is patrilineally descended from Piotr Pilch, Castellan of Czersk in 1224, via his son Wladysław Łada, Commander of the Army of the Duke of Mazovia. From this family of Mocarze, by the Biebrza Marshes (since 1434), came Mikolaj Moczarski (c.1590-1638), famed for his tactical skills against regular forces, Colonel of The Lisowszcycy (aka 'The Horsemen of The Apocalypse'), an irregular cavalry unit famous in Europe in the 17th Century (see Rembrandt's 'The Polish Rider').

 

Professor Zygmunt Moczarski and his wife Ludwika Lipnicka (1886-1964) were survived by their younger son, Stefan Moczarski (1917-1993), UNDP/FAO Agriculture Extension Expert, who married Jolanta Lew-Ostik Kostrowicka (1933-2009)(daughter of Samuel Lew-Ostik Kostrowicki (1902-1953) and his wife Jadwiga Dzierzgowska (h. Jastrzębiec (Bolesta)) (1905-1992)), leaving two sons, Alexander Moczarski and Jeremy Moczarski.

 

The highly talented Adolf Maciej Bayer Wentz'l studied engineering, first in England, later in Germany. He had an accident and was injured while testing a new engine. Despite two years of careful medical care, his health deteriorated. He switched his studies to agriculture and graduated from the University of Halle in Germany. He also managed the estate in Kraśnicza Wola, bringing it to a high level. Mostly English and French were spoken at home. Adolf Maciej II died in 1892 at the age of 40 from typhus, which he contracted while caring for others suffering from the disease.​

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Józef Maciej Wentz'l (c.1796-1857) (state councilor, former head of the department of industry and crafts in the Government Commission for Internal and Clerical Affairs, Knight of the Order of St. Anna with the imperial crown, Order of St. Stanisław II class, Gold Military Cross, decorated with the The Mark of Impeccable Service for 15 years), fourth son of Maksymilian Wentzel, married Maria Działyńska (h. Ogończyk). They had one daughter, Olimpia Tekla Douglas Wentzl (1820-1889), who married Karol Wolk - Łaniewski (1799-1858).​​​

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More information: 'A Man of Power and a Lioness of The Cross', J. Moczarski, KDP, 11/2024, ISBN 9798301410857 (a part of 'The Kostrovitski Triptych')

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