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Lasy Saturday, as I was walking to the Muzeum Narodowe, I passed by the AGH University & Biblioteka Jagiellonska. I shall now tell you an urban legend regarding the statues that you can see below. They are there ever since the building was built and there is a saying that they would move when a girl would pass the exams at this University without cheating... now I do believe this already happened but I did not see the statues move so I also think that either the statues or the persons who made up this legend were very misoginistic! Fo shame!

Right in front of the Biblioteka Jagiellonska the blogs mascot - the Ladybug - and her friend - the Friendly Moose - found this. Jagiellonian University is the oldest university in Poland and one of the oldest in Europe. It boasts a centuries-old tradition, but goes with the times. The motto, "Plus ratio quam vis" means "Reason (means) more than force".

Since 1817, the university used the name of the Jagiellonian University, in honour of the Jagiellonian dynasty. Previous names include the University of Kraków, Kraków Academy, The Main Crown School, and Main School of Kraków.

The list of prominent people who have studied at the Jagiellonian University is impressively long. It includes the names such as Nicolaus Copernicus, Karol Wojtyła (Pope John Paul the 2nd), Jan Długosz, Jan Kochanowski, Marcin Kromer, Mikolaj Rej, Jan III Sobieski, Bronisław Malinowski, Norman Davies.

The history of the university goes back to 1364 when, after many years of efforts for permission of the Pope, King Casimir III the Great founded an institution called Studium Generale. Modelled on the University of Bologna, it was the second - after the university in Prague - institution of this type in Central Europe.

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Second World War was a dramatic period in the history of the university. In 1939, the Nazis, under the pretext of the lecture, gathered professors at the Collegium Novum, and then arrested them and sent to a concentration camp. The university was closed, and its equipment was destroyed, dismantled or transported to Germany. Soon, the underground university began to operate. Secret courses were attended by about 800 students.

You can read about more of the history of the Jagiellonian University right HERE and you can also access the site constructed for this very ocasion, it is in 3 languages (English included) and it is quite nicely done ;)