Outdoor courtyard – Wawel
To fully embrace the "Wawel plateau", it is enough to cover a short distance between the entrance to the Wawel Cathedral (on the left) and the free-standing vicar's house (on the right). The spacious square of the outer courtyard has an irregular shape and slopes slightly to the south-west. On the left (eastern) side, next to the cathedral, the Royal Castle rises, which leads back into the buildings gate. Further on, you can see a mass of buildings above the former royal kitchens, behind which protrudes the Senator's Tower from the 15th century. (also called Lubranka), used as a prison for senators. Straight, that is, along the southern border of the square, partially reconstructed defensive walls from – also partially reconstructed – The Tenczyn Tower, at which, in the times of Jagiełło, a zoo was organized. The obligation to feed the wild animals inhabiting it rested with the Jews of Kraków. Further to the west there was also the Noble Tower (where the nobles were imprisoned), Maiden's Tower (women were imprisoned here) and the Sandomierz Tower. The great building of the former Austrian hospital between the Sandomierz Tower and the Thief Tower (so, so – thieves were imprisoned there) it closes the square on the west side. Next to the Thief's Tower, there is the exit of the southern route to Wawel and the descent to the Dragon's Den. To the north, there are chapter houses and the building of the theological seminary. Little has survived in the center of the square, because only the foundations of two medieval temples: st. George (near the vicar's house) and st. Michael (closer to the buildings on the west side) and the foundations of the house of canon Jan Borek (near the catering point on the south side).
