Dragon with a Metre Stick
Dragon Trail
The dragon with a metre stick stands by the fence of St Nicholas' Church on Kopernika Street.
History
On Kopernika Street, in front of the fence of St Nicholas's Church and next to the lantern of the dead, the Dragon with a Measuring Stick shows off a graduated ruler. He wants to remind us of the almost forgotten Stanisław Pudłowski, a physicist and astronomer and rector of the Kraków Academy, who worked in the 17th century. He had an observatory and a workshop in the parish buildings by this church. While studying the meridian passing through Kraków, he formulated the idea of a universal measure of length. His unit, the Kraków metre, was 0.994 of today's metre, a difference of only 6 mm.
Did you know?
In the Middle Ages lanterns of the dead were set up near cemeteries and hospitals for people with infectious diseases, and the lamp burning inside was meant to warn passers-by of the plague. The lantern by St Nicholas's Church used to stand by a church in Kleparz; after that church was demolished, it was moved here from Słowiański Square.