In 1611, the king of Poland, Sigismund III Vasa, granted the privilege to the Jesuit College, which was allowed to become the first university in Poznań. However, the protest of the Krakow Academy, at that time the largest university in this part of Europe, made Pope Paul V object to opening a new university. However, in May 1919, as much as 308 years after the formal establishment of the university by the Polish king, gala inauguration of the first academic year of the newly opened Wszechnica Piastowska, as the University of Poznań was called at that time, was celebrated in the city. The Adam Mickiewicz University is the present institution practising the traditions of former Wszechnica Piastowska.