Włocławek

Sister cities

• Saint-Avold
• Bedford
• Mahilyow
• Izmail

History

Włocławek's history dates back to the late Bronze Age – early Iron Age (1300 BCE – 500 BCE). Archaeological excavations conducted on the current city site uncovered the remains of a settlement belonging to the Lusatian culture, as well as evidence of a settlement of early Pomeranian culture which had been established. Traces of additional settlements dating to the Roman period and the early Middle Ages have also been excavated in the area. The settlement was founded in the 9th century and its early inhabitants were occupied with agriculture and crafts. In the 10th century it became part of the emerging Polish state under the Piast dynasty. In the mid-10th century, under Casimir I the Restorer, Włocławek was the seat of a castellany and the administrative center of Kuyavia. Włocławek received its city rights in 1255. During the 14th and 15th centuries, the city was destroyed and captured several times by the Teutonic Knights and renamed it Leslau. The Treaty of Thorn, signed in 1411, resulted in short-lived peace for the city, however, it prospered from its involvement in the ransoming of the captured Teutonic Knights which was payable in three instalments and proved to be a hardship on the Prussian faction. Włocławek was located within the Brześć Kujawski Voivodeship of the Greater Poland Province. There is a possibility that Nicolaus Copernicus, the later renowned astronomer, may have attended the local cathedral school in the late 15th century. The city's prosperity came from river transport of grain from Kuyavia, the collection of tolls on grain floated from the more southern part of Poland to the country's main port of Gdańsk, transport of timber from the Narew, Bug and upper Vistula rivers for export to Western Europe and brewing. This is mentioned in the 1595…