Bardejov

Bardejov stands beside the Topľa River near the route across the Carpathians from Hungary to Poland. Its broad market square, enclosed by burghers' houses and the church of St Giles, reflects the wealth of a medieval trading town. Walls, gates and towers protected the merchants and craftsmen who worked within it.

King Louis I ordered the town fortified and made it a free royal town in 1376. Bardejov prospered in the fifteenth century, when its merchants traded linen and wine and its craftsmen organized themselves into guilds. The staple right granted in 1402 required foreign merchants to offer their goods in the town, while King Sigismund extended its fair in 1427. The Gothic church gained richly carved altars, and a Renaissance town hall was built in the square. Later fires damaged the town, but its street plan and fortifications endured. In the eighteenth century a Jewish community developed outside the walls, building a synagogue and other communal institutions.