Dačice

Dačice stands at the confluence of the Moravian Thaya and the Vápovka in the Křižanov Highlands, a plateau country of many small streams and fishponds. The town lies in historical Moravia even though it belongs administratively to the South Bohemian Region. Its position at the crossing of two trade routes brought the first written notice in 1183, and in 1377 it received town status. The surrounding estate and water landscape supported a market centre with links beyond the immediate highlands. After the Krajíř of Krajek family acquired it in 1459, development quickened. Italian architects remodelled the late medieval town during the sixteenth century, adding a town hall, two castles and a new quarter. A Franciscan monastery and its church introduced a strong Baroque presence in the seventeenth century, while the town later endured plague and destructive fires. Industry arrived in the nineteenth century with Moravia's first sugar refinery in 1833. The refinery made the town a pioneer of sugar production on the Moravian plateau, far from any major city.