Lelów

Lelów began as a fortified settlement on the Białka, protected by the surrounding marshes. Casimir the Great granted it Magdeburg rights in 1341 and strengthened the town with a castle and walls. Near the border with Bohemian-ruled Silesia, it served both as a defensive post and as the seat of a county in Kraków Voivodeship.

Polish and Hungarian forces defeated a Bohemian force near Lelów in 1345. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the town remained an important centre of Lesser Poland, and its fine cloth and skilled clothmakers were known throughout the kingdom. A great fire in 1638 and the Swedish invasion brought destruction from which it did not recover. The walls were later dismantled after further damage in the Great Northern War.