Przemyśl

Przemyśl stands on the San at the gateway between the Carpathians and the lowlands. Its river crossing and roads made it a prize for rulers of Poland and Rus', and from 1085 it was the seat of a principality. The city became a meeting place of Latin and Eastern Christian traditions, with Polish, Ruthenian, Jewish, Armenian and other communities.

King Casimir III brought Przemyśl under Polish rule in the fourteenth century, and its Magdeburg charter was confirmed by Władysław Jagiełło in 1389. Trade flourished in the sixteenth century, supporting a Renaissance town hall and a synagogue built in 1559. A Jesuit college followed in 1617. Swedish invasion and the wars of the mid-seventeenth century ended a long period of prosperity, and recovery was slow. In 1754 the Latin bishop founded a public library, among the earliest in the Commonwealth. The first partition of Poland placed Przemyśl under Habsburg rule in 1772. Early in the nineteenth century a Ruthenian library and a revival of Byzantine church music made it an important centre of cultural life.