Toruń

Toruń rises on a bend of the Vistula, where the Teutonic Knights built a fortress in 1231 and in 1233 gave the town and Chełmno the charter known as Kulm law. After floods the town was moved to its present site in 1236, and a separate New Town was added later for craftsmen from German lands. In the Hanseatic League from 1280, Toruń grew rich on grain, timber and the river trade, and the Franciscan and Dominican friars were followed by Gothic brick churches and tall merchant houses.

Under the Teutonic Order it resented heavy taxes. In 1440 its gentry and burghers helped found the Prussian Confederation, and in 1454 the citizens stormed the Order's castle and took it down brick by brick. The Second Peace of Toruń in 1466 made the city part of Poland, with privileges like those of Gdańsk. Nicolaus Copernicus was born here in 1473, and in 1506 Toruń became a royal city. The town turned Protestant in 1557, and in 1568 founded a gymnasium that became a leading school of northern Poland. In 1645 Władysław IV summoned Catholic, Lutheran and Calvinist theologians to a three-month Colloquium Charitativum. Prussia took Toruń in 1793.