Tykocin

Tykocin stands on the Narew at a crossing on routes between Poland and Lithuania. It received town rights in 1425 and became a seat of the Lithuanian Goštautai family. After their male line ended in 1542, the estate passed to the monarch. Sigismund II Augustus remodelled the castle and placed an arsenal, library, treasury and Crown Archives there.

Jewish settlers received permission to establish a community in 1522; the Great Synagogue was built in 1642. The town passed to Stefan Czarniecki in 1661 and then to the Branicki family. Following fires and wartime destruction, much of Tykocin was rebuilt in the eighteenth century.