Żagań

Żagań stands on the Bóbr in Lower Silesia. The town received its charter in the thirteenth century and became the seat of a Piast duchy. Duke Przemko founded an Augustinian monastery here, while the castle served successive dukes as their residence. Known in German as Sagan, the town remained a centre of its principality through many changes of dynasty.

Duke Henry IV made Żagań his capital again after dividing his inheritance in 1321, and in 1329 accepted the overlordship of King John of Bohemia. After a bitter struggle over neighbouring lands, Jan II sold the duchy to the Wettin duke Albert of Saxony. It passed to the Habsburgs in 1549; Emperor Ferdinand II granted it to his commander Albrecht von Wallenstein in 1627, during the Thirty Years' War. The Lobkowicz family later built a Baroque palace here. Żagań became Prussian after the First Silesian War, and in 1786 the duchy was purchased by Peter von Biron of Courland.