Zgorzelec

Panorama of the city

Flag

Coat of arms

Zgorzelec

Coordinates: 51°9′1″N 15°0′31″E / 51.15028°N 15.00861°E

Country

Poland

Zgorzelec (urban gmina)

Government

• Mayor

Rafał Gronicz

Area

• Total

15.88 km² (6.13 sq mi)

Population (2014)

• Total

31 716

Time zone

CET (UTC+1)

• Summer (DST)

CEST (UTC+2)

Postal code

59–900 to 59–903

DZG

Website

Zgorzelec [zɡɔˈʐɛlɛt͡s] (German: Görlitz, Upper Sorbian: Zhorjelc) is a town in south-western Poland with 32,322 inhabitants (2012). It lies in Lower Silesian Voivodeship (from 1975–1998 it was in the former Jelenia Góra Voivodeship). It is the seat of Zgorzelec County, and also of the smaller district of Gmina Zgorzelec (although it is not part of the territory of the latter, as the town is an urban gmina in its own right). Zgorzelec is located on the Lusatian Neisse river, on the post-1945 Polish-German Neisse border adjoining the German town of Görlitz, of which it constituted the eastern part up to 1945.

Up until 1945, the modern-day towns of Zgorzelec and Görlitz were a single entity; their history up to that point is shared. The date of the town's foundation is unknown. It was first mentioned in 1071. At that time Görlitz was a small village named Gorelic in the region of Lusatia, which soon after became a part of Bohemia. In the 13th century the village gradually turned into a town. It became rich due to its location on the Via Regia, an ancient and medieval trade road.

In the following centuries it was a wealthy member of the Six-City League of Upper Lusatia, consisting of the six Lusatian cities Bautzen, Görlitz, Kamenz, Lauban, Löbau and Zittau. The town of Gorlice in southern Poland was founded during the reign of Casimir the Great in 1354 by ethnic German colonists from Görlitz, in the last phases of eastward settlement by Germans (in this case by Walddeutsche).

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Wikipedia