Lubin

Geography

Lubin is situated on the Zimnica river in the Lower Silesian historical region, about 71 kilometres (44 miles) northwest of Wrocław and 20 km (12 miles) north of Legnica.

The town is one of the major industrial locations in Lower Silesia, with the headquarters of the third-largest Polish corporation, the KGHM Polska Miedź mining company.

History

The area of Lubin lies midway between the main settlements of two West Slavic Ślężanie tribes, the Dziadoszanie and the Trzebowianie, whose lands were both subdued by King Mieszko I of Poland about 990. It is unclear which of the two tribes, if either, founded the town. One legend states that the town derives its name from Luba, a young man credited with slaying a giant bear that had been terrifying the inhabitants. A papal bull dated to circa 1155 mentions Lubin as one of 13 Silesian castellanies.

According to legend the Polish voivode Piotr Włostowic of Dunin (1080–1153) had a fieldstone church built on the hill in the west of Lubin, where about 1230 a castellany and a village arose that until today is called the Old Town (Polish: Stary Lubin). The settlement in the Duchy of Głogów was first mentioned under the Old Polish name of Lubin in a 1267 deed by Pope Clement IV as a fiefdom of Trzebnica Abbey.

The New Town of what is today Lubin was probably founded in the 1280s under the rule of Duke Przemko of Ścinawa by German settlers, maybe descending from Lower Lorraine or Franconia, in the course of the Ostsiedlung. It obtained its city rights about 1295. In 1329 Duke John of Ścinawa paid homage to King John of Bohemia, who upon the death of John's brother Duke Przemko II of Głogów in 1331 invaded the lands, which were incorporated into the Kingdom of Bohemia and shared the political fortunes of the Silesian crown land.

From 1348 Lubin Castle served as the residence of the Piast duke Louis I the Fair and his descendants. In the quarrel with his elder brother Duke Wenceslaus I of Legnica a 1359 judgement by Emperor Charles IV allotted Lubin along with Krzeczyn Wielki, Krzeczyn Mały, Osiek and Pieszków to Louis. About 1353 he had a manuscript on the life of Saint Hedwig of Andechs drawn up, later called Schlackenwerth (Ostrov) Codex, which today is kept at the J. Paul Getty Museum. In the late 15th century the Lubin parish church was rebuilt in its present-day Gothic style, its high altar was moved to Wrocław Cathedral in 1951. Under the rule of Duke George I of Brieg (d. 1521) and his widow Anna of Pomerania, the reformer Caspar Schwenckfeld, born in nearby Osiek, made the town a centre of the Protestant Reformation in Lower Silesia. With Bohemian Silesia, Lubin in 1526 fell to the Habsburg Monarchy. It was devastated several times during the Thirty Years' War, conquered in the Silesian wars of King Frederick II of Prussia in the mid-18th Century, and became a part of Prussia and later Germany. In 1871, after creation of the German Empire, it was connected by rail to Liegnitz and Glogau.

During World War II about 70% of the town's buildings were destroyed. In 1945 between the days of 8–10 February Red Army soldiers mass-murdered 150 German pensioners in an old-people's home and 500 psychiatric hospital patients in Lubin. As a result of border changes promulgated at the 1945 Potsdam Conference, the town, lying east of the Oder-Neisse line, became a part of the Republic of Poland.

In 1982 the town saw significant demonstrations against the martial law declared by the Communist regime, which were put down by its death squads, resulting in the murder of three people.

Education

Sports

Transport

Roads: No. 3 (International E65) - Jakuszyce-Legnica-Lubin-Zielona Góra-Gorzów Wielkopolski-Szczecin-Świnoujście

No. 36 - Rawicz-Lubin-Prochowice(-Wrocław)

Lubin has an international airport with a 1000m concrete/asphalt runway.

Born in Lubin

Twin towns - Sister cities

Lubin is twinned with: