Zielona Góra - History

History

The first settlement in the area of Zielona Góra was built in the valley near the Złota Łącza stream during the reign of Polish ruler Mieszko I. The oldest settlement was agricultural and later developed into a trading point along routes from Poznań to Żagań and further to Łużyce. The written records of the Slavic settlement date to 1222 and an increase of its population by Henryk Brodaty. Other documents date the settlement to 1302.

The region received influx of German burghers in the second half of the 13th century during the medieval Ostsiedlung. The settlement became a city with Crossener Recht, a variation of Magdeburg rights, in 1323. The earliest mention of the town's coat of arms is from 1421, although it is believed to have been arranged since the beginning of the 14th century. A document in the town archive of Thorn (Toruń) dating from before 1400 used a sigil with the name GRVNINBERG, an early form of the German name Grünberg.

In 1294, Henry III, Duke of Głogów, founded a church in honor of Saint Hedwig, patron saint of Silesia. This building, today called the konkatedra św. Jadwigi w Zielonej Górze, is the oldest building in the city. A wooden castle near the city, built ca. 1272, was the residence of Duke Jan of Ścinawa from 1358–65; John had ceded his lands to Henry V, Duke of Glogau. In 1477 the town defeated a 5,000-strong army from neighbouring Brandenburg which attempted to seize it during the succession war to the Duchy of Glogau. In 1488 John II, Duke of Sagan, destroyed the castle to prevent his enemies from using it.

After the collapse of the Duchy of Sagan, the town fell to the Kingdom of Bohemia, a state of the Holy Roman Empire. Grünberg converted to Lutheranism during the Protestant Reformation through the efforts of Paul Lemberg, Abbot of Sagan. The city declined during the 17th century, especially during the Thirty Years' War (1618–48) and following decades. Grünberg endured plundering, debts, emigration of burghers, and fires. In 1651 during the Counter Reformation, the Habsburg Monarchy of Austria reintroduced Roman Catholicism and suppressed Protestantism. The city was subjected to heavy Germanisation and German craftsmen banned Poles from attending any practice allowing them to work as members of guilds. A rebellion caused by conscription ended with many Poles being imprisoned.

The city was annexed by the Kingdom of Prussia by the 1742 Treaty of Breslau which ended the First Silesian War. The Prussians introduced religious toleration, leading to the construction of the Protestant parish church Zum Garten Christ from 1746–47; Catholic Poles were later discriminated against, however.The city's textile industry was booming by the end of the 18th century, and by 1800 large parts of the city walls had been dismantled to allow the city to expand. The textile industry suffered during the 1820s while adjusting to the Industrial Revolution and an import ban by the Russian Empire; The city's economy began to recover after many clothiers immigrated to Congress Poland.

During industrialization, many Germans from the countryside moved to large industrial cities and large number of Poles came to German cities to work as well. The Polish population was pushed by Germanisation to rural villages, although some remained in the town contributed to the economic revival of the city. A Polish church remained functional until 1809 and a Polish craftsmen association (Towarzystwo Polskich Rzemieślników) was established by Kazimierz Lisowski in 1898, it existed till 1935 when Lisowski was murdered by Gestapo.

Since 1816 after the Napoleonic Wars, Grünberg was administered within the district Landkreis Grünberg i. Schles. in the Province of Silesia. In 1871 it became part of the German Empire during the unification of Germany. English industrialists purchased some of the city's textile factories during the 1870s and 1880s. By 1885, most of Grünberg's population of 14,396 were Protestants. The city was first connected to the Glogau-Grünberg-Guben railway line in 1871, followed by connections to Christianstadt in 1904, Wollstein in 1905, and a local line to Sprottau in 1911.

In 1919, Grünberg became part of the Province of Lower Silesia within Weimar Germany. On 1 April 1922 it became a district-free city, but this status was revoked on 1 October 1933 while part of Nazi Germany.

The Soviet Red Army occupied Grünberg with little fighting in February 14, 1945 during World War II. In that course, about 500 people committed suicide. The town was placed under Polish administration, followed by the post-war Potsdam Agreement. The remaining German inhabitants who had not fled from the Eastern Front were expelled by Soviet troops, and the town was partly resettled with Poles transferred from Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union. The city was officially renamed from the German name Grünberg to the Polish name Zielona Góra, and the 18th century Protestant church was reconsecrated as a Catholic church (Kościół Matki Boskiej Częstochowskiej).

The University of Zielona Góra was opened in 2001. The city is also the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Zielona Góra-Gorzów.