Wrocław (Polish: [ˈvrɔt͡swaf] ⓘ; German: Breslau [ˈbʁɛslaʊ] ⓘ; also known by other names) is a city in southwestern Poland, and the capital of the Lower Silesian Voivodeship. It is the largest city and historical capital of the regions of Silesia and Lower Silesia. It lies on the banks of the Oder (Odra) River in the Silesian Lowlands. In 2025, the official population of Wrocław was 672,545, making it the third-largest city in Poland. The population of the Wrocław metropolitan area is around 1.25 million.
The city's history spans more than 1,000 years. It emerged as an early medieval settlement and became part of the Piast-ruled Polish state in the late 10th century, later developing into a major centre of Silesia. From the 13th century, migration from German-speaking regions contributed to the city's development, and German gradually became its predominant language. In the 14th century, the city passed to the Bohemian Crown within the Holy Roman Empire, later coming under Austrian and Prussian rule before becoming part of the German Empire in 1871. In 1945, after World War II, it became part of Poland; most German residents fled or were expelled, and Polish settlers arrived. Wrocław's architecture includes Brick Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Historicist and Modernist buildings.
Wrocław is a university city with a student population of over 130,000, making it one of the most youth-oriented cities in the country. Wrocław has numerous historical landmarks, including one of Europe's largest Market Squares and Poland's oldest preserved Town Hall, as well as Cathedral Island, the Bridge of Love, Wrocław Opera, the National Museum and the Centennial Hall, which is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Wrocław's dwarfs are a major tourist attraction and have become a symbol of Wrocław. The city is home to the Wrocław Zoo, the oldest zoological garden in Poland.
Wrocław is classified as a Sufficiency global city by GaWC. It was ranked 1st among all medium and small cities in the 2021 European Cities and Regions of the Future ranking by fDi Intelligence. The city is home to Śląsk Wrocław football club and hosted the 2012 European Football Championship. In 2016, the city was a European Capital of Culture and the World Book Capital, and hosted the Theatre Olympics and the European Film Awards. In 2017, the city was host to the World Games. In 2019, it was named a UNESCO City of Literature.
Names and etymology
The origin of the city's name is debated. It was long believed that the city was named after Duke Vratislav I of Bohemia from the Czech Přemyslid dynasty, who was ruling between 915 and 921. This thesis is contradicted, however, by the fact that the Czechs only took control of the Wrocław gród around the year 945.
The earliest recorded mentions of the city's name, found in Thietmar's Chronicle (Wrotizla, Wordisclavia, Wortizlania, Vaurtizlau), written around the year 1000, indicate the phonetic form of the original name of the city as Wrocisław, derived from the Old Polish given name Wrocisław/Warcisław. According to researchers, this was the name of the city's founder, whom Edmund Małachowicz identified as a duke from the Włost family of Niemcza.
As a result of phonetic changes, the name was later shortened to Wrocław, first recorded in 1175 in the Latinized form Wrezlaw, and it became widespread in the 13th century. Also in the 12th century, a Czech-influenced and Latinized form, Vratislavia, began to appear. The city's first municipal seal was inscribed with Sigillum civitatis Wratislavie.
By the 15th century, the Early New High German variations of the name, Breslau, first began to be used. Despite the noticeable differences in spelling, the numerous German forms were still based on the original West Slavic name of the city, with the Vr- sound being replaced over time by Br-, and the suffix -slav replaced with -slau. These variations included Wrotizla, Vratizlau, Wratislau, Wrezlau, Breßlau or Bresslau among others. A Prussian description from 1819 mentions two names of the city – Polish and German – stating "Breslau (polnisch Wraclaw)".
In other languages, the city's name is: German: Breslau [ˈbʁɛslaʊ] ⓘ; Silesian German: Brassel; Yiddish: ברעסלוי, romanized: Bresloy; Silesian: Wrocław; modern Czech: Vratislav [ˈvracɪslaf]; Hungarian: Boroszló [ˈborosloː]; and Latin: Wratislavia or Vratislavia.
People born or resident in the city are known as "Wrocławians" or "Vratislavians" (Polish: wrocławianie). The now little-used German equivalent is "Breslauer".
History
In ancient times, there was a place called Budorigum at or near the site of Wrocław. It was already mapped on Claudius Ptolemy's map of AD 142–147. Settlements in the area existed from the 6th century onward during the migration period. The Ślężans, a West Slavic tribe, settled on the Oder river and erected a fortified gord on Ostrów Tumski.
Wrocław originated at the intersection of two trade routes, the Via Regia and the Amber Road. Archaeological research conducted in the city indicates that it was founded around 940. In 985, Duke Mieszko I of Poland conquered Silesia, and constructed new fortifications on Ostrów. The town was mentioned by Thietmar explicitly in the year 1000 AD in connection with its promotion to an episcopal see during the Congress of Gniezno.
Middle Ages
During Wrocław's early history, control over it changed hands between the Duchy of Bohemia (1038–1054), the Duchy of Poland and the Kingdom of Poland (985–1038 and 1054–1320). Following the fragmentation of the Kingdom of Poland, the Piast dynasty ruled the Duchy of Silesia. One of the most important events during this period was the foundation of the Diocese of Wrocław in 1000. Along with the Bishoprics of Kraków and Kołobrzeg, Wrocław was placed under the Archbishopric of Gniezno in Greater Poland, founded by Pope Sylvester II through the intercession of Polish duke (and later king) Bolesław I the Brave and Emperor Otto III, during the Gniezno Congress. In the years 1034–1038 the city was affected by the pagan reaction in Poland.
The city became a commercial centre and expanded to Wyspa Piasek (Sand Island), and then onto the left bank of the River Oder. Around 1000, the town had about 1,000 inhabitants. In 1109 during the Polish-German war, Prince Bolesław III Wrymouth defeated the King of Germany Henry V at the Battle of Hundsfeld, stopping the German advance into Poland.
The medieval chronicle, Gesta principum Polonorum (1112–1116) by Gallus Anonymus, named Wrocław, along with Kraków and Sandomierz, as one of three capitals of the Polish Kingdom. Also, the Tabula Rogeriana, a book written by the Arab geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi in 1154, describes Wrocław as one of the main Polish cities, alongside Kraków, Gniezno, Sieradz, Łęczyca and Santok. By 1139, a settlement belonging to Governor Piotr Włostowic (also known as Piotr Włast Dunin) was built, and another on the left bank of the River Oder, near the present site of the university. While the city was largely Polish, it also had communities of Bohemians (Czechs), Germans, Walloons and Jews.
In the 13th century, Wrocław was the political centre of the divided Polish Kingdom. In April 1241, during the first Mongol invasion of Poland, the left-bank part of the city was abandoned by its inhabitants and burnt down for strategic reasons. During the battles with the Mongols Wrocław Castle was successfully defended by Henry II the Pious. In 1245, in Wrocław, Franciscan friar Benedict of Poland, considered one of the first Polish explorers, joined Italian diplomat Giovanni da Pian del Carpine, on his journey to the seat of the Mongol Khan near Karakorum, the capital of the Mongol Empire, in what is considered the first such journey by Europeans.
After the Mongol invasion, the town was partly populated by German settlers who, in the ensuing centuries, gradually became its dominant population. The city, however, retained its multi-ethnic character, a reflection of its importance as a trading post on the junction of the Via Regia and the Amber Road. With the influx of settlers, the town expanded and in 1242 came under German town law. The city council used both Latin and German, and the early forms of the name Breslau, the German name of the city, appeared for the first time in its written records. Polish gradually ceased to be used in the town books, while it survived in the courts until 1337.
The enlarged town covered around 60 hectares (150 acres), and the new main market square, surrounded by timber-frame houses, became the trade centre of the town. The original foundation, Ostrów Tumski, became its religious centre. The city gained Magdeburg rights in 1261. While the Polish Piast dynasty remained in control of the region, the city council's ability to govern independently had increased. The main source of prosperity was trade between Poland and Ruthenia and Western Europe, and crafts also contributed to the city's wealth. In 1274 prince Henry IV Probus gave the city its staple right. In the 13th century, two Polish monarchs were buried in Wrocław churches founded by them, Henry II the Pious in the St. Vincent church and Henryk IV Probus in the Holy Cross church.
Following an agreement reached in 1327 between Henry VI the Good and John of Bohemia, the Duchy of Wrocław passed directly to the Kingdom of Bohemia upon Henry's death in 1335. In 1337, King John of Bohemia abolished the Zaude (Polish: czuda), a territorial court exercising jurisdiction over people subject to Polish customary law. Its abolition left the district courts as the principal courts above the village level. Major fires struck the city in 1342 and 1344. In 1348, Charles IV, then King of the Romans, formally incorporated most of the Silesian duchies into the Lands of the Bohemian Crown within the Holy Roman Empire. Breslau remained an important centre of long-distance trade, with connections extending to the Netherlands, England, southern Germany, northern Italy, Hungary, Wallachia, Novgorod and Scandinavia. The city had joined the Hanseatic League by 1387. On 5 June 1443, a strong earthquake was felt in the city.
Between 1469 and 1490, Breslau was ruled by Matthias Corvinus, who claimed the title King of Bohemia and ruled parts of the Bohemian Crown Lands. Corvinus was said to have had a Vratislavian mistress who bore him a son. In 1474, after almost a century, the city left the Hanseatic League. Also in 1474, the city was besieged by combined Polish-Czech forces. However, in November 1474, Kings Casimir IV of Poland, his son Vladislaus II of Bohemia, and Matthias Corvinus of Hungary met in the nearby village of Muchobór Wielki (present-day a district of Wrocław), and in December 1474 a ceasefire was signed according to which the city remained under the rule of Corvinus. The following year was marked by the publication in Wrocław of the Statuta Synodalia Episcoporum Wratislaviensium (1475) by Kasper Elyan, the first ever incunable in Polish, containing the proceedings and prayers of the Wrocław bishops.
In the 16th century, the Breslauer Schöps beer style was created in Breslau.
The Protestant Reformation reached the city in 1518 and it converted to the new rite. However, starting in 1526 Silesia was ruled by the Catholic House of Habsburg. In 1618, it supported the Bohemian Revolt out of fear of losing the right to religious freedom. During the ensuing Thirty Years' War, the city was occupied by Saxon and Swedish troops and lost thousands of inhabitants to the plague.
The Emperor brought in the Counter-Reformation by encouraging Catholic orders to settle in the city, starting in 1610 with the Franciscans, followed by the Jesuits, then Capuchins, and finally Ursuline nuns in 1687. These orders erected buildings that shaped the city's appearance until 1945. At the end of the Thirty Years' War, however, it was one of only a few Silesian cities to stay Protestant.
The Polish Municipal school opened in 1666 and lasted until 1766. Precise record-keeping of births and deaths by the city fathers led to the use of their data for analysis of mortality, first by John Graunt and then, based on data provided to him by Breslau professor Caspar Neumann, by Edmond Halley. Halley's tables and analysis, published in 1693, are considered to be the first true actuarial tables, and thus the foundation of modern actuarial science. During the Counter-Reformation, the intellectual life of the city flourished, as the Protestant bourgeoisie lost some of its dominance to the Catholic orders as patrons of the arts.
Enlightenment period
One of two main routes connecting Warsaw and Dresden ran through the city in the 18th century and Kings Augustus II the Strong and Augustus III of Poland often traveled that route. The city became the centre of German Baroque literature and was home to the First and Second Silesian school of poets. In 1742, the Schlesische Zeitung was founded in Breslau.
In the 1740s the Kingdom of Prussia annexed the city and most of Silesia during the War of the Austrian Succession. Habsburg Empress Maria Theresa ceded most of the territory in the Treaty of Breslau in 1742 to Prussia. Austria attempted to recover Silesia during the Seven Years' War at the Battle of Breslau, but they were unsuccessful. The Venetian Italian adventurer, Giacomo Casanova, stayed in Breslau in 1766.
Napoleonic Wars
During the Napoleonic Wars, it was occupied by the Confederation of the Rhine army. The fortifications of the city were levelled, and monasteries and cloisters were seized. The Protestant Viadrina European University at Frankfurt an der Oder was relocated to Breslau in 1811, and united with the local Jesuit University to create the new Silesian Frederick-William University (German: Schlesische Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität, now the University of Wrocław). The city became a centre of the German Liberation movement against Napoleon, and a gathering place for volunteers from all over Germany. The city was the centre of Prussian mobilisation for the campaign which ended at the Battle of Leipzig.