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Fortifications
Stargard
Stargard's town walls (say "STAR-gard") are one of the most impressive medieval fortification systems in Poland and a national Historic Monument since 2010. More than a kilometre of stone-and-brick wall survives, together with towers and g…
Fortifications
Świebodzin
In the 16th century the whole of Świebodzin was ringed by a wall with twelve towers and three gates, with a water-filled moat outside. Today only sections remain, and you have to spot them between town houses and trees. The best preserved…
Fortifications
Szydłów
Szydłów is sometimes called the Polish Carcassonne, although its walls look nothing like the French original. They have no towers at all: just a plain stone ring with battlements that has enclosed the little town since the mid-14th century…
Fortifications
Wieluń
Wieluń is one of 25 towns given defensive walls in the reign of Casimir the Great. Together with the castles of the Polish Jura it formed a belt of fortifications guarding the Kingdom of Poland's south-western border, from Kraków to Ostrze…
Fortifications
Ząbkowice Śląskie
The only surviving section of Ząbkowice Śląskie's old moat is now a pond in the town park, and close by stands the Pigeon Tower, one of the best-preserved parts of the town's fortifications. In the 16th century the town was ringed by two l…
Fortifications
Strzelce Opolskie
Medieval Strzelce Opolskie was surprisingly small: from the Opole Gate to the Kraków Gate was just 250 m, and the whole wall circuit was about 900 m long, enclosing under 6 hectares. To the south the town was protected by the castle and by…
Fortifications
Świdnica
In the Middle Ages Świdnica was the capital of the Duchy of Świdnica-Jawor, and for centuries it sat behind one of the strongest rings of walls in Silesia. By the 17th century the circuit had three lines of defences, seven gates and more t…
Fortifications
Wałbrzych
Half a kilometre of concrete corridors and halls cut 50 metres beneath Poland's third-largest castle – and nobody knows to this day how big the whole complex really is. The Książ Castle Underground is an unfinished Nazi German project from…
Fortifications
Świnoujście
The Underground City on Wolin Island (Podziemne Miasto, roughly "pod-ZHEM-neh MYAS-toh") in Świnoujście is a bunker complex where World War II and the Cold War meet. Hidden under the dunes of the Przytór district, a German coastal artiller…
Fortifications
Sierpnica
To this day nobody knows for certain what the concrete halls and tunnels cut into Osówka mountain from 1943 were meant for. Some say a secret headquarters for Hitler was being built here, others that it was underground armaments factories.…
Fortifications
Kołobrzeg
Among the yachts of the Solna Marina in Kołobrzeg hides an 18th-century five-sided earthwork – one of the best-preserved parts of the town's former fortress. The Morast Redoubt, or Marsh Redoubt, defended the harbour and the mouth of the P…
Fortifications
Bobrowniki
In the Wesoła settlement of Dobieszowice, above the floodplain of the Brynica river, a low concrete block with an armoured cupola rises out of an earth embankment. This is heavy combat bunker no. 52 – the key structure of the "Wesoła" Comb…
Fortifications
Węgierska Górka
In the woods on the slope above Cisiec, a short walk from the centre of Węgierska Górka, stands a moss-covered concrete block with dark gun embrasures. This is "Waligóra", a large bunker of the September 1939 defence line – an artillery ca…
Fortifications
Węgierska Górka
The concrete walls of this bunker still bear the marks of shells from September 1939. "Wędrowiec" was the heart of the defence of Węgierska Górka: Captain Tadeusz Semik commanded from here, and the crew surrendered only after three days of…
Fortifications
gmina Niegowa
On top of the Zamkowa limestone rock in Łutowiec (Niegowa municipality) there once stood a small medieval stronghold. Today all that remains is a fragment of wall on the summit of the outcrop and barely visible traces of a rampart and moat…
Fortifications
Żarki
On a lone limestone rock near Suliszowice, at about 400 m above sea level, a 19.5-metre stretch of wall up to 1.8 m thick has survived – the last trace of a small stronghold built to guard the border in the Jura. Nobody even knows for cert…
Fortifications
Walim
The Walim Adits (Polish: Sztolnie Walimskie, roughly "shtol-nyeh vah-leem-skyeh"), also known as the Rzeczka complex, are one of three sections of Nazi Germany's secret Project Riese that you can visit today. Hidden in the Owl Mountains of…
Fortifications
Kołobrzeg
Kołobrzeg Fortress is not a single castle but a scattered set of forts, redoubts and earthworks around the harbor and town of Kołobrzeg (roughly "ko-WOB-zheg"), on Poland's Baltic coast. For more than two centuries, from 1653 to 1872, this…
Fortifications
Kostrzyn nad Odrą
On the Oder, right on the German border, lies a town that no longer exists: Kostrzyn's old town, destroyed in 1945 and never rebuilt, enclosed by the walls of a 16th-century bastion fortress. The surviving street grid, cobbles and house fo…
Fortifications
Przemyśl
Przemyśl Fortress (say "PSHEH-mishl") is a ring of Austro-Hungarian forts around the town of Przemyśl in southeastern Poland, close to the Ukrainian border. In 1914–1915 it endured one of the longest sieges of World War I, and its fall mad…
Fortifications
Gdańsk
Wisłoujście Fortress (Twierdza Wisłoujście, roughly "TVYER-dzah vee-swo-OO-ish-cheh") in Gdańsk is one of Europe's most remarkable surviving fortifications: a 15th-century brick lighthouse tower ringed by the four-bastion Fort Carré and a…
Fortifications
Zamość
Zamość Fortress, and in particular its restored Bastion VII with the outwork known as the Nadszaniec (a raised cavalier), is the best place to see how this Renaissance "ideal city" in southeastern Poland was defended. A guided underground…
Fortifications
Prudnik
The Lower Gate Tower on Batorego Street is the most visible trace of Prudnik's medieval fortifications and one of the town's symbols. Its stone core, brick superstructure and octagonal top under a slender spire show three building phases a…
Fortifications
Głuchołazy
The stone tower on Plac Basztowy grew together with the town of Głuchołazy: at first it was 13 metres tall, in the 15th century it was raised to about 20, and around 1600 it gained a Renaissance parapet. Today it is the only surviving towe…