Early history The city's unrecorded history dates to the 13th century. It was first mentioned in historical documents in 1393, when the estate was the property of a noble named Stefan Karnin-
Wieniawa. The family eventually adopted the name
Leszczyński (literal meaning "of Leszno"), derived from the name of their estate, as was the custom among the
Polish nobility.
16th–18th centuries In around 1516, a community of Protestants known as the
Unity of the Brethren (
Unitas fratrum) were expelled from the
Bohemian lands by King
Vladislaus II and settled in Leszno. They were invited by the
Leszczyński family,
imperial counts since 1473 and who had converted to
Calvinism. The arrival of the Bohemian Protestants, in addition to weavers from nearby
Silesia, helped the settlement to grow. In 1547 it became a town by a privilege according to
Magdeburg Law granted by King
Sigismund I of Poland. Leszno was a
private town, administratively located in the Wschowa County in the
Poznań Voivodeship in the
Greater Poland Province. Leszno became the largest printing center in Greater Poland thanks to the activity of the Protestant community. Their numbers grew with the inflow of refugees from Silesia,
Bohemia, and
Moravia during the
Thirty Years War. In 1631, Leszno was vested with further privileges by King
Sigismund III Vasa, who made it equal with the most important cities of Poland such as
Kraków,
Gdańsk and
Warsaw. By the 17th century, the town had a renowned
Gymnasium (school), which was headed by
Jan Amos Komenský (known in English as Comenius), an educator and the last bishop of the Unity of the Brethren.
Johann Heermann, a German-speaking poet, lived in Leszno from 1638 until his death in 1647. Between 1636 and 1639, the town became fortified and its area increased. Quickly rebuilt afterwards, it was set on fire again during the
Great Northern War by
Russian forces in 1707 and was ravaged by
plague in 1709. The Leszczyński family owned the city until 1738, when King
Stanislaus I Leszczynski sold it to
Aleksander Józef Sułkowski following his abdication.
19th–20th centuries In the
Second Partition of Poland in 1793, Leszno was annexed by the
Kingdom of Prussia, within which it was referred to as
Lissa. In 1807 it was taken by Napoleon's
Grand Armee and included within the newly established but short-lived Polish
Duchy of Warsaw. Following Napoleon's defeat in the
Napoleonic Wars, in 1815 the town was reannexed by Prussia, initially as part of the semi-autonomous
Grand Duchy of Posen. The town was subjected to
Germanisation policies. Nevertheless, Polish press was issued in the town (
Przyjaciel Ludu) and in the 1840s, Polish historian, geographer and former officer
Stanisław Plater published the ''
("Little Polish Encyclopedia"), one of the pioneering 19th-century Polish encyclopedias, in the town. In 1871 it became part of Germany, and in 1887, it became the administrative seat of the Prussian Kreis Lissa''. According to the 1910 census, the population of the town was 17,156, of whom 14,479 (84%) reported German as their sole mother tongue, while 2,365 (14%) reported Polish; the Jewish population was 802 (4.6%). After
World War I, in November 1918, Poland regained independence. Shortly after the
Greater Poland Uprising of 1918–19 broke out, attempting to reintegrate Greater Poland and Leszno with Poland. The first local battles of the uprising took place in the area on 28 December 1918. Though the city was located on the German side of the military demarcation line established following the ceasefire in February 1919, Leszno became part of the newly established
Second Polish Republic under the
Treaty of Versailles, with effect from 17 January 1920. The local populace had to acquire Polish citizenship. In the interbellum, Leszno was a county seat within the Polish
Poznań Voivodeship. In 1924, a monument dedicated to the Polish insurgents of 1918–19 was erected. A prison for Poles was established in the local monastery, where more than 200 people had already been imprisoned in September 1939 during the
Intelligenzaktion. The Polish population was
expelled to the
General Government (German-occupied central Poland). Most of the town's
Jewish population (which had included such notable
rabbis as
Leo Baeck and
Jacob of Lissa, as well as the writer
Ludwig Kalisch) and the remaining Poles were massacred by the Nazi
Einsatzgruppen, which entered the town in September 1939. A notable public execution of 20 Poles, members of the
"Sokół" Polish Gymnastic Society, former Polish insurgents of 1918–1919, a local teacher, and a lawyer, was carried out in Leszno by the
Einsatzgruppe VI on 21 October 1939. Poles who were initially imprisoned in Leszno were also murdered in nearby towns and villages of
Poniec,
Osieczna,
Włoszakowice and
Rydzyna. Poles from Leszno were also among the victims of the large
Katyn massacre committed by the Russians in April–May 1940. , murdered in World War II Already in late 1939, the Germans expelled over 1,000 Poles, including families of Poles murdered in various massacres, in addition teachers, local officials, activists, former insurgents, and owners of shops and workshops, which were then handed over to
German colonists as part of the
Lebensraum policy. A transit camp for Poles expelled from various nearby settlements was established in the local school. The occupiers established and operated a forced labour subcamp of the
Stalag XXI-D prisoner-of-war camp in the city. Despite such circumstances, local Poles organized an
underground resistance movement, which included the
Ogniwo and
Świt organizations, the secret youth organization
Tajna Siódemka and structures of the
Polish Underground State.
Polish underground press was printed in Leszno. The
German occupation ended in 1945, and the town returned to Poland.
Post-war history The pre-war monument of the Greater Poland insurgents was restored in 1957. In 1991, a monument to the
Constitution of 3 May 1791 and the heroes of the fights for Poland's independence was unveiled, From 1975 to 1998, it was the capital of the
Leszno Voivodeship. In 2000, the city was awarded "The Golden Star of Town Twinning" prize by the
European Commission. ==Transport==