collection (late 19th century) The settlement, first mentioned in a 1485 deed, when it was part of the
Duchy of Pomerania ruled by the
Griffin duke
Bogislaw X (1454-1523). The estates were held by nobles from nearby Zitzewitz (now
Sycewice, Poland). Devastated in the
Thirty Years' War, the region was incorporated into the
Brandenburg-Prussian
province of Pomerania in 1653. The Varzin branch of the Zitzewitz noble family became extinct in 1781, whereafter the estates changed hands several times. In 1867 it was bought from the
Blumenthal family for
Otto von Bismarck by the grateful
Prussian state for his services as
Minister President during the
Austro-Prussian War. Bismarck, though born in the
Altmark region of central Germany, had ties to eastern Pomerania as he had spent several years of his childhood at his family's estates in
Kniephof (now Konarzewo) near
Naugard, and married
Johanna von Puttkamer (of the Pomeranian
Puttkamer noble family) at nearby
Kolziglow in 1847. Bismarck evidently enjoyed the lifestyle of a
Prussian Junker and the manor with its extended park and forests became one of the couple's favoured residences. Johanna died staying at Varzin in 1894, preceding her husband by four years. Otto von Bismarck then retired to his
Friedrichsruh manor in
Lauenburg. Varzin manor remained in the possession of the Bismarck family until the end of World War II. The last family resident, Countess Sybille von Bismarck (née von Arnim), widow of Otto von Bismarck's son
Wilhelm, declined to flee and, at age 81, committed suicide when
Red Army forces were approaching in March 1945. She was buried in a family mausoleum on the grounds, which however was destroyed in 1957. After the war, the remaining German residents of the area were
forcibly expelled and the locale became the Polish Warcino. The manor house, converted into a forestry college, retained a huge depiction of Bismarck's horse, Schmetterling, on its walls. In 2011–2012, the remains of the ruinous Protestant
half-timbered church in nearby
Ciecholub were saved and relocated to the Warcino park. The rebuilt church was consecrated by the
Evangelical bishop Marcin Hintz on 17 August 2012. ==Notable people==