Leszno

Leszno AUDPl-Leszno.ogg'leszno (Lissa, 1800–1918 Lissa in Posen) is a historic city in western Poland, within the Greater Poland Voivodeship. It is the seventh-largest city in the province with an estimated population of 62,200, as of 2021. Previously, it was the capital of the Leszno Voivodeship (1975–1998) and is now the seat of Leszno County. 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 It was first mentioned in historical documents in 1393, when the estate was the property of a noble named Stefan Karnin-Wieniawa.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. 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 of the Polish Crown. 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.