Łasin () is a town in

Grudziądz County Grudziądz County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, north-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed i ...

Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship * Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship is one of the 16 voivodeships (provinces) in Poland. * Kuyavian-Pomeranian is one of 13 Polish constituency of the European Parliament. * Kuyavian-Pomeranian Regional Assembly is the regional legislature of t ...

, in northern

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

, with 3,271 inhabitants (2004). It is the seat of the

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' ) is the basic unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,479 gminy throughout the country, encompassing over 43,000 villages. 940 gminy include cities and tow ...

(administrative district) called

Gmina Łasin __NOTOC__ Gmina Łasin is an urban-rural gmina (administrative district) in Grudziądz County, Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-central Poland. Its seat is the town of Łasin, which lies approximately east of Grudziądz and north-east ...

. It lies approximately east of Grudziądz and north-east of

Toruń Toruń is a city on the Vistula River in north-central Poland and a World Heritage Sites of Poland, UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its population was 196,935 as of December 2021. Previously, it was the capital of the Toruń Voivodeship (1975–199 ...

. It is located within the historic Chełmno Land.

History

The history of Łasin dates back to the rule of first Polish King Bolesław I the Brave. Polish brothers Mateusz and Jakub owned land near the Łasinka River (Łasin). In the year 1298, it was taken from them by the Country Master of the Teutonic Order Meinhard von Querfurt and given to Jan de Nemore, who founded the village of Łasin. Also in 1298, the town received Magdeburg law town rights from the monastic state of the Teutonic Knights in which it was located. In the 14th century, papal verdicts ordered the restoration of the territory to Poland, however, the Teutonic Knights did not comply and continued to occupy it. In 1454, King Casimir IV Jagiellon reincorporated the Chełmno Land into the

Kingdom of Poland The Kingdom of Poland (; Latin: ''Regnum Poloniae'') was a monarchy in Central Europe during the Middle Ages, medieval period from 1025 until 1385. Background The West Slavs, West Slavic tribe of Polans (western), Polans who lived in what i ...

upon the request of the Prussian Confederation, however, Łasin itself was captured by Poles in 1461 during the subsequent Thirteen Years' War. After the war, in 1466, the Teutonic Knights renounced claims to the town, and recognized it as part of Poland. Administratively it was located in the Chełmno Voivodeship in the provinces of Royal Prussia and

Greater Poland Greater Poland, often known by its Polish name Wielkopolska (; ), is a Polish Polish historical regions, historical region of west-central Poland. Its chief and largest city is Poznań followed by Kalisz, the oldest city in Poland. The bound ...

. Following the

First Partition of Poland The First Partition of Poland took place in 1772 as the first of three partitions that eventually ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The growth of power in the Russian Empire threatened the Kingdom of Prussia an ...

in 1772, the town, as ''Lessen'', was annexed by King Frederick the Great and made part of the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (, ) was a German state that existed from 1701 to 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1946. It played a signif ...

. In 1871, with the Prussian-led

unification of Germany The unification of Germany (, ) was a process of building the first nation-state for Germans with federalism, federal features based on the concept of Lesser Germany (one without Habsburgs' multi-ethnic Austria or its German-speaking part). I ...

, it became part of the

German Empire The German Empire (),; ; World Book, Inc. ''The World Book dictionary, Volume 1''. World Book, Inc., 2003. p. 572. States that Deutsches Reich translates as "German Realm" and was a former official name of Germany. also referred to as Imperia ...

. It belonged to the Graudenz district in the Prussian Province of West Prussia. According to the census of 1871, the town had a population of 2,385, of which 1,390 (58.3%) were

Poles Pole or poles may refer to: People *Poles (people), another term for Polish people, from the country of Poland * Pole (surname), including a list of people with the name * Pole (musician) (Stefan Betke, born 1967), German electronic music artist ...

. After the end of

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, in 1920, in accordance with the

Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles was a peace treaty signed on 28 June 1919. As the most important treaty of World War I, it ended the state of war between Germany and most of the Allies of World War I, Allied Powers. It was signed in the Palace ...

, Łasin became part of the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 6 October 1939. The state was established in the final stage of World War I ...

, after it regained independence in 1918. In interwar Poland, the mayor of Łasin was Stefan Tomczyński, a Polish activist and efficient administrator, who was previously harassed by Prussians for pro-Polish activity in the Prussian Partition. During the German occupation of Poland (

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

), in October 1939, the '' Selbstschutz'' carried out several mass executions of Polish inhabitants of Łasin and its surroundings, killing 150 people.

Culture

A museum dedicated to

firefighting Firefighting is a profession aimed at controlling and extinguishing fire. A person who engages in firefighting is known as a firefighter or fireman. Firefighters typically undergo a high degree of technical training. This involves structural fir ...

('' Muzeum Pożarnictwa Ziemi Pomorskiej'') is located in Łasin.

Sports

Piast Łasin sports club is based in Łasin, with

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

table tennis Table tennis (also known as ping-pong) is a racket sport derived from tennis but distinguished by its playing surface being atop a stationary table, rather than the Tennis court, court on which players stand. Either individually or in teams of ...

and

powerlifting Powerlifting is a competitive strength athletics, strength sport that consists of three attempts at maximal weight on three lifts: Squat (exercise), squat, bench press, and deadlift. As in the sport of Olympic weightlifting, it involves the athle ...

sections.

Gallery

File:Pomnik Magdalenka Lasin.jpg, Monument to Poles murdered by the Nazis in 1939 File:Lasin, city wiev (7).jpg, Old townhouses File:Lasin jezioro.jpg, Łasin Lake File:Wieża Łasin.JPG, Water tower

Notable people

* Zbigniew Dębski (1922–2010), Polish military officer, member of the

Home Army The Home Army (, ; abbreviated AK) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) established in the ...

and participant of the

Warsaw Uprising The Warsaw Uprising (; ), sometimes referred to as the August Uprising (), or the Battle of Warsaw, was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance movement in World War II, Polish underground resistance to liberate Warsaw from ...

* Heiner Stadler (1942–2018), jazz composer and musician

References

{{Authority control Cities and towns in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship Grudziądz County