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Pacanów , sometimes referred to as the European Capital of Fable, is a town in
Busko County __NOTOC__ Busko () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, south-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed in 1998 ...
,
Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship ( ), also known as Holy Cross Voivodeship, is a voivodeship (province) in southeastern Poland, in the historical region of Lesser Poland. The province's capital and largest city is Kielce. The voivodeship takes its ...
in southern Poland. It is the seat of Gmina Pacanów. It had a population of 1137 in 2003. In modern times the town is partly noted for its connection to the fictional character Koziołek Matołek. It lies in historic
Lesser Poland Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name ''Małopolska'' (; ), is a historical region situated in southern and south-eastern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Kraków. Throughout centuries, Lesser Poland developed a separate cult ...
, approximately east of
Busko-Zdrój Busko-Zdrój () is a spa town in Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, southern Poland. It is the capital of Busko County. As of December 2021, it has a population of 15,310. History The origin of Busko goes back to the 12th century, when a group of sh ...
and south-east of the regional capital
Kielce Kielce (; ) is a city in south-central Poland and the capital of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. In 2021, it had 192,468 inhabitants. The city is in the middle of the Świętokrzyskie Mountains (Holy Cross Mountains), on the banks of the Silnic ...
.


History

Pacanów was first mentioned in a document from 1110–1117, issued by the Bishop of
Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...
Maur, in which the erection of St. Martin's church was confirmed. At that time, the village probably belonged to a man named Siemian, who is mentioned in the document. The existence of the parish church was confirmed on August 1219 by the incumbent Bishop of Kraków Iwo Odrowąż, and in 1265, the village was granted
Magdeburg rights Magdeburg rights (, , ; also called Magdeburg Law) were a set of town privileges first developed by Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor (936–973) and based on the Flemish Law, which regulated the degree of internal autonomy within cities and villages gr ...
by Prince Bolesław V the Chaste. In the same period, a number of local villages were also granted town charters ( Połaniec,
Nowy Korczyn Nowy Korczyn is a small town in Busko County, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, in southern Poland. It is the seat of the gmina (administrative district) called Gmina Nowy Korczyn. It lies in Lesser Poland, approximately south of Busko-Zdrój and so ...
, Koprzywnica and Opatowiec). The original charter of Pacanów has not been preserved, but in a document issued on February 26, 1603, King
Sigismund III Vasa Sigismund III Vasa (, ; 20 June 1566 – 30 April 1632 N.S.) was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1587 to 1632 and, as Sigismund, King of Sweden from 1592 to 1599. He was the first Polish sovereign from the House of Vasa. Re ...
reconfirmed its town status. Pacanów remained a private
Bailiwick A bailiwick () is usually the area of jurisdiction of a bailiff, and once also applied to territories in which a privately appointed bailiff exercised the sheriff's functions under a royal or imperial writ. In English, the original French combi ...
, belonging, among others, to a man named Piotr of Mokrsko and Pacanów,
Castellan A castellan, or constable, was the governor of a castle in medieval Europe. Its surrounding territory was referred to as the castellany. The word stems from . A castellan was almost always male, but could occasionally be female, as when, in 1 ...
of
Małogoszcz Małogoszcz is a town in the Jędrzejów County, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, in southern Poland. The Battle of Małogoszcz. one of the biggest battles of the 1863 January Uprising, took place there. Małogoszcz belongs to Lesser Poland; the nam ...
, (1306–1310),
Wiślica Wiślica () () is a town in Busko County, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, in south-central Poland. It is the seat of the gmina (administrative district) called Gmina Wiślica. It lies on the Nida River, approximately south of Busko-Zdrój and sout ...
(1315), and
Sandomierz Sandomierz (pronounced: ; , ) is a historic town in south-eastern Poland with 23,863 inhabitants (), situated on the Vistula River near its confluence with the San, in the Sandomierz Basin. It has been part of Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship (Holy ...
(1317–1328). By 1417, the town already had a parish school, and in 1433 in Nowy Korczyn, King
Władysław II Jagiełło Jogaila (; 1 June 1434), later Władysław II Jagiełło (),Other names include (; ) (see also Names and titles of Władysław II Jagiełło) was Grand Duke of Lithuania beginning in 1377 and starting in 1386, becoming King of Poland as well. ...
recognized its Magdeburg rights, allowing a number of fairs to be held there. The town was administratively located in the
Sandomierz Voivodeship Sandomierz Voivodeship (, ) was a unit of administration and local government in Poland from the 14th century to the partitions of Poland in 1772–1795. It was part of the Lesser Poland region and the Lesser Poland Province. Originally Sandomier ...
in the Lesser Poland Province. In 1502, during a Tatar raid, in which the invaders crossed the Vistula, Pacanów was successfully defended. The significance of the town was further enhanced when
Nicholas of Cusa Nicholas of Cusa (1401 – 11 August 1464), also referred to as Nicholas of Kues and Nicolaus Cusanus (), was a German Catholic bishop and polymath active as a philosopher, theologian, jurist, mathematician, and astronomer. One of the first Ger ...
included Pacanów on his map of Central Europe. In 1583 and 1585 King Stephen Bathory stayed there briefly. The town's prosperity came to an end during the
Swedish invasion of Poland The Deluge was a series of mid-17th-century military campaigns in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. In a wider sense, it applies to the period between the Khmelnytsky Uprising of 1648 and the Truce of Andrusovo in 1667, comprising the Pol ...
. On April 9, 1657, the town was captured by the Transilvanian army of George II Rakoczi. The invaders burned it to the ground, and that marked the decline of Pacanów, which never quite recovered its former importance. As a result of the
Partitions of Poland The Partitions of Poland were three partition (politics), partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that took place between 1772 and 1795, toward the end of the 18th century. They ended the existence of the state, resulting in the eli ...
, Pacanów became part of the Austrian Habsburg Empire. After the Polish victory in the
Austro-Polish War The Austro-Polish War or Polish-Austrian War was a part of the War of the Fifth Coalition in 1809 (a coalition of the Austrian Empire and the United Kingdom against Napoleon's French Empire and allied states). In this war, Polish forces of ...
of 1809, it became part of the short-lived
Duchy of Warsaw The Duchy of Warsaw (; ; ), also known as the Grand Duchy of Warsaw and Napoleonic Poland, was a First French Empire, French client state established by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1807, during the Napoleonic Wars. It initially comprised the ethnical ...
, and after the duchy's dissolution, it was part of Russian-controlled
Congress Poland Congress Poland or Congress Kingdom of Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It was established w ...
from 1815 to 1915. On August 24, 1813, the town was completely flooded by the Vistula River. In 1820, Pacanów had circa 1,000 residents, half of whom were
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
. In 1869, following the failed
January Uprising The January Uprising was an insurrection principally in Russia's Kingdom of Poland that was aimed at putting an end to Russian occupation of part of Poland and regaining independence. It began on 22 January 1863 and continued until the last i ...
, the Imperial Russian authorities revoked the town status and reduced it to a village. In 1918, with Poland regaining independence, Pacanów 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 ...
, within Kielce Voivodeship. According to the 1921 census, it had a population of 2,598, 35.0% Polish and 65.0% Jewish. Jews owned most local businesses and stores. Following the German-Soviet
invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...
, which started
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 September 1939, the town was occupied by Germany. The Jews were conscripted for forced, usually unpaid, labor. Jews from
Radom Radom is a city in east-central Poland, located approximately south of the capital, Warsaw. It is situated on the Mleczna River in the Masovian Voivodeship. Radom is the fifteenth-largest city in Poland and the second-largest in its province w ...
were forcibly resettled into Pacanów resulting in a widespread lack of housing and severe overcrowding. In April 1942, a
ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...
was set up with an average of 12 or 13 people per room. Jews were not allowed into the marketplace and some local Christians smuggled food for trade. In October, 1942, some of the younger Jews were sent to labor camps, some were killed in Pacanów, and the rest taken to the
Treblinka extermination camp Treblinka () was the second-deadliest extermination camp to be built and operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II. It was in a forest north-east of Warsaw, south of the village of Treblinka in what is now the Mas ...
where they were murdered by the
Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...
. The number of survivors among Pacanów's Jews is unknown.


Personalities associated with the town

* Feliks Paweł Jarocki 19th century zoologist * Kornel Makuszyński and Marian Walentynowicz, creators of * '' Koziołek Matołek'' mythical goat-hero associated with Pacanów


Koziołek Matołek

The fictional character Koziołek Matołek, or ''Matołek the Billy-Goat'' in English, was searching for a Pacanów due to hearing that in Pacanów they give goats horseshoes. He was created by Kornel Makuszyński (story) and Marian Walentynowicz (art) in one of the first and most famous Polish comics back in 1933. Once when Makuszyński and Walentynowicz were sitting in a coffee house in Kraków, they spotted a sad looking man sipping a drink at a nearby table. They asked him why he looked so gloomy, and he told them that he came from the small town of Pacanów and was wondering how to help the town prosper. Makuszyński and Walentynowicz decided then to help him by popularizing the small town in their books. It became a
cult classic A cult following is a group of Fan (person), fans who are highly dedicated to a person, idea, object, movement, or work, often an artist, in particular a performing artist, or an artwork in some List of art media, medium. The latter is often cal ...
, popular since its creation till today, and becoming an important part of
canon Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the material accepted as officially written by an author or an ascribed author * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western canon, th ...
of Polish
children's literature Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. In addition to conventional literary genres, modern children's literature is classified by the intended age of the reade ...
. The comic has influenced many generations of Poles, and some of its phrases have penetrated into the
Polish language Polish (, , or simply , ) is a West Slavic languages, West Slavic language of the Lechitic languages, Lechitic subgroup, within the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family, and is written in the Latin script. It is primarily spo ...
itself, with expressions like 'w Pacanowie kozy kują' (''In Pacanów, they shoe goats''), 'pacan' and 'matoł' (''slowpoke'', ''dummy''). Later it was made into a children's cartoon. To this day Koziołek Matołek remains Pacanów's claim to fame, and images of him can be seen all around the town. File:Pacanów pomnik koziołka.JPG, Koziołek Matołek monument in Pacanów square File:Pacanów1pl.jpg, Floral monument File:Pacanów2pl.jpg, Wooden monument File:Pacanów3pl.jpg, Koziołek Matołek on a post box File:Pacanów4pl.jpg, Restaurants, shops, offices, all feature Koziołek Matołek File:Pacanów6pl.jpg, Koziołek Matołek is inviting customers into a shop File:Pacanów5pl.jpg, Koziołek Matołek on a road-side fence There exists a Fairy Tale Center in the town.


References


External links


Pacanów official site


{{Authority control Busko County Cities and towns in Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship Holocaust locations in Poland