Every design for Bartoszyce

Around 1241 the Teutonic Knights built a castle on the left bank of the Łyna, on the border between the Old Prussian lands of Natangia and Bartia. The town that grew up opposite it was first recorded as Rosenthal, received its charter in 1332 and became Bartenstein – or, to the Poles who settled here in large numbers, Bartoszyce.

What makes Bartoszyce unmistakable is the mix of all that history in a small, ordinary town. You walk to the shops through the Brama Lidzbarska, a surviving gate of the old walls; you pass the Kamienne Baby (Bartki) Bartel i Gustebalda, two stone figures known locally as Bartki; and on the riverbank you find the Pozostałości zamku krzyżackiego. The Łyna runs right through the middle, with the town spread over both banks and the Russian border not far to the north.

For anyone who grew up here, the map traces the river, the gate and the paths through Park Elżbiety – a childhood drawn street by street.