Olsztyn

The Warmian cathedral chapter built its castle here from 1346 and granted town rights in October 1353; the German name Allenstein comes from Alna, the Old Prussian name of the river, and Polish settlers rendered it as Olsztyn. Polish forces took the town in 1410 and 1414, and in 1454 the townspeople rose against the Teutonic Knights and recognised the Polish king; the Second Peace of Thorn confirmed it as part of Poland in 1466, within the Prince-Bishopric of Warmia. From 1516 to 1521 Nicolaus Copernicus lived in the castle as administrator and organised the defence that held off a Teutonic siege in 1521.

A golden age of crafts and trade on the Warsaw–Königsberg route was halted in the 1620s by a fire and an epidemic, followed by Swedish raids in 1655 and 1708 and the plague and cholera epidemics of 1710. Prussia annexed the town in 1772. It grew again from 1818, and became the capital of a government region in 1905, while remaining a Polish centre: the Gazeta Olsztyńska newspaper was founded here in 1886. In the 1920 plebiscite the city voted overwhelmingly to stay German, and under Nazi rule its Polish activists were persecuted, arrested and killed.

On 22 January 1945 the Red Army plundered and burned the city. Polish administration began in May, the remaining Germans were expelled in October, and settlers arrived from Vilnius, Grodno and Volhynia. A match factory and later a tyre plant drove post-war growth, and in 1956 the city held Poland's largest demonstration in support of the Hungarian Revolution. Since 1999 Olsztyn has been the capital of the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship.

Copernicus is the city's most celebrated resident: his astronomical table survives in the castle, a monument to him stands in the city, and the planetarium opened in 1973 for the 500th anniversary of his birth. The castle museum and the Gazeta Olsztyńska House, which tells the story of the Polish community under German rule, keep the city's divided past in view, as does the restored funeral chapel designed by Erich Mendelsohn, born in the city, for the Jewish community.

Summer is festival season. The Olsztyn Artistic Summer, held since 1996, runs from mid-June to mid-September with concerts and shows in the amphitheatre below the castle and in the Old Town's squares, including the international Olsztyn Blues Nights. The Stefan Jaracz Theatre, founded in 1925, holds the international Demoludy festival; there are also a puppet theatre and the Warmia-Masuria Philharmonic. Each May the student festival Kortowiada takes over the university district, and it is one of the largest student events in Poland.

Olsztyn is a seat of the Catholic Archdiocese of Warmia, and Warmia's Catholic tradition sets it apart from formerly Protestant Masuria to the east. Volleyball is the leading sport: Indykpol AZS Olsztyn has been Polish champion five times. Many families came from the lost eastern borderlands after 1945.

About 167,000 people lived in Olsztyn at the end of 2023. The city has been ranked highly among Polish cities for quality of life, income, employment and safety. It is the administrative centre of the voivodeship and home to the University of Warmia and Mazury, founded in 1999 and now one of the largest universities in north-eastern Poland, whose campus at Kortowo gives the city a large student population.

The tyre factory founded in 1967, now Michelin Polska, is the largest employer in Warmia and Masuria, and food processing and furniture making are the other main industries.

Nature is close to everyday life: forests cover about a fifth of the city, mostly in the Municipal Forest, and fifteen lakes lie inside the city limits, with a municipal beach on Lake Ukiel. Since 2015 a new tram network has reshaped commuting between the large residential districts and the centre, and two more lines were added at the turn of 2024. There are plans to replace the main railway station building.

Olsztyn's restaurants serve the Polish repertoire: pierogi, filled dumplings; bigos, a long-cooked stew of cabbage and meat; kotlet schabowy, the breaded pork cutlet; gołąbki, cabbage leaves stuffed with meat; and soups such as żurek and barszcz. In restaurants a soup may be followed by herring, prepared with cream, oil or in aspic. Vodka, which may have originated in Poland, is drunk clear or as żubrówka, flavoured with bison grass and made in Białystok in the neighbouring province. Placki ziemniaczane, potato pancakes, and kotlet mielony, a minced-meat cutlet, are canteen standards.

Masuria, to the east, is known among Poles for its smoked fish, sold at stalls near the lakes. Mushrooms are used widely in Polish cooking, in soups such as zupa grzybowa and in pierogi with sauerkraut.

The Old Town around the market square and the castle has the city's densest cluster of restaurants, cafés and bars. The bar mleczny, the milk bar, a type of cheap canteen first opened in Warsaw in 1896, still serves simple dishes in Polish cities.