Płock

A stronghold rose on the high bank of the Vistula in the 10th century, and under the first Piast rulers, even before Poland's baptism, Płock served as one of their seats. From 1037 to 1047 it was the capital of Miecław's breakaway Mazovian state, and from 1079 to 1138, under Władysław I Herman and Bolesław III Wrymouth, it was the capital of Poland — the origin of its official title, the Ducal Capital City of Płock. When the kingdom split into duchies after 1138, it became the capital of Mazovia, and its bishopric, founded in the 11th century, is one of the oldest in the country.

The city prospered on a trade route linking Toruń with Warsaw and Lublin, and the 16th century was its golden age, before plague, fire and the Swedish wars of the late 17th and early 18th centuries brought decline. Jews had settled here from the 14th century, and in the early 19th century they made up close to half of the old town's population. Płock became the capital of a department of Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw in 1807, and in 1831 the last Sejm of Congress Poland met in its Town Hall.

The German occupation brought a ghetto in 1940 and the deportation of the Jewish community, of whom only a few hundred survived; museum and cathedral collections were looted. After the war the building of the country's largest oil refinery transformed the city, and from 1975 to 1998 it was the capital of its own province. Its population peaked at about 131,000 in 1998.

Płock's identity rests on its age. The cathedral holds the sarcophagi of Polish monarchs, Cathedral Hill is a national Historic Monument, and the city takes pride in the Małachowianka, a school traditionally dated to 1180 and counted as the oldest in Poland. It is also the world centre of the Mariavite Church, an independent church whose cathedral, the Temple of Mercy and Charity, was built in the English Neo-Gothic style just before the First World War.

Art Nouveau, secesja in Polish, is the city's other claim. The Museum of Mazovia was founded in 1820, staged the first museum display of Art Nouveau in Poland in 1967 and now holds the largest collection of the style in the country, in a restored tenement on Tumska Street; the street itself is now a pedestrian promenade.

Sport means Wisła Płock: the handball team is one of the most successful in the country, with many national titles and cups, and the football team plays in the top division and won the Polish Cup in 2006. From 2006 to 2023 the city hosted the Audioriver electronic music festival, which then moved to Łódź.

About 117,000 people lived in Płock at the end of 2021, fewer than at the 1998 peak. The city is a local centre for administration, schools and hospitals, with a campus of the Warsaw University of Technology among its colleges. It is also the seat of one of the oldest Catholic dioceses in Poland and the world headquarters of the Mariavite Church, so church institutions remain a visible part of the old town.

The economy is dominated by the refinery and its parent company, Orlen, whose headquarters are here. Since 2003 Basell Orlen Polyolefins has run plastics plants in the city as well.

Most people travel by the city's buses, whose 41 routes cover the whole city. Weekends bring families to the zoo and to the riverside below the escarpment, and shopping and errands to Tumska Street. Rail links to the rest of the country are poor, so coaches to Warsaw, Włocławek and Toruń do much of the work.

Płock has two foods on the national register of traditional products, both designated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development as originating in the city. Kiełbasa tumska is a local kiełbasa named after Wzgórze Tumskie, Cathedral Hill, and baleron płocki is the city's version of baleron, a popular Polish smoked pork meat eaten as cold cuts. Płock lies in Mazovia, whose capital, Warsaw, claims flaki, a tripe soup, the pyza dumpling and the wuzetka, a chocolate sponge and cream cake.

Beyond these local specialities, menus follow the wider Polish kitchen of soups, dumplings and meat dishes.

The places to eat are concentrated in the old town, a short walk from the cathedral, the castle and the museums of Cathedral Hill. The restaurants around the Old Market Square and along Tumska Street serve both visitors climbing to the cathedral and local families, and cafés on the pedestrian street fill on summer evenings and at weekends.