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Published: 2023-12-29
Vol. 15 (2023)

Natural and Anthropogenic Barriers in the Spatial Development of Medieval and Modern Cities in Silesia. A Cartographic Analysis

Rafał Eysymontt Logo ORCID
Section: Artykuły
https://doi.org/10.31261/SPiP.2023.19.12

Abstract

City walls were the obvious border of the medieval city, a function that in the modern city is fulfilled by a belt of bastion fortifications. It is necessary to consider the conditions that determined the line of this border. These are both natural (the course of rivers, the location of lakes and ponds, the lay of the land) and anthropogenic, the latter resulting, for example, from the city’s location in the immediate vicinity of a medieval and early modern center of fertile agricultural areas and villages or populous suburbs surrounding the city walls with a tight loop. A good illustration of this phenomenon is given in some modern descriptions of cities (Bartłomiej Stein’s for Wrocław, Friderico Lucae’s for Wołów), but more common are historical cartographic materials and occasionally also the results of archaeological research. The conjectural course of the waters, as in Środa Śląska, sometimes provides the basis for a reconstruction of the original functional layout of the city. More obvious, although worth noting, are the spatial systems of cities conditioned by the course of the river (Bytom Odrzański, Krosno Odrzańskie).
The spatial layout of cities was also conditioned by their location in foothill areas. It is easy to see how this factor influenced the development of Bolków and Bystrzyca Kłodzka, located in the Kłodzko region. The mountainous location was, on the one hand, a complication for the founders of cities, while on the other – a chance for a more effective sculpting of the city’s position.
As the case in Wrocław shows, the development of suburbs could have been hampered by intensive use of suburban villages, especially those located south of the city. This for a long time prevented the area from being transformed into suburbs. It was different north of the center, where the street network began to be organized at the beginning of the eighteenth century.
The last phenomenon discussed in the article is the extremely intensive development of the suburbs of Kąty Wrocławskie and Jelenia Góra, which weakened the defensive functions of these cities. In Brzeg, this function was sustained thanks to a series of demolitions of the suburban villages.

Keywords:

history of cities , urban planning of Silesia in the Middle Ages

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Citation rules

Eysymontt, R. (2023). Natural and Anthropogenic Barriers in the Spatial Development of Medieval and Modern Cities in Silesia. A Cartographic Analysis. Średniowiecze Polskie I Powszechne, 15, 185–218. https://doi.org/10.31261/SPiP.2023.19.12

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Vol. 15 (2023)
Published: 2023-12-31

ISSN: 2080-492X
eISSN: 2353-9720
Publisher
Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego | University of Silesia Press
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