Kołobrzeg

Kołobrzeg (Polish: [kɔˈwɔbʐɛk] ^ⓘ; Kashubian: Kòlbrzég; German: Kolberg [ˈkɔlbɛʁk] ^ⓘ) is a port city in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in north-western Poland with about 47,000 inhabitants (as of 2014). Kołobrzeg is located on the Parsęta River on the south coast of the Baltic Sea (in the middle of the section divided by the Oder and Vistula Rivers). It is the capital of Kołobrzeg County.

During the Early Middle Ages, the Pomeranian tribes established a settlement at the site of modern-day Budzistowo. Thietmar of Merseburg first mentioned the site as Salsa Cholbergiensis. Around the year 1000, when the city was part of Poland, it became the seat of the Diocese of Kołobrzeg, one of five oldest Polish dioceses. During the High Middle Ages, the town was expanded with an additional settlement inhabited by German settlers a few kilometers north of the stronghold and chartered with Lübeck law, which settlement eventually superseded the original Pomeranian settlement. The city later joined the Hanseatic League. Within the Duchy of Pomerania the town was the urban center of the secular reign of the prince-bishops of Cammin and their residence throughout the High and Late Middle Ages. When it was part of Brandenburgian Pomerania during the Early Modern Age, it withstood Polish and Napoleon's troops in the siege of Kolberg. From 1815, it was part of the Prussian province of Pomerania.

In the late 19th century Kolberg became a popular spa town at the Baltic Sea. In 1945, Polish and Soviet troops captured the town, while the remaining German population which had not fled the advancing Red Army was expelled in accordance to the Potsdam Agreement. Kołobrzeg, now part of post-war Poland and devastated in the preceding Battle of Kolberg, was rebuilt, but lost its status as the regional center to the nearby city of Koszalin.