Złotoria

Poland, Poland

---

Złotoria, a village in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland, near the Vistula and Drwęca rivers' confluence, gained prominence in the 14th century when King Casimir III the Great ordered construction of a Gothic brick castle around 1343 to guard Poland's Dobrzyń Land border against Teutonic Knights. Replacing an earlier Mazovian wooden stronghold mentioned since 1242, this quadrilateral fortress with Flemish bond walls played a turbulent role in regional conflicts, changing hands between Polish dukes like Władysław the White—who seized it in 1373 and endured a 1376 siege—and briefly the Teutonic Order after 1391 before returning to Poland via the 1411 Peace of Toruń. Captured and destroyed by Teutonic forces under Ulrich von Jungingen in 1409 amid dramatic spectacle for Toruń's citizens, its ruins—further damaged in the Napoleonic Wars—now stand as a historic remnant of medieval border warfare.