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raków, the city with 700,000 inhabitants, is located on the Wisla River. It is an urban city matched by few others in Europe. It is not only a complex of houses and buildings of various kind but also of ideas, traditions and monuments which have provided water of life to many generations of Poles. The city of Kraków belongs traditionally to the leading scientific and cultural centres of Poland. Today there are 17 academic schools in Kraków, with the academic community numbering about 10,000 scientists and about 120,000 students.

The origins of Kraków are obscure. An enduring legend has it that the city was founded by the mythical ruler Krak on Wawel Hill, above a cave occupied by a ravenous dragon. Krak disposed of the beast by offering it animal skins stuffed with tar and sulphur which it duly and fatally devoured. In reality traces of human habitation from prehistoric times have been found in the city area, while the first historical records are of Slavic peoples settling along the banks of the Wisla River here in the 8^th century.

By the end of the 10^th century Kraków was a major market centre and had been incorporated into the Polish state which was ruled by the Piast dynasty. In the middle of the 11^th century Kraków became the capital of Poland. Destroyed two hundred years later by the Tatar invasion it was rebuilt in the form basically unaltered untill our times.

The period of Kraków's greatest splendor began with the reign of the excellent administrator, King Kazimierz the Great, who was a generous patron of art and scholarship and who founded here a university in 1364 - the oldest in central Europe after Prague. The growth continued during the reign of the Jagiellonian dynasty as manifested by the great works of the Renaissance art and architecture created at that time.

After the transfer of the capital to Warszawa in 1596, Kraków began to decline, a process accelerated by the pillaging of the city during the Swedish invasion. Following the Partitions of Poland between three powerfull neighboring countries at the end of the 18^th century, Kraków was the capital of a tiny, nationally autonomous republic and later incorporated into Austria - Hungarian province of Galicia. The brief interlude of independence following World War I ended for Kraków in September 1939 when the Nazis entered the city. Kraków was designated capital of the Central Government incorporating all Polish territories not directly annexed to the Reich. Fortunately, most of priceless, old buildings of Kraków escaped destruction during World War II and it is now flourishing again.

Nowadays Kraków attracts numerous tourists from all over the world who are eager to see the ancient capital of Poland and its magnificent art treasures. This artistic abundance was recognized by the UNESCO which in 1978 entered the city on the World List of Cultural Heritage, and thus emphasized its high position in world culture.

Among thousands of historic buildings, the following are of the special interest: the Royal Castle on Wawel Hill - an ancient seat of Polish Kings, the medieval Old Town with one of Europe's most beautiful Market Squares, dozens of old churches and museums as well as the 14^th century Jagiellonian University.

Centuries ago Kraków gained the title "totius Poloniae urbs celeberrima", which well reflected the unique character of the town, the old capital of Poland, the city of Nicholas Copernicus and Pope John Paul II.