The oldest traces of human life in the Sącz Basin are between forty and fifteen thousand years old. This is the Upper Palaeolithic – a time when hunters, flint weapons in hand, wandered the cold valleys.
They left little behind: a few scattered finds, chips of flint. Little more remains of the Stone Age farmers who were the first to come and till the soil here – the Neolithic left but scant traces in the basin.
Hillforts of the Bronze and Iron Ages
The people of the Bronze Age and the early Iron Age made their presence felt more boldly. At Maszkowice they raised a hillfort, in use between the 17th and 13th centuries before Christ and linked with the Otomani-Füzesabony culture, whose centres lay mainly south of the Carpathians.
A second hillfort, at Marcinkowice, was in use from the beginning of the first millennium until the 6th century BC.
In the northern part of present-day Podegrodzie traces have been found of the Púchov culture from the last two centuries before Christ, and of the Przeworsk culture.
The Slavs, for their part, appear in the basin in the first half of the 6th century – their coming is attested by a few graves beside the Barczynka stream.
Naszacowice, or the stronghold before the Piasts
By the early Middle Ages the basin was already thickly settled: close on forty open settlements were scattered along both banks of the Dunajec. Strongholds, on the other hand, were built on the left bank, near the forests, where timber and shelter were easier to come by.
The master of this land was the stronghold at Naszacowice, founded most likely around the middle of the 8th century.
Archaeologists from the Institute of Archaeology of the Jagiellonian University, led by Jacek Poleski, dug here from 1983 for fourteen seasons, until 1997. They uncovered a multi-part hillfort covering about 15 hectares, with ramparts rebuilt time and again, in which lay layers left by fires.
The stronghold went through four phases of building – the last of them already Piast – and it survived the incorporation of Lesser Poland into the Piast state, still serving in the 11th century. Poleski published his monograph on the site in 2004.
In the 9th century two smaller strongholds grew up beside Naszacowice, at Chełmiec and Marcinkowice – most likely refuges where people sheltered in times of danger. Both were deserted in the 10th century.
All three are regarded as local centres of power from the days before the Piasts came here.
The first Sącz lay in Podegrodzie
Whoever seeks the cradle of Sącz in the market square of Stary Sącz will be disappointed. The first “Sącz” was a centre of power on the Piast borderland and lay in the northern part of today’s village of Podegrodzie.
Archaeology has found no settlement older than the town’s charter on the site of the present town.
First there stood the stronghold called Zamczysko, on a promontory cut off by a ditch, in use from the middle of the 11th century. It burnt down at the turn of the 11th and 12th centuries.
Some six hundred metres to the south a larger stronghold was then raised, called Grobla, with a rampart of layered construction. It burnt and was rebuilt at least four times, and it served right up to the second half of the 13th century.
Here sat the oldest castellans of Sącz – the excavations confirmed Andrzej Żaki’s old hypothesis that the seat of the castellany is to be identified with Grobla.
To the north of Grobla an outer settlement grew up around the church of St James the Great – most likely a royal foundation of the 11th or 12th century. From this “pod grodem”, “below the stronghold”, Podegrodzie took its name. The first written mention of the church, however, dates only from 1310.
The castellans of Sącz
The castellans of Sącz appear in written sources from 1224. The first known by name was Chwalisław, who attended the assemblies of Leszek the White in 1224 and 1227.
The castellan wielded judicial, administrative and military power in the prince’s name – he was, in his land, his lord’s eye, hand and sword.
Under Bolesław the Chaste the castellany of Sącz was counted among the offices of “moderate importance”, alongside Brzesko, Czechów, Wojnicz and Zawichost.
Around 1273 the castellans vanish from the sources like a candle blown out. Krasnowolski supposes that they were rivals to the authority of Princess Kinga – the new lady of this land.
And the land was already stirring to new life. In the years 1251–1268 Łącko was a knightly estate held by the Canons of the Holy Sepulchre from Miechów; in 1256 mention is made of Podoliniec, later joined to the Sącz region.
From 1255 Kinga co-issued her husband’s documents, and her chamberlain in 1256–1258 was Janusz of the Topór clan. A great change hung in the air.
In old and new photographs
