This is the main secular building of Toruń's Old Town - a Gothic building built in stages, and rebuilt and renovated over the centuries, it is one of the most prominent axis of thegns of medieval bourgeois architecture in Europe. As early as the 13th century, the 109 x 104-meter Old Town Square was home to cloth halls, bread benches, a city weighing scale, a courthouse and a 23-meter-high market tower. At the end of the 14th century, the city received a privilege from the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order to build a town hall. At that time a new one-story town hall was built in the shape of a quadrangle with a courtyard. The previously standing tower was raised to its current height of 40 meters and incorporated into the architecture of the town hall. In spring and summer, the tower is open to tourists from Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm (PLN 3). It offers a fantastic view of the Old Town. After World War II, the building housed the District Museum, which has been operating here ever since. It presents collections of medieval art, modern Polish painting and Torun crafts. In front of the Town Hall stands the immortal Nicolaus Copernicus, bearing the Latin inscription: Nicolaus Copernicus, the Torunian who told the Sun to stop and the Earth to move.
Michal - 11.08.2008
