Milicz Castle Ruins

As early as 1136 a stronghold stood on the site of today's ruins – a watch post over the Barycz, for a long time in the hands of the bishops of Wrocław. In 1282 the so-called Treaty of Milicz was concluded here: in the presence of a papal legate, Duke Mestwin II of Pomerania ceded the Gniew land to the Teutonic Knights.

The brick castle whose ruins we see today was built, according to some scholars, on the bishops' initiative at the end of the 13th century, and according to others under Duke Konrad I of Oleśnica, who bought Milicz in 1358. It was an irregular polygon in plan, enclosed by a wall and a moat, with a three-storey residential tower. In 1338 the stronghold was seized by the troops of the Bohemian King John of Luxembourg; in 1342 it returned to the bishops.

After the Oleśnica line of the Piasts died out, Milicz passed to the Kurzbach family in 1494, and from 1590 it belonged to the Maltzans. In 1536 the castle was ravaged by fire; it was rebuilt with a new wing containing a great hall. In the 18th century the castle buildings housed a cotton-spinning mill. Another fire in 1797 coincided with the construction of the new Maltzan palace nearby, and in the mid-19th century the castle was abandoned.

Today the ruins stand in the park next to the palace (now a forestry technical school). Surviving are fragments of the brick walls of the 14th-century residential tower, remains of later buildings and traces of the moat. The monument was entered in the heritage register in 1961. Do not climb on the walls – the ruin has not been restored.