Lower Silesian Voivodeship (Polish: województwo dolnośląskie, [vɔjɛˈvut͡stfɔ dɔlnɔˈɕlɔ̃skjɛ] ) in southwestern Poland, is one of the 16 voivodeships (provinces) into which Poland is divided. It covers an area of 19,946 square kilometres (7,701 sq mi) and as of 2019 has a total population of 2,899,986.
It is one of the wealthiest provinces in Poland, as natural resources such as copper, brown coal and rock materials are widely present.
Wałbrzych County (Polish: powiat wałbrzyski; German: Waldenburg) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Lower Silesian Voivodeship, south-western Poland. It was created on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed in 1998. The county covers an area of 514.2 square kilometres (198.5 sq mi). Its administrative seat is the city of Wałbrzych, which is located outside of the county, and it also contains the towns of Boguszów-Gorce, Głuszyca, Szczawno-Zdrój, Jedlina-Zdrój and Mieroszów.
When the county came into being in 1999, the city of Wałbrzych was not part of its territory, although it served as the county seat. As of 2003 the city county (powiat grodzki) of Wałbrzych was incorporated into Wałbrzych County. Wałbrzych became again a separate city county starting from 1 January 2013 and is no longer part of the Wałbrzych County (powiat wałbrzyski).
Sokołowsko [sɔkɔˈwɔfskɔ] is a village and traditional climatic health resort in Gmina Mieroszów, within Wałbrzych County, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, in south-western Poland.
The Sudetes (/suːˈdiːtiːz/ soo-DEE-teez), also known as the Sudeten Mountains or Sudetic Mountains, is a geomorphological subprovince of the Bohemian Massif province in Central Europe, shared by the Czech Republic, Poland and Germany. They consist mainly of mountain ranges and are the highest part of the Bohemian Massif. They stretch from the Saxon capital of Dresden in the northwest across to the region of Lower Silesia in Poland and to the city of Ostrava in the Czech Republic in the east. Geographically the Sudetes are a Mittelgebirge with some characteristics typical of high mountains. Its plateaus and subtle summit relief makes the Sudetes more akin to mountains of Northern Europe than to the Alps.
In the east of the Sudetes, the Moravian Gate and Ostrava Basin separates from the Carpathian Mountains. The Sudetes' highest mountain is Sněžka (Polish: Śnieżka) at 1,603 m (5,259 ft), which is also the highest mountain of the Czech Republic, Bohemia, Silesia, and Lower Silesian Voivodeship. It lies in the Giant Mountains on the border between the Czech Republic and Poland. Praděd (1,491 m/4,893 ft) in the Hrubý Jeseník mountains is the highest mountain of Moravia. Lusatia's highest point (1,072 m/3,517 ft) lies on Smrk mountain in the Jizera Mountains, and the Sudetes' highest mountain in Germany, which is also the country's highest mountain east of the river Elbe, is Lausche (793 m/2,600 ft) in the Lusatian Mountains. The most notable rivers rising in the Sudetes are the Elbe, Oder, Spree, Morava, Bóbr, Lusatian Neisse, Eastern Neisse, Jizera and Kwisa. The highest parts of the Sudetes are protected by national parks; Karkonosze and Stołowe (Table) in Poland and Krkonoše in the Czech Republic.
Wrocław (Polish: [ˈvrɔt͡swaf] ; German: Breslau [ˈbʁɛslaʊ] ; also known by other names) is a city in southwestern Poland, and the capital of the Lower Silesian Voivodeship. It is the largest city and historical capital of the region of Silesia. It lies on the banks of the Oder River in the Silesian Lowlands of Central Europe, roughly 40 kilometres (25 mi) to the north of the Sudetic Mountains. In 2023, the official population of Wrocław was 674,132, making it the third-largest city in Poland. The population of the Wrocław metropolitan area is around 1.25 million.
Wrocław is the historical capital of Silesia and Lower Silesia. The history of the city dates back over 1,000 years; throughout history it has been part of, chronologically: the Duchy of Poland, the Kingdom of Poland, the Duchy of Silesia, the Kingdom of Bohemia, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Habsburg monarchy of Austria, the Kingdom of Prussia and Germany, until it became again part of Poland in 1945 immediately after World War II.
Opole Voivodeship (Polish: województwo opolskie [vɔjɛˈvut͡stfɔ ɔˈpɔlskʲɛ] , Silesian: wojewodstwo Ôpole), is the smallest and least populated voivodeship (province) of Poland. The province's name derives from that of the region's capital and largest city, Opole. It is part of Silesia. A relatively large German minority lives in the voivodeship, and the German language is co-official in 28 communes.
Opole Voivodeship is bordered by Lower Silesian Voivodeship to the west, Greater Poland and Łódź Voivodeships to the north, Silesian Voivodeship to the east, and the Czech Republic (Olomouc Region and Moravian-Silesian Region) to the south.
Lusatia (/luːˈseɪʃiə, -ʃə/; German: Lausitz [ˈlaʊzɪts] ; Polish: Łużyce [wuˈʐɨt͡sɛ] ; Upper Sorbian: Łužica [ˈwuʒitsa]; Lower Sorbian: Łužyca [ˈwuʒɨtsa]; Czech: Lužice [ˈluʒɪt͡sɛ]), otherwise known as Sorbia, is a region in Central Europe, territorially split between Germany and Poland. Lusatia stretches from the Bóbr and Kwisa rivers in the east to the Pulsnitz and Black Elster rivers in the west, and is located within the German states of Saxony and Brandenburg and the Polish voivodeships of Lower Silesia and Lubusz. Major rivers of Lusatia are the Spree and the Lusatian Neisse, which defines the border between Germany and Poland. The Lusatian Mountains of the Western Sudetes separate Lusatia from Bohemia (Czech Republic) in the south. Lusatia is traditionally divided into Upper Lusatia, the hilly southern part, and Lower Lusatia, the flat northern part.
The areas east and west along the Spree in the German part of Lusatia are home to the Slavic Sorbs, one of Germany’s four officially recognized indigenous ethnic minorities. The Upper Sorbs inhabit Saxon Upper Lusatia, and the Lower Sorbs Brandenburgian Lower Lusatia. Upper and Lower Sorbian are spoken in the German parts of Upper and Lower Lusatia respectively, and the signage there is mostly bilingual.
Gmina Mieroszów is an urban-rural gmina (administrative district) in Wałbrzych County, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, in south-western Poland. Its seat is the town of Mieroszów, which lies approximately 15 kilometres (9 mi) south-west of Wałbrzych, and 79 kilometres (49 mi) south-west of the regional capital Wrocław.
The gmina covers an area of 76.17 square kilometres (29.4 sq mi), and as of 2019 its total population is 6,808.