Royal city in Poland in the context of "Crown Tribunal"

Płock (pronounced [pwɔt͡sk] ), officially the Ducal Capital City of Płock, is a city in central Poland, on the Vistula river, in the Masovian Voivodeship. According to the data provided by GUS on 31 December 2021, there were 116,962 inhabitants in the city.

Płock is a seat of the county (powiat) in the west of the Masovian Voivodeship. From 1079 to 1138 it was the capital of Poland. The Cathedral Hill (Wzgórze Tumskie), along with Płock Castle and the Catholic Cathedral containing the sarcophagi of some Polish monarchs, is listed as a Historic Monument of Poland. It was the main city and administrative center of Mazovia in the Middle Ages before the rise of Warsaw, and later it remained a royal city of Poland. It is the cultural, academic, scientific, administrative and transportation center of the west and north Masovian region. Płock is the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Płock, one of the oldest dioceses in the country, founded in the 11th century, and it is also the global headquarters for the Mariavite Church. Poland's oldest school and largest oil refinery are located in Płock.

Sandomierz (pronounced: [sanˈdɔmjɛʂ] ; Latin: Sandomiria, Yiddish: צויזמר, צוזמיר, romanized: Tsouzmer, Tsoyzmer) is a historic town in south-eastern Poland with 23,863 inhabitants (as of 2017), situated on the Vistula River near its confluence with the San, in the Sandomierz Basin. It has been part of Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship (Holy Cross Province) since its transfer from the Tarnobrzeg Voivodeship in 1999. It is the capital of Sandomierz County. Sandomierz is known for its preserved Old Town, a major cultural and tourist attraction which the President of Poland declared a National Monument of Poland in 2017.

In the past, Sandomierz was one of the most important urban centers not only of Lesser Poland, but also of the whole country. It was a royal city of the Polish Crown and functioned as a regional administrative centre from the High Middle Ages to the 19th century.

Świecie (Polish: [ˈɕfjɛt͡ɕɛ] ; German: Schwetz) is a town in northern Poland with 24,841 inhabitants (2023), capital of Świecie County in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship. It is located within the ethnocultural region of Kociewie in the historic region of Pomerania.

Founded in the Middle Ages, Świecie is a former royal town of Poland, which prospered as a trade center due to its location at the intersection of important trade routes. The town features heritage sites in a variety of styles, including Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Neo-Renaissance and Neo-Gothic, a preserved market square, and the region's sole Museum of Firefighting. Świecie is home to one of the oldest psychiatric hospitals in Poland.

Kalisz (Polish: [ˈkaliʂ] ) is a city in central Poland, and the second-largest city in the Greater Poland Voivodeship, with 97,905 residents (December 2021). It is the capital city of the Kalisz Region. Situated on the Prosna river in the southeastern part of Greater Poland, the city forms a conurbation with the nearby towns of Ostrów Wielkopolski and Nowe Skalmierzyce.

Kalisz is one of the oldest cities in Poland and one of the two traditional capitals of Greater Poland (alongside Poznań). It has served as an important regional center in Poland since the Middle Ages as a provincial capital and notable royal city. It is one of the historical burial sites of medieval Polish monarchs and dukes of the Piast dynasty and the site of a number of significant events in Polish history as well as several battles. Since the 19th century it has been the center of an industrial district. It is the cultural, scientific, educational and administrative center of the eastern and southern Greater Poland region, and the seat of Roman Catholic Diocese of Kalisz.

Rawa Mazowiecka [ˈrava mazɔˈvʲɛt͡ska] is a town in central Poland, with 16,090 inhabitants (2022). It lies in the Łódź Voivodeship and is the capital of the Rawa County.

Rawa is a former medieval ducal seat of the Piast dynasty and an early modern provincial capital and royal city of Poland. From 1562 the city hosted the Rawa Treasury for the Polish army. It prospered thanks to its location on important trade routes, then in the 19th century it became a center of cloth manufacturing, and currently it is a center of the food and light industries. The town features heritage sites in a variety of styles, including Gothic, Baroque and Neoclassical and a regional museum.

Opoczno ([ɔˈpɔt͡ʂnɔ] ) is a town in south-central Poland, seat of Opoczno County in the Łódź Voivodeship.

Founded in the Middle Ages, Opoczno is a former royal town of Poland, which used to be one of the most important urban centers of northwestern Lesser Poland. It prospered as a trade center due to its location at the intersection of important trade routes. Currently, Opoczno is an important road and rail junction; its patron saint is Saint Cecilia, and the town is famous across Poland for its folklore and ceramics manufacturing.

Piotrków Trybunalski ([ˈpʲɔtrkuf trɨbuˈnalskʲi] ; also known by alternative names), often simplified to Piotrków, is a city in central Poland with 71,252 inhabitants (2021). It is the capital of Piotrków County and the second-largest city in the Łódź Voivodeship.

Founded in the late Middle Ages, Piotrków was once a royal city and holds an important place in Polish history; the first parliament sitting was held here in the 15th century. It then became the seat of a Crown Tribunal, the highest court of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The city also hosted one of Poland's oldest Jewish communities, which was entirely destroyed by the Holocaust. The old town in Piotrków features many historical and architectural monuments, including tenements, churches, synagogues and the medieval Royal Castle.

Polish landed gentry (Polish: ziemiaństwo, ziemianie, singular: zemianin, from ziemia, "land") was a social group or class of hereditary landowners who held manorial estates. Historically, ziemianie consisted of hereditary nobles (szlachta) and landed commoners (kmiecie; Latin: cmethones). The Statutes of Piotrków (1496) restricted the right to hold manorial lordships to hereditary nobility. The non-nobles thus had to either sell their estates to the lords or seek a formal ennoblement for themselves (not an easy task), or had their property taken away. A rare exception was the burgesses of certain specially privileged "ennobled" royal cities who were titled "nobilis" and were allowed to buy and inherit manorial estates and exercise their privileges (such as jurisdiction over their subjects) and monopolies (over distilleries, hunting grounds, etc.). Therefore, in the szlachta-dominated Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth there was almost no landed gentry in the English meaning of the term, i.e. commoners who owned landed estates. (However, this is merely a matter of semantics; the gentry of England were roughly equivalent to lower nobility of other countries.) With the Partitions these restrictions were loosened and finally any commoner could buy or inherit land. This made the 20th-century Polish landed gentry consist mostly of hereditary nobles, but also of others.

They were the lesser members of the szlachta, contrasting with the much smaller but more powerful group of "magnate" families (sing. magnat, plural magnaci in Polish), see "Magnates of Poland and Lithuania". Compared to the situation in England and some other parts of Europe, these two parts of the overall "nobility" to a large extent operated as different classes, and were often in conflict. After the Partitions of Poland, at least in the stereotypes of 19th-century nationalist lore, the magnates often made themselves at home in the capitals and courts of the partitioning powers, while the gentry remained on their estates, keeping the national culture alive (for a preserved, non-magnate example, see Dąbrowski Manor in Michałowice).