Wapno is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

Wągrowiec County __NOTOC__ Wągrowiec County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Greater Poland Voivodeship, west-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passe ...

, in the

Greater Poland Voivodeship Greater Poland Voivodeship ( ) is a Voivodeships of Poland, voivodeship, or province, in west-central Poland. The province is named after the region called Greater Poland (''Wielkopolska'' ). The modern province includes most of this historic re ...

, close to the border with

Żnin County __NOTOC__ Żnin County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, north-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms pass ...

. ''Wapno'' is Polish for

lime Lime most commonly refers to: * Lime (fruit), a green citrus fruit * Lime (material), inorganic materials containing calcium, usually calcium oxide or calcium hydroxide * Lime (color), a color between yellow and green Lime may also refer to: Bo ...

and reflects the large

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate Hydrate, dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, drywall and blackboard or sidewalk ...

deposits in the area, which can be processed to produce lime. There are also large deposits of

rock salt Halite ( ), commonly known as rock salt, is a type of salt, the mineral (natural) form of sodium chloride ( Na Cl). Halite forms isometric crystals. The mineral is typically colorless or white, but may also be light blue, dark blue, purple, pi ...

that were mined extensively beginning in the nineteenth century. Wapno lies in the so-called Gniezno Lake District, and is close to several lakes. The village is north of the town of

Wągrowiec Wągrowiec () is a town in west-central Poland, from both Poznań and Bydgoszcz. Since the 18th century it has been the seat of a powiat. Administratively it is attached to the Greater Poland Voivodeship. The town is situated in the middle of th ...

Municipal organization

The present municipality (''

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' ) is the basic unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,479 gminy throughout the country, encompassing over 43,000 villages. 940 gminy include cities and tow ...

'') of Wapno includes the following

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

s in addition to the central village of Wapno: * Aleksandrowo * Graboszewo * Komasin * Podolin * Rusiec * Srebrna Góra * Stołężyn

History

The town is first mentioned in 1299, in an entry in the Codex Diplomaticus Majoris Poloniae, which records the appearance of one

Count Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Pine, L. G. ''Titles: How the King Became His Majesty''. New York: ...

Adam of Wapno at a trial in the court of one Count Rozal, concerning the rights of the

Cistercian The Cistercians (), officially the Order of Cistercians (, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint Benedict, as well as the contri ...

monastery in

Łękno Łękno,''Szczecin stary i nowy'' by T. Białecki and L. Turek-Kwiatkowska, 1991, Szczecińskie Towarzystwo Kultury, Szczecin, page 155 officially known as Łekno,Rozporządzenie Ministra Administracji i Cyfryzacji z dnia 13 grudnia 2012 r. w spra ...

''vis-a-vis'' the village of Dębogóra. At that time, Wapno was part of the

Kuyavia Kuyavia (; ), also referred to as Cuyavia, is a historical region in north-central Poland, situated on the left bank of Vistula, as well as east from Noteć River and Lake Gopło. It is divided into three traditional parts: north-western (with th ...

n principality headed by

Duke Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of Royal family, royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and above sovereign princes. As royalty or nobi ...

Władyslaw I Łokietek ( Vladislaus the Short), who became the second king of Poland upon his election in 1330. Under Prussian rule, Wapno was part of

South Prussia South Prussia (; ) was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1793 to 1807 created out of territory annexed in the Second Partition of Poland. History South Prussia was created out of territory annexed in the Second Partition of Poland and i ...

(1793–1807) and again of the Bromberg Region (1815–1919) in the

Province of Posen The Province of Posen (; ) was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1848 to 1920, occupying most of the historical Greater Poland. The province was established following the Greater Poland Uprising (1848), Poznań Uprisi ...

(''Prowincja Poznańska''), interrupted only by it forming part of the

Duchy of Warsaw The Duchy of Warsaw (; ; ), also known as the Grand Duchy of Warsaw and Napoleonic Poland, was a First French Empire, French client state established by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1807, during the Napoleonic Wars. It initially comprised the ethnical ...

. After World War I, it became part of the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 6 October 1939. The state was established in the final stage of World War I ...

. During the

Invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...

, the elementary school in Wapno served as the headquarters of the Polish 26th Infantry Division, a component of the

Intervention Corps The Intervention Corps (Polish language: ''Korpus Interwencyjny'') was a tactical unit of the Polish Armed Forces of the Second Polish Republic. It did not exist in the peacetime organization of the Polish Army, and was created for specific purposes ...

. Under the German

Reichsgau Wartheland The Reichsgau Wartheland (initially Reichsgau Posen, also Warthegau) was a Nazi Germany, Nazi German ''Reichsgau'' formed from parts of Second Polish Republic, Polish territory Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, annexed in 1939 during World War ...

occupation (1939–1945), it was briefly (1944–1945) renamed ''Salzhof'' — "Saltyard." In 1945, Wapno once again became part of Poland. Since mediaeval times, Wapno has been known for the quality of its gypsum, which was used in the construction of the cathedrals at

Gniezno Gniezno (; ; ) is a city in central-western Poland, about east of Poznań. Its population in 2021 was 66,769, making it the sixth-largest city in the Greater Poland Voivodeship. The city is the administrative seat of Gniezno County (''powiat'') ...

and

Poznań Poznań ( ) is a city on the Warta, River Warta in west Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business center and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John's ...

. There are also large salt deposits, consisting of

salt dome A salt dome is a type of structural dome formed when salt (or other evaporite minerals) intrudes into overlying rocks in a process known as diapirism. Salt domes can have unique surface and subsurface structures, and they can be discovered us ...

s intruding through the gypsum layer in

diapir A diapir (; , ) is a type of intrusion in which a more mobile and ductilely deformable material is forced into brittle overlying rocks. Depending on the tectonic environment, diapirs can range from idealized mushroom-shaped Rayleigh–Taylor ...

ism. The salt and gypsum deposits under Wapno were subject to increasingly intensive extraction from 1828 onward, when landowner Florian Wilkoński began exploratory

surface mining Surface mining, including strip mining, open-pit mining and mountaintop removal mining, is a broad category of mining in which soil and rock overlying the mineral deposit (the overburden) are removed, in contrast to underground mining, in whic ...

. Output increased from 200 tonnes per year at the beginning of modern mining, to over 5,000 tonnes per year in 1850, with the pace accelerating after the introduction of steam power in 1835. Output began increasing again in the 1950s, accompanied by the construction of housing for up to 3,000 workers. Gypsum was processed on site, whereas beginning in 1887, after the construction of a line connecting Wapno and Nakło to

, salt was transported by rail to Nakło for processing. On September 28, 1977, the Tadeusz Koscziusko saltmine underneath the town center collapsed, forcing the evacuation of around 1,000 residents. Wapno has never recovered economically from the loss of mining jobs after the accident, which has never been fully explained.A 2014 study found that a likely cause of the accident was exploitation of resources at the tenth (and lowest) level of the mine, along with preparatory work at the eighth and ninth levels, which study authors called a "mistake," as

room and pillar mining Room and pillar or pillar and stall is a variant of breast stoping. It is a mining system in which the mined material is extracted across a horizontal plane, creating horizontal arrays of rooms and pillars. To do this, "rooms" of ore are dug out w ...

of rock salt tends to lead to the accumulation of

fracture Fracture is the appearance of a crack or complete separation of an object or material into two or more pieces under the action of stress (mechanics), stress. The fracture of a solid usually occurs due to the development of certain displacemen ...

fissure A fissure is a long, narrow crack opening along the surface of Earth. The term is derived from the Latin word , which means 'cleft' or 'crack'. Fissures emerge in Earth's crust, on ice sheets and glaciers, and on volcanoes. Ground fissure A ...

s, and leaching of liquified sand and soil that lead to

subsidence Subsidence is a general term for downward vertical movement of the Earth's surface, which can be caused by both natural processes and human activities. Subsidence involves little or no horizontal movement, which distinguishes it from slope mov ...

References

External links

Official site (in Polish, includes photos)
{{Gmina Wapno Villages in Wągrowiec County