Wleń w is a town in Lwówek Śląski County

Lwówek Slaski County

Lwówek Śląski County is a unit of territorial administration and local government in Lower Silesian Voivodeship, south-western Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed in 1998. The county covers an area of...

, Lower Silesian Voivodeship

Lower Silesian Voivodeship

Lower Silesian Voivodeship, or Lower Silesia Province , is one of the 16 voivodeships into which Poland is currently divided. It lies in southwestern Poland...

, in south-western Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

. It is located on the Bóbr

Bóbr

Bóbr is a river which runs through the north of the Czech Republic and the southwest of Poland, a left tributary of the Oder River, with a length of and a basin area of .The Bóbr originates in the Rýchory mountains in the southeast of the Karkonosze range, where the source is...

 river in the historic Lower Silesia

Lower Silesia

Lower Silesia ; is the northwestern part of the historical and geographical region of Silesia; Upper Silesia is to the southeast.Throughout its history Lower Silesia has been under the control of the medieval Kingdom of Poland, the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy from 1526...

n region, approximately 13 kilometres (8 mi) south-east of Lwówek Śląski

Lwówek Slaski

Lwówek Śląski is a town in the Lower Silesian Voivodeship in Poland. Situated on the Bóbr River, Lwówek Śląski is about 30 km NNW of Jelenia Góra and has a population of about 10,300 inhabitants...

, and 97 kilometres (60 mi) west of the regional capital Wrocław.

The town is the seat of the administrative district (gmina

Gmina

The gmina is the principal unit of administrative division of Poland at its lowest uniform level. It is often translated as "commune" or "municipality." As of 2010 there were 2,479 gminas throughout the country...

) called Gmina Wleń

Gmina Wlen

Gmina Wleń is an urban-rural gmina in Lwówek Śląski County, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, in south-western Poland. Its seat is the town of Wleń, which lies approximately south-east of Lwówek Śląski, and west of the regional capital Wrocław.The gmina covers an area of , and as of 2006 its total...

. As of 2006, it has a population of 1,884.

Wleń was established in 1214 by the Silesian

Duchy of Silesia

The Duchy of Silesia with its capital at Wrocław was a medieval duchy located in the historic Silesian region of Poland. Soon after it was formed under the Piast dynasty in 1138, it fragmented into various Duchies of Silesia. In 1327 the remaining Duchy of Wrocław as well as most other duchies...

 duke Henry I the Bearded

Henry I the Bearded

Henry I the Bearded , of the Silesian line of the Piast dynasty, was Duke of Silesia at Wrocław from 1201 and Duke of Kraków and thus High Duke of all Poland - internally divided - from 1232 until his death.-Heir of Wroclaw:...

 and his wife Hedwig of Andechs

Hedwig of Andechs

Saint Hedwig of Silesia , also Saint Hedwig of Andechs from the comital House of Andechs was Duchess of Silesia from 1201 and of Greater Poland from 1231 as well as High Duchess consort of Poland from 1232 until 1238.-Life:...

. The ruins of Łupki (Lehnhaus) Castle lie very close to the town's center, it served to protect the nearby borders with Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

 and Upper Lusatia

Upper Lusatia

Upper Lusatia is a region a biggest part of which belongs to Saxony, a small eastern part belongs to Poland, the northern part to Brandenburg. In Saxony, Upper Lusatia comprises roughly the districts of Bautzen and Görlitz , in Brandenburg the southern part of district Oberspreewald-Lausitz...

 and was devastated during the Thirty Years' War

Thirty Years' War

The Thirty Years' War was fought primarily in what is now Germany, and at various points involved most countries in Europe. It was one of the most destructive conflicts in European history....

. A Baroque

Baroque architecture

Baroque architecture is a term used to describe the building style of the Baroque era, begun in late sixteenth century Italy, that took the Roman vocabulary of Renaissance architecture and used it in a new rhetorical and theatrical fashion, often to express the triumph of the Catholic Church and...

 palace was rebuilt underneath it, last held by the Haugwitz

Haugwitz

Haugwitz is a Meissen-origin nobility and refers to:* Georg von Haugwitz* Johann IX. von Haugwitz* August Adolph von Haugwitz* Friedrich Wilhelm Graf von Haugwitz , Austrian statesman...

noble family.

Before it recently crumbled, the Łupki castle's only remaining tower was visible from the town, and the picture shows the former view of Wleń from the top of the tower.