Plungė | |
|---|---|
City | |
 Aerial view of Plungė  Clock tower of the Plungė Library  Liberty Boulevard with theIndependence Monument  Façade of thePlungė Manor and fountain | |
 Flag  Coat of arms | |
  Plungė Location of Plungė | |
| Coordinates:55°55′N21°51′E / 55.917°N 21.850°E /55.917; 21.850 | |
| Country |  Lithuania |
| Ethnographic region | Samogitia |
| County | Telšiai County |
| Municipality | Plungė district municipality |
| Eldership | Plungė town eldership |
| Capital of | Plungė district municipality Plungė town eldership Plungė rural eldership |
| First mentioned | 1567 |
| Grantedcity rights | 1792 |
| Population (2022) | |
• Total | 17,252 |
| Demonym(s) | Plungian(s) (English), plungiečiai orplungiškiai (Lithuanian) |
| Time zone | UTC+2 (EET) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC+3 (EEST) |
| Website | plunge |
Plungė (pronunciationⓘ;Samogitian:Plongė;Polish:Płungiany) is a city inLithuania with 17,252 inhabitants.[1] Plunge is the capital of thePlungė District Municipality which has 33,251 inhabitants (2022).[1][2] Two parts of the city are separated by the Babrungas River and two bridges are built over it.[1]
Plungė is known forPlungė Manor and its park, where the Samogitian Art Museum is located.[1] In the Oginskiai manor park stands thePerkūnas oaknatural monument.[1] TheLourdes grotto of Plungė was created in 1905 and attracts visitors.[1] In the center of Plungė stands a monument for the 10th anniversary of regaining theindependence of Lithuania and a sculpture ofSaint Florian built by theLithuanian book carrier Kazys Barzdys.[1]
The city has acrab stick factory which exports to many countries in Europe.[3]
It is thought that the territory in which Plungė is situated was inhabited in 5th–1st centuries BC. After theTreaty of Melno, county seats were established in the forests ofSamogitia. From the 14th century to the middle of the 16th century, Plungė was part of theGandingadistrict as an ordinary settlement. Later, the population of Plungė started to grow faster and surpassed the population of Gandinga. In 1567 Plungė was first mentioned as a town. It was located in theDuchy of Samogitia in theGrand Duchy of Lithuania within thePolish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
On January 13, 1792, Plungė was grantedMagdeburg rights. From 1806 to 1873 Plungė belonged toPlaton Zubov, and later – to theOgiński family, who built apalace here in 1879.
During the interwar period a gymnasium was established in 1925, and a railway branch-line was built in 1932. In 1933, the current Catholic Church was consecrated. Since the private hospital was founded in 1939, maternity and surgical sections started operations in the city.Lithuanian Jews were active in the town's government and comprised around half of Plungė's inhabitants leading up toThe Holocaust in Lithuania.
During the 1941June Uprising in Lithuania and the German invasion as part ofOperation Barbarossa, Plungė was captured by German forces on 25 June 1941.[4] Lithuanian nationalists, led byJonas Noreika,[5][6] seized control and formed a town administration and police force. German forces killed 60 young Jewish men, accused by the Lithuanians of being a rear guard for the Red Army, shortly after the town's capture. On 26 June 1941, the day after the Germans' arrival in Plungė, Lithuanian forces moved the town's Jews into a makeshiftghetto, while carrying out beatings, torture, murders and forcing Jews to perform heavy labor. On 13 or 15 July in thePlungė massacre, the Lithuanian nationalists transported Jewish men, women and children to ditches near the village of Kausenai where they were shot. Of the 1,700 Jews living in Plungė in 1939, very few survived and often those who were victims of theSoviet deportations from Lithuania prior to the Holocaust.[4] Remembrance sites for the events of 1941 exist in and around the town.[7][8][9] The Jewish holocaust survivor and sculptorJacob Bunka was one of the town's few Jews to survive the war.
During theinterwar period years of the independence of Lithuania Plungė's economic was based on the factory of fibre flax and cottonKučiskis – Pabedinskiai and also on the activities of Jewish businessmen and agricultural products made by Samogitian farmers.
After World War II and the Soviet occupation, Plungė started to grow rapidly – the city had 7,400 inhabitants in 1950, and by 1990 it had around 23,300 inhabitants. During the years of Soviet occupation, Lithuanians became the majority of the city's inhabitants. According to the Government's Resolution of 1963, Plungė was to become a regional centre with a strong industry. However, these plans didn't come to fruition as it became obvious that the city did not have enough water resources, although some companies were established in Plungė. However, most of these companies bankrupted after the independence of Lithuania was announced.[10]
The coat of arms of Plungė was affirmed by the decree of the President on June 6, 1997.[11] In 2009 Plungė was electedLithuanian Capital of Culture.[12] Nowadays Plungė is the sixteenth largest city ofLithuania having 22,287 inhabitants.
The origin of the namePlungė is not clear. The most likely theory is that its name comes from the riverPaplunga which flowed through the city.[13]
The city's name is Płungiany in Polish, Plongė in Samogitian, and Plungyan (פלונגיאן) in Yiddish. It was also known as Плунгяны (Plungyany) in Russian in the past.[14]
Highways near the city are:
Plungė has a railway station. Trains going by the routeVilnius–Klaipėda andRadviliškis–Klaipėda stop there.
Football club "FK Babrungas Plungė" plays inLithuanian Football Federation's 2 League's Western Zone. The team plays in the Central Stadium of Plungė.
Basketball club "Olimpas Plungė" plays inNational Basketball League. The team was established in 1989. In 1997, BC Olimpas played in theLithuanian Basketball League finals, where they lost toBC Žalgiris Kaunas. Afterwards, the team did not appear in national competitions until 2011. Olimpas Plungė started to play inRegional Basketball League and won gold medals in 2012 and qualified to the National Basketball League. In 2012-2013 National Basketball League's regular season team finished 3rd amongst 18 teams, however it lost the quarter-finals series 2-0 toBC Žalgiris Kaunas 2.[15] Team plays in "SS Žemaitijos Suvenyras" arena, which has a capacity of 200 people.
Bjerkreim, Norway
Boxholm, Sweden
Bruntál, Czech Republic
Golub-Dobrzyń, Poland
Konotop, Ukraine[17]
Kvareli, Georgia
Menden, Germany
Tukums, Latvia
Viljandi County, EstoniaFormer twin towns (until 2022):[16]
Krasnogorsky District, Russia
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