Podgórze is a district of
Kraków,
Poland, situated on the right (southern) bank of the
Vistula River, at the foot of Lasota Hill. The district was subdivided in 1990 into six new districts, see present-day
districts of Kraków for more details. The name Podgórze roughly translates as
the base of a hill. Initially a small settlement, in the years following the
First Partition of Poland the town's development was promoted by the
Austria-Hungary Emperor Joseph II who in 1784 granted it the city status, as the Royal Free City of Podgórze. In the following years it was a self-governing administrative unit. After the
Third Partition of Poland in 1795 and the takeover of the entire city by the Empire, Podgórze lost it political role of an independent suburb across the river from the
Old Town.