Among them were professors of the University of Kraków: Maciej of Kobylin, who was a philosopher and one of the teachers of Nicolaus Copernicus, Piotr of Kobylin, author of the first known Polish textbook, and Andrzej Glaber [pl], translator of the first anatomical book published in the Polish language.

[3][5] Famous fairs were held in Kobylin during the reign of King Sigismund II Augustus.

[3] One of the greatest Polish Baroque poets Samuel Twardowski was buried in the Bernardine church.

Following the successful Greater Poland uprising of 1806, it was regained by Poles and included in the short-lived Duchy of Warsaw, in 1815 it was re-annexed by Prussia.

The Germans expelled the Polish population to the General Government in the more eastern part of occupied Poland or imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps.