[1] In other languages the town is referred to as: Yiddish: קורשאַן Kurshon; German: Kurschenen; Polish: Kurszany; Latvian: Kuršēni.

In 1564, King and Grand Duke Sigismund II Augustus gave Kuršėnai with 162 valakas of land, on the advice of the Samogitian Elder Jonas Chodkevičius, to the Despot-Zenavičiai family.

[2] Under George Despot-Zenevičius, the Castellan of Polotsk, the town began to expand in the manor lands on the other side of the Venta River.

In 1631, by a decree of the King Sigismund III Vasa, the manor of Kuršėnai was given to George Gruževskis (1591-1651) as a perpetual right for his merits in the Livonian War.

Having brought in the artist J. Rilke with the apprentice team, he built a new (current) manor house and a chapel and renovated other buildings in 1811.

Kuršėnai Manor has the most valuable heritage of wooden manorial architecture in Šiauliai District.

At the end of July Nazis and a group of Lithuanian nationalists (white armbanders) together with police seized approximately 150 to 168 Jewish men and murdered them in a mass execution in a nearby forest, about three kilometers from the city.

Currently Agrokoncerno grupė agricultural company established a Grain Processing Plant in the territory of the former sugar factory.

Since clay deposits that were ideal for making fine ceramics were discovered near Kuršėnai, pottery has long been thriving in the city.

Kuršėnų vyniotinis, a type of sweet rolled pastry with cheese curd filling, was named after the city.

The dessert was created by Eugenija Dragūnienė, a gulag survivor who opened a local confectionery store after her release.