Zgorzelec is located on the Lusatian Neisse river, on the Polish-German border adjoining the German town of Görlitz, of which it constituted the eastern part up to 1945.

Zgorzelec/Görlitz was first mentioned in a document from the King of Germany, and later Holy Roman Emperor, Henry IV in 1071 as a small village named Goreliz in the region of Upper Lusatia.

In the following centuries, from 1346, it was a wealthy member of the Six-City League of Upper Lusatia, consisting of the six Lusatian cities Bautzen, Görlitz, Kamenz, Lubań, Löbau and Zittau.

[6] In 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars, the Congress of Vienna awarded Görlitz to the Kingdom of Prussia and subsequently the city became part of the German Empire in 1871.

During World War I, the Germans operated a prisoner-of-war camp in present-day Zgorzelec, in which initially Russian, French and British POWs were held, and then from 1916 to 1919 around 6,500 Greek soldiers were interned.

[11] During the war also POWs of various other nationalities were held in the camp, including the Czechs, Lithuanians, Jews, French, Belgians, Russians, Italians, Britons, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Yugoslavs, Slovaks, Americans.

[16] On 2 June 1945, Polish military closed the bridge in Görlitz to block Germans from returning to their homes in Silesia.

Early in the morning on 21 June, the Polish ordered the Germans to leave their homes on the eastern part of Görlitz.

[16] The Potsdam Conference confirmed Polish rule and henceforth, the Oder-Neisse line as the Polish-East German border divided Görlitz (lying on the Lusatian Neisse) between the two countries.

Zgorzelec had a difficult start as a Polish town because almost all of the infrastructure facilities were located in the part remaining German.

Two of the numerous bridges over the Neisse river that had been blown up by retreating German forces in World War II have been rebuilt, reconnecting the two towns with one bus line.

It was hoped that the jury would be convinced by the concept of Polish-German cooperation, but the award fell to Essen, with Görlitz/Zgorzelec in second place.