This handsome triangular plot was once the official main market 'square' of the Free City of Podgórze, until the independent city was absorbed into Kraków in 1915. The square was laid out in the 18th century at the foot of Lasota Hill, where roads leading to Kraków, Kalwaria, and Wieliczka intersected. Once a lively marketplace frequented by merchants from regional cities and more distant parts of Austria-Hungary, the Rynek had to say goodbye to commerce in 1917 when the turning loop of a new tram line took up most of the trading space (oh modernity). Though the loop was eventually moved (traces of it can still be seen), the markets never resumed, and today the quiet square is mostly lined with residential buildings, save for the iconic neo-Gothic St. Joseph’s Church dominating the south end, and two former Town Halls - the 'Under the White Eagle' manor at no. 14 (early 19th century to 1854), and the younger, stately building at no. 1 (1854-1915, now the Kraków City Council Department of Architecture). It was beside the latter that a main gate into the Jewish Ghetto stood on ul. Limanowskiego during WWII. Also of note is the small 18th-century manor house 'Under the Black Eagle' (no. 13), a former inn where Chopin once spent a night.