Czarnków is a town in Poland in Czarnków-Trzcianka County in Greater Poland Voivodeship. As of December 2021, the town has 10,279 inhabitants. In the early 12th century, it was a stronghold of pagan Pomeranians, ruled by local Pomeranian ruler Gniewomir. It was reconquered by Polish Duke Bolesław III Wrymouth in 1108, and shortly after it was noted for the first time in the early 12th century Gesta principum Polonorum by Gallus Anonymus, the oldest Polish chronicle. Czarnków developed at the intersection of trade routes connecting Poznań with Pomerania and Wieleń with Nakło nad Notecią. From 1244 until 1407 Czarnków was the seat of a castellany.
In the late 13th century Polish monarch Władysław I Łokietek granted Czarnków to the Polish noble family of Nałęcz, which then changed its name to Czarnkowski after the town. Afterwards it was divided by the new German-Polish border. The western part of the town remained within Weimar Germany and was renamed Deutsch Czarnikau in 1920 and Scharnikau in 1937, while Polish Czarnków became a county seat within the Poznań Voivodeship.
During the German occupation (World War II), in November 1939, the Germans murdered many inhabitants of Czarnków during large massacres of Poles carried out in Mędzisko as part of the Intelligenzaktion. Six local Polish police officers, a local school teacher, a local tax inspector, and six graduates from the local teachers' college were murdered by the Russians in the Katyn massacre in 1940. In August 1944, the Germans carried out mass arrests of local members of the Home Army, the leading Polish underground resistance organization. Czarnków was eventually liberated in January 1945,
From 1975 to 1998, the town was administratively located in the Piła Voivodeship. In August 1980, employees of local factories joined the nationwide anti-communist strikes, which led to the foundation of the Solidarity organization, which played a central role at the end of communist rule in Poland.
Historic architecture and tourist sights
thumb|upright=1.2|Evening view of the Plac Wolności with the Saint Mary Magdalene church on the left and the illuminated town hall in the middle
- medieval layout of the town
- Gothic church of Saint Mary Magdalene with rich Renaissance and Baroque interior The local Noteckie beer is an officially protected traditional beverage, as designated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Poland.