In 1996, a jubilee was celebrated which was of great importance to this medieval city – five centuries of the market square and town hall. The event was marked with a scientific seminar and culminated in the publication of a book invaluable to the city’s present and future inhabitants, entitled 500 Years of Cieszyn Town Hall and Market Square, 1496 – 1996. This work touched on a wide range of issues concerning the development of the town in the middle ages, and in particular the square and the town hall on its southern side.
      The questions raised in this work, despite the historical investigations carried out on the basis of iconographic and archival sources, did not fully explain all the problems connected with the creation nor with the functioning in times past of the place in which today’s market square was established. Neither was it satisfactorily explained how many squares had been created in the city previously to the present one. As a result of debates taking place after 1996, the currently prevailing view is that three market squares have existed over the last nine centuries of Cieszyn’s urban develpment, of which the third and most recent is the current market square. The first was most likely a square formed in the 13th century within the town which was then arising at the foot of the castle. From the town plans which have survived to the present day, we can assume that this little (market) square may have been located in the area of today’s Theatre Square. As a result of the town’s gradual expansion to the east, a new square was created where the Stary Targ (Old Market) now stands – this functioned as the second market square in the town’s history and was probably also the site of the old town hall until 1496. The third, which has already been mentioned, was created at the end of the 15th century in the place where it can be seen today.
      No classical, large scale archaeological investigations have ever been carried out in the area of the present market square, which seems to leave a huge gap in our knowledge of the city’s past. The only archaeological investigation at all was the archaeological supervision of the earthworks which took place in the 1990s during installation of underground water and heating pipes. In addition to this, radar tests of the structures below the surface were carried out. These, despite revealing the existence of interesting structures below ground, can tell us very little without archaeological verification. These tests were carried out shortly after a layer of black earth was discovered during the digging of a heating trench at the end of Mennicza Street. This lay at a shallow depth of around 0.7 – 0.9 m below the present street level, and yielded five fragments of leather. After assembling these fragments, it transpired that they were a medieval laced shoe, dated to the 14th century. Pieces of ceramic pots were also discovered, as well as wooden debris. The find lay in a typically medieval culture layer, as far as smell, colour and structure are concerned.
      Half a year later, in April 1998, excavations took place on the eastern and northern sides of the market square to change the water pipe system. Thanks to this work, vertical sections of strata to a depth of 1.7 metres were obtained. Archaeological analysis revealed that a layer of paving existed along the entire length of the excavation. This was made of irregularly shaped stones, and was directly below the contemporary pavement of the market square. This earlier pavement was probably constructed in late 18th or early 19th century, after the great fire of 1798. Beneath the paving was a layer of bedding consisting of sand with an admixture of brick rubble and lime mortar. By far the most important layer turned out to be that at a depth of 0.7 to 0.9 m below the present ground level. A regular, vertical layer was discovered, composed of river-smoothed cobbles – this was almost certainly the remains of the original paving of the market square built in 1496. No further layers of stone paving were confirmed below this level, although there was another, extremely interesting, dark grey layer of earth containing a large amount of chippings and wood slivers. These were probably the remains of everyday life from before the cobbles were laid at the end of the 15th century on the newly created market square. The existence of this layer is explained by the fact that towards the end of the 15th century the present market square was the site of a market, situated then by the eastern defensive walls of the town. 
      The most interesting discovery, and at the same time the most difficult to interpret, was made at an excavation to the north, opposite Matejki Street. In a hole 0.7 m across and at a depth of 50 cm below the present street level, a wall made of large broken stones was discovered on a foundation of lime mortar. This wall was 80 cm thick, and its depth reached 2.5 m below the present street level. In addition, the section of wall uncovered was in the shape of a curve. If the whole wall were to be recreated on the basis of the fragment found, it would form a circle 4 m in diameter. It is not clear if this is part of a well, or the remains of some round construction such as a tower or part of some unknown building (the old town hall?). Only by undertaking a wider archaeological survey can it ever be explained what has actually been discovered here. Beside the wall were found large fragments of wooden beams and stone and brick rubble. 
      The radar tests mentioned earlier revealed the existence of a rectangular structure 10 m by 12.5 m to the south of the construction uncovered. In the south-western part of the square another rectangular shaped structure was captured by the radar. It cannot be ruled out that these large unidentified objects, possibly medieval, appear on the so-called Brno map of Cieszyn town from 1775. All that remains, therefore, is to commence the relevant investigations to shed light on this irksome problem.