The urban space of Gniezno have no monuments testifying to its medieval origins. There is only gothic churches and monuments kept in museums. Awareness of the historical value of Gniezno survived, even despite the intensive germanisation of these lands at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. When Greater Poland regained independence at the turn of 1918 and 1919, one of the elements of emphasising the Piast heritage was giving street names, founding monuments etc. This activity was also continued during the period of the Polish People's Republic (1944-1989), establishing institutions in the city with names referring to the Piasts or locating Gniezno in the middle of the tourist Piast Trail. Before the war this "Piast policy" had a symbolic dimension, in the context of the Polish People's Republic it was a well-thought-out strategy aimed at embedding it in the consciousness of the residents - that they lived in the first capital of Piast Poland.