 Unlike the contemporary town, early Stopnica was not located on a hill, but in the valley of the "Stopniczanka", among marshes and ponds.The first mention of Stopnica (known then as "Stobnica") comes from the 12th century, but a gord, or Slavic settlement, had existed here earlier.According to Jan Długosz’s chronicle "Annales seu cronici incliti regni Poloniae", in 1103 the parish priest of Stopnica, Reverend Baldwin, became the Bishop of Kraków.