With its population of almost two million, Warsaw has been capital of Poland for over four hundred years. It is located in the center of the country in the Mazovian Lowland on the banks of Poland's largest river-the Vistula. It is the administrative, economic, scientific, cultural, and tourist center of the country. A city total devastated during World War II, it was rebuilt through the efforts of its people. The Old Town-founded in the Middle Ages-is the oldest of its districts; it was restored following wartime destruction almost from the ground up. Uniquely, it is the only reconstruction included on the UNESCO World Cultural and Natural Heritage List (in 1980). The paintings of Bellotto Bernardo Canaletto depicting Warsaw served as the basis for reconstruction. These paintings proved to be invaluable iconographic documents that architects used in rebuilding Warsaw's destroyed historical monuments, which had no preserved architectural plans. Bounded by historical tenement houses, churches, and palaces, the Royal Way stretches from the Royal Castle adjacent to the Old Town, through the historical Łazienki complex-a royal residence-all the way to the 17th century palace in Wilanów; it is the most beautiful route in Warsaw. Warsaw's cityscape has its share of modern architecture-skyscrapers and modern office buildings-as well as age old monuments.