No prizes for guessing that the preferred form in English is "Cracow." The Polish form looks like this--

--as you've surely noticed. But your plane ticket says "Krakow," doesn't it? So do lots of hotel and tourist guides. And in some old encyclopedias and other putatively authoritative sources, you might stumble upon "Crakow," or even "Kracow." So what's going on here? We'll straighten you out.

We use "Cracow" in English for the same reason that we use "Lisbon" for the place the Portuguese call "Lisboa" or "Moscow" for the Russian "Mockba." It's the traditional form, which has been in use for centuries. And you will find plenty of mentions of Cracow in the written record in English, because the city was always a significant place on the world map. In Elizabethan times, it was the capital of one of the largest countries in Europe. It already had a reputation as an exceptional place. Anyone who was culturally literate knew that this was where Dr. Faustus learned his tricks. Nor was Poland an exotically remote place; there were up to 30,000 British "expat businessmen," mostly Scots involved in the timber and grain trade, in the country. (Which is why you still run into Poles with last names like Gordon.) So, if you're speaking or writing English, Cracow is the name of the place. Using a non-English written form, or pronunciation, might smack of affectation.

And if Polish friends have nothing better to do than try to convince you otherwise in some misguided effort at enforcing linguistic chauvinism, just ask them why they chatter blithely about "Mediolan," which not all Italians would necessarily recognize as their Milano, let alone "Rzym" (good grief) for the place we call Rome and Italians call Roma--not to mention Nowy Jork or Waszyngton.

So why do you keep coming across "Krakow" in English? Probably because that's the name of the city in international airline schedules (note the "KRK" on your luggage tag). This usage therefore spills over into everything connected with the travel trade. But it's neither English nor Polish (since it lacks the diacritical mark over the "o"). It's simply part of an international jargon (or pidgin) connected with a globalized industry.

Other languages have their own names for the city, just as English does. In German, it's "Krakau," which you'll still see on some manhole covers while rambling around town. This form might bring a nostalgic smile to the faces of locals who still identify with good old Emperor Francis Joseph and the Austrian Empire. It can stir other associations among those who remember the most recent occasion when German was the official language here, for five and a half long years beginning in 1939.

For Ukrainians, it's Krakiv, for the French, Cracovie, and for the Italians, Cracovia. In Yiddish it's Kroke, which seems to be the most fashionable foreign form these days.

Got all that? Good. So just be sure not to use "Crakow" or "Kracow," because those are simply mistakes resulting from confusion.