The history of Poland

Our trip from Germany to Poland caused a rather strange feeling in all of us. It is like we are heading the same way as the troops did in the beginning of the Second World War. Nevertheless we had a warm welcome from the kind Poles. The people here, are very kind and religious. Our hotel owner informed us to go to church with him on Sunday since they have such a great choir.

When we are talking about the history of Poland, you immediately see the Christian influences. The history of Poland begins as early as the 10th century, that is when the Polish nation accepted Christianity. Poland suffered from inner and outer enemies (the Franks, Sovjets,…) but succeeded to preserve its own identity in the Middle ages.

From the 14th until the 18th century, Poland joined the union of Lithuania. The union made Poland one of the strongest states in Europe. But their Jagiellon dynasty was experiencing a lot of trouble with the more and more determined nobles. In the middle 16th century the Polish Parliament, the Sejm, became the main legislative power.

The Polish Parliament, the Sejm, became the main legislative power in the middle of the 16th century. When the last Jagiellon king died in 1569, Poland became an elective monarchy. In contrast to the large amount of absolute monarchies all around Europe, Poland became from then on, a quasi-democratised state.

Unfortunately, the once so powerful Poland lost a lot of its competitiveness and had to surrender against their stronger neighbours. In the 17th and 18th century, Poland was partitioned by the former Austria, Prussia and Russia. However, the Poles kept the idea of independence alive through the 19th century which resulted in an uprising against the Tsar.

Poland regained its independence after the First World War but as I said in the beginning, Poland was the first country which fell against the German and Soviet attack at the beginning of the Second World War. Numerous Poles served in the armies of the Allied Forces, they wanted the war to stop. At the end of the war, the death count was enormous: 6 million Polish citizens were killed and 2,5 million were transported to labour or extermination camps.

After the war, Poland became ‘property’ of the Soviet Union and had therefore a communist regime. The Poles tried to escape the regime in 1956 and 1968 but both uprisings were suppressed. In 1989, led by a reform movement called “Solidarity”, Poland became the first Eastern European state to break free of the Communism.

The Polish economy developed into one of the strongest in Eastern Europe. Poland joined the European Union on May 1, 2004 and is now headed by Bronisław Komorowski, the president.

Below you find an animated video of the Polish history.