Portal:Poland

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Welcome to the Poland Portal — Witaj w Portalu o Polsce

Cityscape of Kraków, Poland's former capital

Poland is a country in Central Europe, bordered by Germany to the west, the Czech Republic to the southwest, Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, Lithuania to the northeast, and the Baltic Sea and Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast to the north. It is an ancient nation whose history as a state began near the middle of the 10th century. Its golden age occurred in the 16th century when it united with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania to form the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. During the following century, the strengthening of the gentry and internal disorders weakened the nation. In a series of agreements in the late 18th century, Russia, Prussia and Austria partitioned Poland amongst themselves. It regained independence as the Second Polish Republic in the aftermath of World War I only to lose it again when it was occupied by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union in World War II. The nation lost over six million citizens in the war, following which it emerged as the communist Polish People's Republic under strong Soviet influence within the Eastern Bloc. A westward border shift followed by forced population transfers after the war turned a once multiethnic country into a mostly homogeneous nation state. Labor turmoil in 1980 led to the formation of the independent trade union called Solidarity (Solidarność) that over time became a political force which by 1990 had swept parliamentary elections and the presidency. A shock therapy program during the early 1990s enabled the country to transform its economy into one of the most robust in Central Europe. With its transformation to a democratic, market-oriented country completed, Poland joined NATO in 1999 and the European Union in 2004, but has experienced a constitutional crisis and democratic backsliding since 2015.

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A statue at the Palace of Culture and Science (1955) in Warsaw, holding a book of works by Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels and Vladimir Lenin

The history of Poland from 1945 to 1989 was shaped by the influence of Soviet Communism and opposition to it from the Roman Catholic Church, trade unions and other groups. In the aftermath of World War II, forces of Nazi Germany were driven from Poland by the advancing Red Army of the Soviet Union. A liberalizing thaw in Eastern Europe followed the death of Stalin in early 1953, sparking the desire for further reform. De-Stalinization, however, left Poland's communist party in a difficult position. In the 1970s, Edward Gierek's economic program brought a rise in living standards and expectations, but it faltered unexpectedly because of worldwide recession and increased oil prices following the 1973 world oil crisis. The election of the Polish-born John Paul II to papacy in 1978 triggered radical changes in the political atmosphere of the country. In 1980, electrician Lech Wałęsa and his independent Solidarity trade union led a wave of strikes at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk. The 1989 Round Table talks resulted in a semi-free parliamentary election and a Solidarity-led coalition government, sparking off a succession of mostly peaceful transitions from Communist rule across Central and Eastern Europe. (Full article...)

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Aleksander Gierymski

Credit: Aleksander Gierymski

Feast of Trumpets is an 1884 painting by Aleksander Gierymski, held by the National Museum in Warsaw, which depicts Ashkenazi Jewish men on the bank of the Vistula in the same city, performing tashlikh. It is an atonement ritual performed on Rosh Hashanah, or Jewish New Year, in which one's sins are symbolically cast into naturally-flowing water. Prior to the Holocaust, Poland was home to about three million Jews and a long-time important center of Jewish religious and cultural life.

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... that the fossil crane fly Elephantomyia bozenae (pictured), discovered in Baltic amber, is named after the Polish biologist Bożena Szala?
... that in 1890, Henry Lowenfeld, an immigrant from Poland, established the UK's first brewer of non-alcoholic beer, in Fulham, London?
... that between 1942 and 1944, Polish resistance fighter Antoni Koper hid Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto in his apartment?
... that, when described, at least five males of the fossil crane fly Elephantomyia irinae were known from inclusions in Baltic amber from the collection of the Polish Academy of Sciences?

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Przemysł II as imagined by Jan Matejko

Premislaus II (Przemysł II; 1257–1296) was the first king of Poland after a hiatus of more than two centuries. Born posthumously as the only son of Duke Premislaus I of Greater Poland, he was brought up by his uncle, Duke Boleslaus the Pious, until he came of age and began to rule the Duchy of Poznań. Through inheritance, by 1294 he had expanded his domain over the duchies of Kalisz, Lesser Poland and Pomerelia, but he was forced to retreat from Lesser Poland, leaving it to King Wenceslaus II of Bohemia. Thanks to the mediation of Archbishop Jakub Świnka of Gniezno, Premislaus formed an anti-Bohemian alliance with the dukes of Kuyavia, Vladislaus the Elbow-high and Casimir II of Łęczyca. With much of Poland's territory under his rule, he decided to take the Polish throne; he was crowned by Świnka in Gniezno, in 1295. His reign was cut short nine months later, as he was murdered during a failed kidnapping attempt orchestrated by the margraves of Brandenburg. (Full article...)

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Old Town Hall of Toruń by night

Toruń is a city on the Vistula River in northern Poland. Known in German as Thorn, it was founded by the Teutonic Knights in 1233 and ceded to the Kingdom of Poland under the terms of a treaty signed here in 1466. Seven years later, it became the birthplace of Nicolaus Copernicus. Today, Toruń is the seat of the legislature (sejmik) of the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, forming with the city of Bydgoszcz, its western neighbor, the Bydgoszcz-Toruń metropolitan area. With its medieval spatial layout preserved almost intact and with many brick Gothic buildings, including the town hall, churches and burgher houses, Toruń is a popular tourist attraction and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is also famous for its traditional gingerbread flavored with honey and spices. (Full article...)

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