The lands originally inhabited by the Polans became known as Staropolska, or "Old Poland", and later as Wielkopolska, or "Greater Poland", while the lands conquered towards the end of the 10th century, home of the Vistulans (Wiślanie) and the Lendians, became known as Małopolska, or "Lesser Poland."
From 1795 to 1918, Poland was split between Prussia, the Habsburg monarchy, and Russia and had no independent existence. In 1795 the third and the last of the three 18th-century partitions of Poland ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
While the official name of the country, Polska, along with its cognates in various modern languages – like Poland, Polen, Pologne, Polónia or Польша (Polsha) – all go back to one historical word root, the story of the name, and actually the many names of Poland, is much more intricate and puzzling.
The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 7 October 1918 and 30 September 1939.
By the early seventeenth century, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (Poland's formal name after the 1569 political union between Crown Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania) was the largest country in Europe, encompassing all of post-1991 Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, and Latvia as well as most of Ukraine and Estonia.
In 1772, Austria, Russia, and Prussia conducted the First Partition of Poland. Attempts at reform leading to the Constitution of 1791 led Russia and Prussia to conduct a Second Partition in 1793. After suppressing a Polish revolt in 1794, the three powers conducted the Third Partition in 1795.
After the Congress of Vienna in 1815, the Russian Empire created a separate entity called Congress Poland out of some of the above governorates.
Poland with a B: Bulania
Yet these early – Latin and Arabic – manuscripts preserved a truly mind-boggling variety of alternate versions of the name, such as Polania, Palania, Polenia and even Bulania.
In Polish Poland is called "Polska". It literally means "The Land of Fields" and it comes from the word "pole" meaning "a plain/a field". However, the story behind the country's name is a little bit more complicated than that.
Poles, or Polish people, are a West Slavic ethnic group and nation who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in Central Europe.
1952. The constitution adopted by the communists introduces a new name for the Polish state, the Polish People's Republic (Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL), which replaces the previously used Republic of Poland (Rzeczpospolita Polska).
Polish is a Western Slavic language spoken by approximately 38 million people within Poland. Polish speakers can also be found throughout the globe, especially in hubs of the Polish diaspora such as Chicago, London and New York. Polish uses a Latin-based alphabet with diacritics on certain consonants and vowels.
Soviet control over the Polish People's Republic lessened after Stalin's death and Gomułka's Thaw, and ceased completely after the fall of the communist government in Poland in late 1989, although the Soviet-Russian Northern Group of Forces did not leave Polish soil until 1993.
Poland as a Formerly Colonised Country. Poland has experienced multiple histories of colonisation by external powers. In the 18th century Poland disappeared from the European map and the country was partitioned three times – by the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia and the Austrian Monarchy (1772, 1793 and 1795).
Seventeen days after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, which marked the beginning of the Second World War, the Soviet Union entered the eastern regions of Poland (known as the Kresy) and annexed territories totalling 201,015 square kilometres (77,612 sq mi) with a population of 13,299,000.
The Kingdom of Poland emerged in 1025 and in 1569 cemented its longstanding association with Lithuania, thus forming the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was one of the great powers of Europe at the time, with a uniquely liberal political system that adopted Europe's first modern constitution in 1791.
Prussia (/ˈprʌʃə/; German: Preußen, pronounced [ˈpʁɔʏsn̩] ( listen), Old Prussian: Prūsa or Prūsija) was a German state located on most of the North European Plain, also occupying southern regions. It formed the German Empire when it united the German states in 1871.
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. After the Union of Lublin in 1569 and the formation of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth Ukraine fell under the Polish administration, becoming part of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland.
The growth of power in the Russian Empire threatened the Kingdom of Prussia and the Habsburg monarchy and was the primary motive behind the First Partition.
Polish intelligence
During the Polish–Soviet War, the Polish decryption of Red Army radio messages made it possible to use Polish military forces efficiently against Soviet Russian forces and to win many individual battles, most importantly the Battle of Warsaw.
Following the failed Soviet coup attempt, Ukraine declared independence on August 24, 1991. A day after the referendum on December 2, 1991, the Republic of Poland was the first foreign country to recognize Ukraine's state independence.
Prior to World War I, Poland was a memory, and its territory was divided among the empires of Germany, Russia and Austro-Hungary; these powers along with France and Great Britain were wrestling for dominance of the continent, as illustrated in this serio-comic map.
Poland was the first item on the Soviet agenda. Stalin stated that “For the Soviet government, the question of Poland was one of honor” and security because Poland had served as a historical corridor for forces attempting to invade Russia.