The History Of Poland

An updated and expanded second edition covering Polish history from medieval times to the present day.

This is an account of the evolution of Poland from conditions of subjection to its reconstruction in 1918, development in the years between the two World Wars, and reorganisation after 1945. It begins at a time when Poland was still suffering from the legacy of the eighteenth-century Partitions and burdened with problems of sizeable ethnic minorities, inadequate agrarian reforms and sluggish industrial development sustained by foreign capital. It traces the history through to independence and then to the transformation of the country in the last thirty years. Although many of the problems of the past have now disappeared, industrialisation, the structure of peasant agriculture, and political association with the Soviet Union present the Polish People's Republic with difficulties that have yet to be resolved. Substantial achievements in an ethnically homogeneous state must be set against substantial discontents. This history provides the English-speaking reader with a scholarly synthesis based mainly on literature in Polish and other East European languages. It will be essential reading for historians of Eastern Europe and for those interested in modern Polish society.

Biskupski (history, St. John Fisher College) offers a critical account of the historical developments of the last century in Poland, with an emphasis on the last several decades. Intended for high school and college students, as well as the general reader. Includes a chronology.Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

The history of eastern European is dominated by the story of the rise of the Russian empire, yet Russia only emerged as a major power after 1700. For 300 years the greatest power in Eastern Europe was the union between the kingdom of Poland and the grand duchy of Lithuania, one of the longest-lasting political unions in European history. Yet because it ended in the late-eighteenth century in what are misleadingly termed the Partitions of Poland, it barely features in standard accounts of European history. The Making of the Polish-Lithuanian Union 1385-1569 tells the story of the formation of a consensual, decentralised, multinational, and religiously plural state built from below as much as above, that was founded by peaceful negotiation, not war and conquest. From its inception in 1385-6, a vision of political union was developed that proved attractive to Poles, Lithuanians, Ruthenians, and Germans, a union which was extended to include Prussia in the 1450s and Livonia in the 1560s. Despite the often bitter disagreements over the nature of the union, these were nevertheless overcome by a republican vision of a union of peoples in one political community of citizens under an elected monarch. Robert Frost challenges interpretations of the union informed by the idea that the emergence of the sovereign nation state represents the essence of political modernity, and presents the Polish-Lithuanian union as a case study of a composite state. The modern history of Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Belarus cannot be understood without an understanding of the legacy of the Polish-Lithuanian union. This volume is the first detailed study of the making of that union ever published in English.

This new edition has been fully updated to reflect recent developments within Poland, Eastern Europe, and the wider world.

This volume presents various aspects of public history practices in Poland, alongside their historical development and theoretical reflections on public history. Despite a long tradition and variety of forms of public history, the very term "public history", or literally speaking "history in the public sphere", has been in use in Poland only since the 2010s. This edited collection contains chapters that focus on numerous practices and media forms in public history including historical memory, heritage tourism, historical re-enactments, memes and graphic novels, films, archives, archaeology and oral history. As such, the volume brings together the Polish experiences to wider international audiences and shares Polish controversies related to public history within the academic discourse, beyond media news and politically engaged commentaries. Furthermore, it sheds crucial light on the developments of collective memory, historical and political debates, the history of Poland and East-Central Europe, and the politics of post-World War Two and post-communist societies. Authored by a team of academic historians and practitioners from the field, Public History in Poland is the perfect resource for students from a variety of disciplines including Public History, Heritage, Museum Studies, Anthropology, and Archaeology.