POLAND 



62 1 9 



POLAND 



by his wars against the Turks, he 

 saw and helped Poland on the way 

 to anarchy and dissolution. On his 

 death in 1696, the elector of 

 Saxony, Augustus II, secured the 

 throne, and in 1699 the war with 

 Turkey was ended. 



In 1700 there began a war be- 

 tween the powers of northern 

 Europe, during which Poland was 

 the main battleground. It ended 

 in 1720, and in 1733, on the death 

 of Augustus, Stanislas Leszczynski 

 was chosen king for the second time. 



Augustus II had suggested a par- 

 tition of Poland, but it was not 

 until some time after his death. 



Kosciusko in 1794. By it much 

 land was recovered from the 

 Russians, but in the end, the Poles, 

 having redeemed their follies by 

 their gallantry, were beaten in 

 1795, and the final treaty of par- 

 tition was signed ; the carcass was 

 di vided between the three powers 

 and Poland ceased to exist. In 

 1807, Napoleon created the grand- 

 duchy of Warsaw, but it died in 

 1813, when the Russians entered 

 its capital. The Congress of Vienna 

 arranged a new partition, one 

 feature of which was the establish- 

 ment of a new kingdom of Poland, 



Poland. Group of peasants in characteristic working dress 



that, in 1772, the first took place. 

 Prussia obtained West Prussia, but 

 not Danzig, and also the regions 

 around Kulm and Marienburg. 

 Austria received much of Galicia, 

 and Russia a district beyond the 

 Dvina. Altogether Poland lost 

 about a quarter of her territory. 



Under a new constitution Poland 

 lived for another twenty years. 

 Her rulers took some advantage of 

 the jealousies between the various 

 European powers, and signed an 

 alliance with Russia. The crown, 

 then worn by Stanislas Ponia- 

 towski, was, in 1791, made here- 

 ditary, and another constitution, 

 one giving to the people much of 

 the political freedom, which the 

 French revolution was demanding, 

 was drawn up. This new con- 

 stitution caused the next trouble. 

 Some who disliked it appealed to 

 Catherine of Russia, and when she 

 declared war on Poland, Prussia 

 declined to fulfil the terms of her 

 alliance. Alono the Poles fought 

 the Russians, but they could not 

 stop their onrush, whereupon the 

 Prussians, to secure something for 

 themselves, occupied Great Poland. 

 In September, 1793, the two in- 

 vaders came to terms, and by the 

 second partition Poland lost 

 250,000 square miles of her eastern 

 provinces. 



Little was now left, and the end 

 followed the Polish rising under 



king In 1830, there was a rising 

 of the Poles, which was only sup- 

 pressed after hard fighting, and in 

 1863 there was -another, after 

 which the kingdom ceased to exist. 

 As part of Russia, Prussia, and 

 Austria, Poland remained until the 

 Great War. A . w . Holland 



Having dissolved the council ot 

 state in Oct. 1918, the regency 

 council, wliich had been set up by 

 the Austro -Germans in 1917, and 

 consisted of three Poles, pro- 

 claimed the independence of Poland 

 on Nov. 9, 1918. Five days later, 

 General Pilsudski (q.v.) assumed 

 the supreme power, and convoked 

 a constituent assembly, for which 

 elections were held, about 190 

 representatives being returned on 

 a franchise that gave every Pole, 

 male and female, over 21 a vote. 

 Pilsudski became president on 

 Feb. 20, 1919, with Paderewski as 

 prime minister. The Versailles 

 treaty, June 28, recognized the 

 independence of Poland. Several 

 changes of government took place, 

 191921, but Pilsudski remained 

 president, and a constitution was 

 adopted on April 8, 1921. 



Poland was evacuated by the 

 German troops by the end of 1918, 

 but the Poles were almost con- 

 stantly engaged in wars during 

 1919-21. In a struggle with the 

 Bolshevists they forced the latter 

 back into Soviet Russia. A peace 



treaty was signed between them, 

 Mar. 18, 1921 Later the town and 

 region of Vilna were claimed by 

 Poland, and after prolonged dis- 

 pute between that country and 

 Lithuania the conference of am- 

 bassadors in Mar., 1923, allocated 

 the territory to Poland. 



LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE. 

 Forming with Bohemian or Czech 

 and Wendish the western group 

 of the Slavonic languages, Polish 

 is spoken by about 20 million 

 people in Poland, Lithuania*, and 

 other parts of Europe. In flexi- 

 bility, variety, and power, Polish 

 rivals Russian. The Cyrillic 

 alphabet, however, serves Russian 

 better than the Roman does Polish, 

 inasmuch as it can indicate the 

 sounds of Slav words by com- 

 binations of appropriate letters. 

 The disability of the Roman to 

 do this results in that collocation 

 of consonants which seems so 

 intimidating in Polish, till it is 

 explained that sz = sh, cz=ch, and 

 rz=zh or sh ; e.g. Pszybiszewski 

 is pronounced Pshybishew(v)ski. 



Polish literature is extensive, 

 and much of it is high in quality. 

 It has had a marked influence on 

 Russian, Czech, Serbian, and Ru- 

 thenian literatures. The earliest 

 extant Polish works were written 

 in Latin, and consisted of monastic 

 chronicles similar to those found 

 in other European countries at 

 the time, the principal being the 

 Chronicle of Martin Gallus (d. c. 

 1140). The foundation of the 

 university of Cracow, 1364, led 

 to an increase in learning. The 

 first printing press in Poland was 

 set up in Cracow in 1475, but Latin 

 was still used, and the first book in 

 Polish did not appear till 1521. 



Meanwhile the Renaissance, 

 with its humanism, had enlarged 

 the horizon of the Poles, and in 

 the 16th century brought about 

 what is sometimes called the 

 Golden Age of Polish literature 

 and the growing employment of 

 the vernacular. Of the writers of 

 this time Kochanowski was the 

 greatest, both as poet and dramatist. 

 Polish literature declined during 

 the 17th century, owing to wars 

 and internal troubles. 



The rise of the Romantic School 

 of Polish authors dates from about 

 1820. This school produced one 

 writer of genius, and two of 

 remarkable talent. The first was 

 AdamMickiewicz(<7.t;.) ; the others 

 were Jules Slowacki (1809-1849), 

 poet and dramatist, his most 

 notable work being King Mind, 

 and Zygmunt Krasinski (1812- 

 1859), poet and thinker, whose chief 

 work, the Undivine Comedy, deals 

 with the sufferings of his unfor- 

 tunate land. A prolific author was 



