fbpx
Wikipedia

Greater Poland

May 04, 2023

Not to be confused with Greater Poland Voivodeship.
For other uses, see Greater Poland (disambiguation).

Greater Poland, often known by its Polish name Wielkopolska (pronounced [vjɛlkɔˈpɔlska] (listen); German: Großpolen; Swedish: Storpolen; Latin: Polonia Maior), is a historical region of west-central Poland. Its chief and largest city is Poznań followed by Kalisz, the oldest city in Poland.

Greater Poland
Wielkopolska
Historical region
Coat of arms
The proper Greater Poland
Country Poland
SeatGniezno, Poznań, Kalisz
Time zoneUTC+1 (CET)
 • Summer (DST)UTC+2 (CEST)
A map of Greater Poland/Great Poland during Piast period from the Codex diplomaticus Maioris Poloniae, based on data from historical documents

The boundaries of Greater Poland have varied somewhat throughout history. Since the Middle Ages, Wielkopolska proper has been split into the Poznań and Kalisz voivodeships. In the wider sense, it also encompassed Sieradz, Łęczyca, Brześć Kujawski and Inowrocław voivodeships, which were situated further eastward. After the Partitions of Poland at the end of the 18th century, Greater Poland was incorporated into Prussia as the Grand Duchy of Posen. The region in the proper sense roughly coincides with the present-day Greater Poland Voivodeship (Polish: województwo wielkopolskie).

Like the historical regions of Pomerania, Silesia, Mazovia or Lesser Poland, the Greater Poland region possesses its own distinctive folk costumes, architecture, cuisine, dialect and other traditions that differ from other parts of Poland.

Name

 
A map of Polish dialects. The area where Greater Poland's dialect is spoken is marked in violet.

Because Greater Poland was the settlement area of the Polans and the core of the early Polish state, the region was at times simply called "Poland" (Latin Polonia). The more specific name is first recorded in the Latin form Polonia Maior in 1257 and in Polish w Wielkej Polszcze in 1449. Its original meaning was the Older Poland to contrast with Lesser Poland (Polish Małopolska, Latin Polonia Minor), a region in south-eastern Poland with its capital at Kraków that later became the main centre of the state.

Geography

Greater Poland comprises much of the area drained by the Warta River and its tributaries, including the Noteć River. The region is distinguished from Lesser Poland with the lowland landscape, and from both Lesser Poland and Mazovia with its numerous lakes. In the strict meaning, it covers an area of about 33,000 square kilometres (13,000 sq mi), and has a population of 3.5 million. In the wider sense, it has almost 60,000 square kilometres (23,000 sq mi), and 7 million inhabitants.

The region's main metropolis is Poznań, near the centre of the region, on the Warta. Other cities are Kalisz to the south-east, Konin to the east, Piła to the north, Ostrów Wielkopolski to the south-east, Gniezno (the earliest capital of Poland) to the north-east, and Leszno to the south-west.

An area of 75.84 square kilometres (29.28 sq mi) of forest and lakeland south of Poznań is designated the Wielkopolska National Park (Wielkopolski Park Narodowy), established in 1957. The region also contains part of Drawa National Park, and several designated Landscape Parks. For example, the Rogalin Landscape Park is famous for about 2000 monumental oak trees growing on the flood plain of the river Warta, among numerous ox-bow lakes.

History

Further information: History of Poland and History of Poznań

Greater Poland formed the heart of the 10th-century early Polish state, sometimes being called the "cradle of Poland". Poznań and Gniezno were early centres of royal power, but following devastation of the region by pagan rebellion in the 1030s, and the invasion of Bretislaus I of Bohemia in 1038, the capital was moved by Casimir I the Restorer from Gniezno to Kraków.

In the Testament of Bolesław III Wrymouth, which initiated the period of fragmentation of Poland (1138–1320), the western part of Greater Poland (including Poznań) was granted to Mieszko III the Old. The eastern part, with Gniezno and Kalisz, was part of the Duchy of Kraków, granted to Władysław II. However, for most of the period the two parts were under a single ruler, and were known as the Duchy of Greater Poland (although at times there were separately ruled duchies of Poznań, Gniezno, Kalisz and Ujście). The region came under the control of Władysław I the Elbow-high in 1314, and thus became part of the reunited Poland of which Władyslaw was crowned king in 1320.

In the reunited kingdom, and later in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the country came to be divided into administrative units called voivodeships. In the case of the Greater Poland region these were Poznań Voivodeship and Kalisz Voivodeship. The Commonwealth also had larger subdivisions known as prowincja, one of which was named Greater Poland. However, this prowincja covered a larger area than the Greater Poland region itself, also taking in Masovia and Royal Prussia. (This division of Crown Poland into two entities called Greater and Lesser Poland had its roots in the Statutes of Casimir the Great of 1346–1362, where the laws of "Greater Poland" – the northern part of the country – were codified in the Piotrków statute, with those of "Lesser Poland" in the separate Wiślica statute.)

In 1768 a new Gniezno Voivodeship was formed out of the northern part of Kalisz Voivodeship. However more far-reaching changes would come with the Partitions of Poland. In the first partition (1772), northern parts of Greater Poland along the Noteć (German Netze) were taken over by Prussia, becoming the Netze District. In the second partition (1793) the whole of Greater Poland was absorbed by Prussia, becoming part of the province of South Prussia. It remained so in spite of the first Greater Poland uprising (1794), part of the unsuccessful Kościuszko Uprising directed chiefly against Russia.

More successful was the Greater Poland Uprising of 1806, which led to the region's becoming part of the Napoleonic Duchy of Warsaw (forming the Poznań Department and parts of the Kalisz and Bydgoszcz Departments). However, following the Congress of Vienna in 1815, Greater Poland was again partitioned, with the western part (including Poznań) going to Prussia. The eastern part (including Kalisz) joined the Russian-controlled Kingdom of Poland, where it formed the Kalisz Voivodeship until 1837, then the Kalisz Governorate (merged into the Warsaw Governorate between 1844 and 1867).

Within the Prussian empire, western Greater Poland became the Grand Duchy of Posen (Poznań), which theoretically held some autonomy. Following an unrealized uprising in 1846, and the more substantial but still unsuccessful uprising of 1848 (during the Spring of Nations), the Grand Duchy was replaced by the Province of Posen. The authorities made efforts to Germanize the region, particularly after the founding of Germany in 1871, and from 1886 onwards the Prussian Settlement Commission was active in increasing German land ownership in formerly Polish areas.

Following the end of World War I, the Greater Poland uprising (1918–19) ensured that most of the region became part of the newly independent Polish state, forming most of Poznań Voivodeship (1921–1939). Northern and some western parts of Greater Poland remained in Germany, where they formed much of the province of Posen-West Prussia (1922–1938), whose capital was Schneidemühl (Piła). The Polish state enacted anti-German policies, copying the past Germanization policies of Prussia to undermine the region's German minority.[1]

Following the German invasion of 1939, Greater Poland was incorporated into Nazi Germany, becoming the province called Reichsgau Posen, later Reichsgau Wartheland (Warthe being the German name for the Warta river). The Polish and Jewish population was classified by Nazis as subhuman and subjected to organized genocide,[2] involving mass murder and ethnic cleansing, with many former officials and others considered potential enemies by the Nazis being imprisoned or executed, including at the notorious Fort VII concentration camp in Poznań.[3] Poznań was declared a stronghold city (Festung) in the closing stages of the war, being taken by the Red Army in the Battle of Poznań, which ended on 22 February 1945.

After the war, Greater Poland was fully within the Polish People's Republic, as Poznań Voivodeship. With the reforms of 1975 this was divided into smaller provinces (the voivodeships of Kalisz, Konin, Leszno and Piła, and a smaller Poznań Voivodeship). The present-day Greater Poland Voivodeship, again with Poznań as its capital, was created in 1999.

Main cities

The following table lists the cities in proper Greater Poland with a population greater than 25,000 (2015):

City Population (2015)[4] Voivodeship in 1750 Voivodeship in 2016 Additional information
1.   Poznań 548,028   Poznań   Greater Poland Former capital of Poland, former royal city of Poland, historical capital of Greater Poland.
2.   Kalisz 103,997   Kalisz   Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland, former voivodeship capital, historical capital of Greater Poland.
3.   Konin 77,224   Kalisz   Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland.
4.   Piła 74,609   Poznań   Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland.
5.   Ostrów Wielkopolski 72,890   Kalisz   Greater Poland Former private town of the Przebendowski family.
6.   Gniezno 69,883   Kalisz   Greater Poland Former capital of Poland, former royal city of Poland, ecclesiastical capital of Poland.
7.   Leszno 64,589   Poznań   Greater Poland Former private town of the Leszczyński family.
8.   Swarzędz 31,084   Poznań   Greater Poland Former private town of the Grudziński family, part of the Poznań metropolitan area.
9.   Luboń 30,676   Poznań   Greater Poland Part of the Poznań metropolitan area.
10.   Śrem 30,152   Poznań   Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland.
11.   Września 29,552   Kalisz   Greater Poland
12.   Krotoszyn 29,397   Kalisz   Greater Poland Former private town.
13.   Jarocin 26,311   Kalisz   Greater Poland
14.   Wałcz 26,231   Poznań   West Pomeranian Former royal city of Poland.
15.   Wągrowiec 25,178   Kalisz   Greater Poland

See also

References

  1. ^ Elizabeth A. Drummond (2002). "From "verloren gehen" to "verloren bleiben"". In Ingrao, Charles W.; Szabo, Franz A. J. (eds.). The Germans and the East. Purdue University Press. p. 231.
  2. ^ Od socjaldemokracji do "Solidarności": organizacje robotnicze w Wielkopolsce w XIX i XX wieku, do roku 1990 Edmund Makowski Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu im. Adama Mickiewicza, page 155,1991
  3. ^ "Kraj Warty" 1934-1945: studium historyczno-gospodarcze okupacji hitlerowskiej Czesław Łuczak Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 1972
  4. ^ "Lista miast w Polsce (spis miast, mapa miast, liczba ludności, powierzchnia, wyszukiwarka)". polskawliczbach.pl.

Further reading

Main article: Bibliography of the history of Poland

External links

May 04, 2023
greater, poland, confused, with, voivodeship, other, uses, disambiguation, this, article, needs, additional, citations, verification, please, help, improve, this, article, adding, citations, reliable, sources, unsourced, material, challenged, removed, find, so. Not to be confused with Greater Poland Voivodeship For other uses see Greater Poland disambiguation This article needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources Greater Poland news newspapers books scholar JSTOR April 2014 Learn how and when to remove this template message Greater Poland often known by its Polish name Wielkopolska pronounced vjɛlkɔˈpɔlska listen German Grosspolen Swedish Storpolen Latin Polonia Maior is a historical region of west central Poland Its chief and largest city is Poznan followed by Kalisz the oldest city in Poland Greater Poland WielkopolskaHistorical regionCoat of armsThe proper Greater PolandCountry PolandSeatGniezno Poznan KaliszTime zoneUTC 1 CET Summer DST UTC 2 CEST A map of Greater Poland Great Poland during Piast period from the Codex diplomaticus Maioris Poloniae based on data from historical documents The boundaries of Greater Poland have varied somewhat throughout history Since the Middle Ages Wielkopolska proper has been split into the Poznan and Kalisz voivodeships In the wider sense it also encompassed Sieradz Leczyca Brzesc Kujawski and Inowroclaw voivodeships which were situated further eastward After the Partitions of Poland at the end of the 18th century Greater Poland was incorporated into Prussia as the Grand Duchy of Posen The region in the proper sense roughly coincides with the present day Greater Poland Voivodeship Polish wojewodztwo wielkopolskie Like the historical regions of Pomerania Silesia Mazovia or Lesser Poland the Greater Poland region possesses its own distinctive folk costumes architecture cuisine dialect and other traditions that differ from other parts of Poland Contents 1 Name 2 Geography 3 History 4 Main cities 5 See also 6 References 7 Further reading 8 External linksName Edit A map of Polish dialects The area where Greater Poland s dialect is spoken is marked in violet Because Greater Poland was the settlement area of the Polans and the core of the early Polish state the region was at times simply called Poland Latin Polonia The more specific name is first recorded in the Latin form Polonia Maior in 1257 and in Polish w Wielkej Polszcze in 1449 Its original meaning was the Older Poland to contrast with Lesser Poland Polish Malopolska Latin Polonia Minor a region in south eastern Poland with its capital at Krakow that later became the main centre of the state Geography EditGreater Poland comprises much of the area drained by the Warta River and its tributaries including the Notec River The region is distinguished from Lesser Poland with the lowland landscape and from both Lesser Poland and Mazovia with its numerous lakes In the strict meaning it covers an area of about 33 000 square kilometres 13 000 sq mi and has a population of 3 5 million In the wider sense it has almost 60 000 square kilometres 23 000 sq mi and 7 million inhabitants The region s main metropolis is Poznan near the centre of the region on the Warta Other cities are Kalisz to the south east Konin to the east Pila to the north Ostrow Wielkopolski to the south east Gniezno the earliest capital of Poland to the north east and Leszno to the south west An area of 75 84 square kilometres 29 28 sq mi of forest and lakeland south of Poznan is designated the Wielkopolska National Park Wielkopolski Park Narodowy established in 1957 The region also contains part of Drawa National Park and several designated Landscape Parks For example the Rogalin Landscape Park is famous for about 2000 monumental oak trees growing on the flood plain of the river Warta among numerous ox bow lakes History EditFurther information History of Poland and History of Poznan Greater Poland formed the heart of the 10th century early Polish state sometimes being called the cradle of Poland Poznan and Gniezno were early centres of royal power but following devastation of the region by pagan rebellion in the 1030s and the invasion of Bretislaus I of Bohemia in 1038 the capital was moved by Casimir I the Restorer from Gniezno to Krakow In the Testament of Boleslaw III Wrymouth which initiated the period of fragmentation of Poland 1138 1320 the western part of Greater Poland including Poznan was granted to Mieszko III the Old The eastern part with Gniezno and Kalisz was part of the Duchy of Krakow granted to Wladyslaw II However for most of the period the two parts were under a single ruler and were known as the Duchy of Greater Poland although at times there were separately ruled duchies of Poznan Gniezno Kalisz and Ujscie The region came under the control of Wladyslaw I the Elbow high in 1314 and thus became part of the reunited Poland of which Wladyslaw was crowned king in 1320 In the reunited kingdom and later in the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth the country came to be divided into administrative units called voivodeships In the case of the Greater Poland region these were Poznan Voivodeship and Kalisz Voivodeship The Commonwealth also had larger subdivisions known as prowincja one of which was named Greater Poland However this prowincja covered a larger area than the Greater Poland region itself also taking in Masovia and Royal Prussia This division of Crown Poland into two entities called Greater and Lesser Poland had its roots in the Statutes of Casimir the Great of 1346 1362 where the laws of Greater Poland the northern part of the country were codified in the Piotrkow statute with those of Lesser Poland in the separate Wislica statute In 1768 a new Gniezno Voivodeship was formed out of the northern part of Kalisz Voivodeship However more far reaching changes would come with the Partitions of Poland In the first partition 1772 northern parts of Greater Poland along the Notec German Netze were taken over by Prussia becoming the Netze District In the second partition 1793 the whole of Greater Poland was absorbed by Prussia becoming part of the province of South Prussia It remained so in spite of the first Greater Poland uprising 1794 part of the unsuccessful Kosciuszko Uprising directed chiefly against Russia More successful was the Greater Poland Uprising of 1806 which led to the region s becoming part of the Napoleonic Duchy of Warsaw forming the Poznan Department and parts of the Kalisz and Bydgoszcz Departments However following the Congress of Vienna in 1815 Greater Poland was again partitioned with the western part including Poznan going to Prussia The eastern part including Kalisz joined the Russian controlled Kingdom of Poland where it formed the Kalisz Voivodeship until 1837 then the Kalisz Governorate merged into the Warsaw Governorate between 1844 and 1867 Within the Prussian empire western Greater Poland became the Grand Duchy of Posen Poznan which theoretically held some autonomy Following an unrealized uprising in 1846 and the more substantial but still unsuccessful uprising of 1848 during the Spring of Nations the Grand Duchy was replaced by the Province of Posen The authorities made efforts to Germanize the region particularly after the founding of Germany in 1871 and from 1886 onwards the Prussian Settlement Commission was active in increasing German land ownership in formerly Polish areas Following the end of World War I the Greater Poland uprising 1918 19 ensured that most of the region became part of the newly independent Polish state forming most of Poznan Voivodeship 1921 1939 Northern and some western parts of Greater Poland remained in Germany where they formed much of the province of Posen West Prussia 1922 1938 whose capital was Schneidemuhl Pila The Polish state enacted anti German policies copying the past Germanization policies of Prussia to undermine the region s German minority 1 Following the German invasion of 1939 Greater Poland was incorporated into Nazi Germany becoming the province called Reichsgau Posen later Reichsgau Wartheland Warthe being the German name for the Warta river The Polish and Jewish population was classified by Nazis as subhuman and subjected to organized genocide 2 involving mass murder and ethnic cleansing with many former officials and others considered potential enemies by the Nazis being imprisoned or executed including at the notorious Fort VII concentration camp in Poznan 3 Poznan was declared a stronghold city Festung in the closing stages of the war being taken by the Red Army in the Battle of Poznan which ended on 22 February 1945 After the war Greater Poland was fully within the Polish People s Republic as Poznan Voivodeship With the reforms of 1975 this was divided into smaller provinces the voivodeships of Kalisz Konin Leszno and Pila and a smaller Poznan Voivodeship The present day Greater Poland Voivodeship again with Poznan as its capital was created in 1999 Main cities EditThe following table lists the cities in proper Greater Poland with a population greater than 25 000 2015 City Population 2015 4 Voivodeship in 1750 Voivodeship in 2016 Additional information1 Poznan 548 028 Poznan Greater Poland Former capital of Poland former royal city of Poland historical capital of Greater Poland 2 Kalisz 103 997 Kalisz Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland former voivodeship capital historical capital of Greater Poland 3 Konin 77 224 Kalisz Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland 4 Pila 74 609 Poznan Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland 5 Ostrow Wielkopolski 72 890 Kalisz Greater Poland Former private town of the Przebendowski family 6 Gniezno 69 883 Kalisz Greater Poland Former capital of Poland former royal city of Poland ecclesiastical capital of Poland 7 Leszno 64 589 Poznan Greater Poland Former private town of the Leszczynski family 8 Swarzedz 31 084 Poznan Greater Poland Former private town of the Grudzinski family part of the Poznan metropolitan area 9 Lubon 30 676 Poznan Greater Poland Part of the Poznan metropolitan area 10 Srem 30 152 Poznan Greater Poland Former royal city of Poland 11 Wrzesnia 29 552 Kalisz Greater Poland12 Krotoszyn 29 397 Kalisz Greater Poland Former private town 13 Jarocin 26 311 Kalisz Greater Poland14 Walcz 26 231 Poznan West Pomeranian Former royal city of Poland 15 Wagrowiec 25 178 Kalisz Greater Poland Poznan Town Hall Palace of the Raczynski family in Rogalin within the Rogalin Landscape Park Gniezno cathedral Kalisz Town Hall Leszno town hall Marian sanctuary in Lichen near KoninSee also EditGreater Poland VoivodeshipReferences Edit Elizabeth A Drummond 2002 From verloren gehen to verloren bleiben In Ingrao Charles W Szabo Franz A J eds The Germans and the East Purdue University Press p 231 Od socjaldemokracji do Solidarnosci organizacje robotnicze w Wielkopolsce w XIX i XX wieku do roku 1990 Edmund Makowski Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu im Adama Mickiewicza page 155 1991 Kraj Warty 1934 1945 studium historyczno gospodarcze okupacji hitlerowskiej Czeslaw Luczak Wydawnictwo Poznanskie 1972 Lista miast w Polsce spis miast mapa miast liczba ludnosci powierzchnia wyszukiwarka polskawliczbach pl Further reading EditMain article Bibliography of the history of PolandExternal links EditInformation on Wielkopolska Greater Poland at the University at Buffalo State University of New York Information about Greater Poland Database of business culture sport motorization tourism and medicine by CyberWielkopolska Archived 2017 09 23 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Greater Poland amp oldid 1150280143, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

article

, read, download, free, free download, mp3, video, mp4, 3gp, jpg, jpeg, gif, png, picture, music, song, movie, book, game, games.