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A map showing the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth at its maximum extent following the Truce of Деулино, superimposed on present-day national borders. The map shows in red all of the territory that was ruled by Zygmunt III Waza in 1619 (the Polish monarch at that time), which made up the Commonwealth; it can be further divided up into:
The borders of Poland resembled the borders of the German-Russian gains in World War 2, with the exception of the city of Bialystok. This is called the Curzon line. The small area of Trans-Olza, which had been annexed by Poland in late 1938, was returned to Czechoslovakia on Stalin's orders. [citation needed]
By the end of the Polish Defensive War the Soviet Union had taken over 52.1% of the territory of Poland (circa 200,000 km 2), with over 13,700,000 people.The estimates vary; Professor Elżbieta Trela-Mazur gives the following numbers in regards to the ethnic composition of these areas: 38% Poles (ca. 5.1 million people), 37% Ukrainians, 14.5% Belarusians, 8.4% Jews, 0.9% Russians and 0.6% Germans.
[85] [86] Prussia annexed Warmia, Powiśle, northern Greater Poland and most of Polish Pomerania, except for the city of Gdańsk, which remained a Polish exclave. Austria annexed a large portion of southern Poland with the major city of Lwów. Russia annexed territories in the north-east and east, in historic Latgale and White Ruthenia.
As a result of the Polish-Lithuanian conflict of 1919–1920, and the Polish-Soviet war of 1919–1921, Vilnius and the surrounding region became part of Poland. Lithuania claimed the region, still considering Vilnius as its historical and constitutional capital. The strained relations between the two countries did not improve until 1938.
The issue of Polish and Lithuanian relations during the World War II is a controversial one, and some modern Lithuanian and Polish historians still differ in their interpretations of the related events, many of which are related to the Lithuanian collaboration with Nazi Germany and the operations of Polish resistance organization of Armia Krajowa on territories inhabited by Lithuanians and Poles.
The region was disputed between Poland and Lithuania after their re-emergence as independent states following World War I. This dispute along with the Vilnius question was the cause of the Polish-Lithuanian War and the Sejny Uprising. The area has since been part of Poland, with the exception of the German and Soviet occupation during World War II.
The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, [b] formally known as the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania [c] and also referred to as Poland–Lithuania or the First Polish Republic, [d] [9] [10] was a federative real union [11] between the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, existing from 1569 to 1795.