Mieczysław Jałowiecki - a forgotten hero of the battle for Polish Gdańsk

Two trusted companions, a gun and a determination to revive the nation after the hardships of war and partition were all that Mieczysław Jałowiecki had when he embarked on a seemingly impossible diplomatic mission to Gdańsk. His courageous efforts would help Poland bolster its new found identity in Gdansk and through his vision and drive...

Władysław Szpilman: How did the pianist survive the war?
(5 December 1911 – 6 July 2000)

Władysław Szpilman is currently the most well-known of the Warsaw Robinsons. How did he survive in German-occupied Warsaw? by Michał Studniarek   In 1939, Władysław Szpilman resided in the center of Warsaw on Śliska Street with his parents, Samuel and Edwarda, his brother Henryk and his two sisters – Regina and Halina. Władysław was working...

Dr. A. Buława: November Night is "the second Warsaw Uprising"

On November Night, the lower classes of the Warsaw community joined the young cadets. According to Dr. Adam Buława, a historian from the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, some historians even use the term “the second Warsaw Uprising”, as the first was the April 1794 insurrection.   Polish Press Agency: One of the historians...

The November Uprising: More Than a Romantic Rebellion
The outbreak of the November Uprising

One of the several classic ‘Polish insurgences’: armed, bloody and lost. Apart from the romantic legend around it, it is distinguished by the fact that the episode lasting a year was unusually effective in unsettling things as they were. After the lost uprising, two paths of development, possible before, were not available to the Poles...

Was Sigrid Storråda the daughter of Mieszko I?
Mysterious origins of Sweyn Forkbeard's wife

One of the more prominent figures of early Polish history is Świętosława, also known as Sigrid the Haughty (Storråda). This daughter of Mieszko I made her mark mainly in the history of the countries on the other side of the Baltic Sea, being the wife of the kings of Sweden and Denmark, and the mother...

Letter of Reconciliation of the Polish Bishops to the German Bishops
the 57th anniversary of the Polish bishops address to German bishops

Pope John XXIII opened the Second Vatican Council in 1962, its aim being adaptation of the Church to the contemporary world situation and conditions. The Polish Catholic clergy was focused at the time on a pastoral programme called the Great Novena, which was supposed to prepare Poles in the Polish People’s Republic to the 1000th...

The suffering and scale of destruction of Polish lands during the Great War is seldom present in the Western historical narrative
an interview with Prof. A. Chwalba

World history is written mainly by Western historians from the perspective of the experiences of their own countries and nations. Thus some topics like the suffering and scale of the destruction of Polish lands during the First World War are almost absent in historical narratives or journalism, says Prof. Andrzej Chwalba,  a historian from the...

What's your emblem?
Short history of Poland's Coat of arms

We all know the poem by Władysław Bełza, “The Catechism of a Polish Child,” written in 1900, and we will all reply without a second thought: the white eagle. Still, it would not come amiss to wonder: why the eagle? by Beata Wolszczak   The legendary  Lech had resolved to settle in the flatlands, where...

The Victors and the Polish Cause at the End of the Great War
104th anniversary of the Polish independence

When exactly 104 years ago, on 11 November 1918, the military operations ceased and the armistice ended the Great War the world was waiting for the accords of the peace conference which was to be held soon to determine the future of the world. A question remains: what did the main victorious powers offer Poland?...

Lwów is a city with a rebellious nature
An interview with Dr. Damian Markowski

Multi-nationality is an integral part of the landscape of Central and Eastern Europe. I really wished to avoid writing a one-dimensional book based on one narrative, even if it coincided with the way my compatriots would like to see the events of 1918 in Lwów, says Damian Markowski, the author of the book about Polish-Ukrainian...

The Mark, the Lech and the Zloty, or how Poland’s currency was born
When the Bank of Poland began issuing the Zloty

In 1916, it was the third year of the Great War, and there was no end in sight to the military struggle. All sides of the conflict were looking for new allies, although it was not so much about gaining more political supporters as it was about, above all, gaining more soldiers. For soldiers were...

Chicago, the Polish city
An interview with Professor Dominic Pacyga

An estimated 3 million Poles left their country between 1850 and 1914. The most common direction of their emigration was Chicago in the United States. As a result, the second biggest population of Polish people still lives in this city today, outside Poland! How did it happen that people from Polish lands started to migrate...

Żwirko and Wigura, or a catastrophe in the skies
90th anniversary of plane crash

Pilot Franciszek Żwirko and designer Stanisław Wigura won Challenge 1932 in Berlin, the world’s most important sports aviation competition and became national heroes. Then, just a dozen days after their success, they both died in a plane crash on 11 September 1932. by Piotr Bejrowski   Franciszek Żwirko, the oldest of the pair, was born...

Jan Długosz: father of Polish historiography
The 541th anniversary of Jan Długosz’s death

Historian, chronicler, heraldry expert, geographer, diplomat and educator of Polish kings, Jan Długosz was undoubtedly one of the greatest historiographers of the Middle Ages. This author of the monumental 12 volume Annals or Chronicles of the Famous Kingdom of Poland died on 19 May 1480 in Kraków. by Piotr Bejrowski   Długosz was born in...
short news_
Check out all the articles on our website Check out all
the articles > >
featured_ > > SEE ALL

Germany sold a painting stolen from Poland. "Scandalous situation"

The German auction house Grisebach has sold a painting stolen from the National Museum in Warsaw. Despite the intervention of the Polish authorities, Kandinsky’s composition went to a new buyer for a price of 310,000 euros. Wassily Kandinsky’s watercolour ‘Ohne Titel – Lot 31’ was stolen from Warsaw’s National Museum from the exhibition ‘Concepts of...
interviews_ > > SEE ALL

Mieczysław Jałowiecki - a forgotten hero of the battle for Polish Gdańsk

Two trusted companions, a gun and a determination to revive the nation after the hardships of war and partition were all that Mieczysław Jałowiecki had when he embarked on a seemingly impossible diplomatic mission to Gdańsk. His courageous efforts would help Poland bolster its new found identity in Gdansk and through his vision and drive...
essays_ > > SEE ALL

Władysław Szpilman: How did the pianist survive the war?

(5 December 1911 – 6 July 2000)

Władysław Szpilman is currently the most well-known of the Warsaw Robinsons. How did he survive in German-occupied Warsaw? by Michał Studniarek   In 1939, Władysław Szpilman resided in the center of Warsaw on Śliska Street with his parents, Samuel and Edwarda, his brother Henryk and his two sisters – Regina and Halina. Władysław was working...
reviews_ > > SEE ALL

Józef Beck. Biografia [Józef Beck. Biography]

review of the book by Marek Kornat and Mariusz Wołos

In historiography, he is usually shown as a politician and diplomat. He himself felt most of all a soldier who on Piłsudski’s orders assumed responsibility for Poland’s foreign policy. Unlike Piłsudski, Józef Beck lost the most important battle – for the historical memory of his countrymen. Will this book by Marek Kornat and Mariusz Wołos...

VIDEOS

The Battle of Warsaw 1920-2020

17 August 2020
polishhistory
WATCH
The Battle of Warsaw 1920-2020
The Second World War and its Consequences from the Perspective of 75 Years since its End. Panel 2
The Second World War and its Consequences from the Perspective of 75 Years since its End. Panel 1
CLICK HERE FOR MORE VIDEOS

MEETINGS

About

Polishhistory is an online project of the Polish History Museum in Warsaw. It is primarily addressed to all those interested in Polish and Central European history. Our aim is to build a community consisting of those professionally involved in research and of those interested in the outcomes of research, essentially, all lovers of history. The...
> > READ MORE