Augustus III of Poland
Augustus III was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1734 until 1763, as well as Elector of Saxony in the Holy Roman Empire from 1733 until 1763 where he was known as Frederick Augustus II. The only legitimate son of Augustus II of Poland, he followed his father's example by joining the Roman Catholic Church in 1712. In 1719 he married Maria Josepha, daughter of Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor, became Elector of Saxony on his father's death in 1733; as a candidate for the Polish crown, he secured the support of Emperor Charles VI by assenting to the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713, designed to preserve the integrity of the Habsburg inheritance, that of Russian Empress Anna by supporting Russia's claim to Courland. Chosen king by a small minority of electors on 5 October 1733, he drove his rival, the former Polish king Stanisław I, into exile, he was crowned in Kraków on 17 January 1734, was recognised as king in Warsaw in June 1736. Augustus gave Saxon support to Austria against Prussia in the War of the Austrian Succession and again in the Seven Years' War, both of which resulted in Saxony being conquered and occupied by Prussia.
His last years were marked by the increasing influence of the Czartoryski and Poniatowski families, by the intervention of Catherine the Great in Polish affairs. His rule increased the country's dependence on its neighbours; the Russian Empire, which had assisted him in his bid to succeed his father, prevented him from installing his family on the Polish throne, supporting instead the aristocrat Stanisław August Poniatowski. During his reign, Augustus spent little time in Poland and was more interested in ease and pleasure than in affairs of state; the reign of Augustus witnessed one of the greatest periods of disorder in Polish history. Royal titles in Latin: Augustus tertius, Dei gratia rex Poloniae, magnus dux Lithuaniæ, Russiæ, Prussiæ, Masoviæ, Samogitiæ, Kijoviæ, Volhiniæ, Podoliæ, Podlachiæ, Livoniæ, Smolensciæ, Severiæ, Czerniechoviæque, nec non-hæreditarius dux Saxoniæ et princeps elector. English translation: August III, by the grace of God, King of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania, Prussia, Samogitia, Volhynia, Podlaskie, Smolensk, Severia and hereditary Duke of Saxony and Prince-Elector.
Augustus was the only legitimate son of Augustus II the Strong, Prince-Elector of Saxony and king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth who belonged to the Albertine line of the House of Wettin. His mother was Christiane Eberhardine of Brandenburg-Bayreuth. Groomed to succeed his father as king of Poland, Augustus converted to Catholicism in 1712. Faced with a hereditary Catholic succession for Saxony and Hanover attempted to oust Saxony from the directorship of the Protestant body in the Reichstag, but Saxony managed to retain the directorship. Upon the death of Augustus II in 1733, Augustus inherited the Saxon electorate and was elected to the Polish throne, with the support of the Russian Empire and the Holy Roman Empire, he was opposed by the forces of Stanisław I Leszczyński, who had usurped the throne with Swedish support during the Great Northern War. Reigning from 1706 until 1709, Stanisław was overthrown after the Swedish defeat at Poltava. Returning from exile in 1733 with the support of Louis XV of France, Stanisław sparked the War of the Polish Succession, which concluded in 1738 with a victory for Augustus's Russian and Imperial allies.
As King, Augustus was uninterested in the affairs of his Polish–Lithuanian dominion, focusing instead on hunting, the opera, the collection of artwork. He spent less than three years of his thirty-year reign in Poland, where political feuding between the House of Czartoryski and the Potocki paralysed the Sejm, fostering internal political anarchy and weakening the Commonwealth. Augustus delegated most of his powers and responsibilities in the Commonwealth to Heinrich von Brühl, who served in effect as the viceroy of Poland. Augustus's eldest surviving son, Frederick Christian of Saxony, succeeded his father as Elector. A Russian-supported coup d'état in Poland, instigated by the Czartoryskis, resulted in the election of Stanisław August Poniatowski as king of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania on 7 September 1764. Reigning under the name Stanisław II, Poniatowski was the son of the elder Stanisław Poniatowski, a powerful Polish noble and a onetime agent of Stanisław I. August was portrayed by Ernst Dernburg in the 1941 film Friedemann Bach.
In Dresden on 20 August 1719, Augustus married Archduchess Maria Josepha of Austria, the eldest child of Joseph I, the Holy Roman Emperor. They had sixteen children: Frederick Augustus Franz Xavier Joseph Augustus Wilhelm Frederick Franz Xavier Johann Nepomuk Frederick Christian Leopold Johann Georg Franz Xavier, successor to his father as Elector of Saxony Stillborn daughter Maria Amalia Christina Franziska Xaveria Flora Walburga.
Habsburg Monarchy
The Habsburg Monarchy – Habsburg Empire, Austrian Monarchy or Danube Monarchy – is an unofficial umbrella term among historians for the countries and provinces that were ruled by the junior Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg between 1526 and 1780 and by the successor branch of Habsburg-Lorraine until 1918. The Monarchy was a typical composite state composed of territories within and outside the Holy Roman Empire, united only in the person of the monarch; the dynastic capital was Vienna, except from 1583 to 1611. From 1804 to 1867 the Habsburg Monarchy was formally unified as the Austrian Empire, from 1867 to 1918 as the Austro-Hungarian Empire; the head of the Austrian branch of the House of Habsburg was elected Holy Roman Emperor: from 1452 until the Empire's dissolution in 1806, Charles VII of Bavaria was the only Holy Roman Emperor, not Habsburg ruler of Austria. The two entities were never coterminous, as the Habsburg Monarchy covered many lands beyond the Holy Roman Empire, most of the Empire was ruled by other dynasties.
This Austrian Habsburg Monarchy must not be confused with the House of Habsburg, existing since the 11th century, whose vast domains were split up in 1521 between this "junior" Austrian branch and the "senior" Spanish branch. The monarchy had no official name. Instead, various names included: Habsburg Monarchy Habsburg Empire Habsburg/Austrian Hereditary Lands Austrian Monarchy Danubian Monarchy The Habsburg family originated with the Habsburg Castle in modern Switzerland, after 1279 came to rule in Austria; the Habsburg family grew to European prominence with the marriage and adoption treaty by Emperor Maximilian I at the First Congress of Vienna in 1515, the subsequent death of adopted Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in 1526. Following the death of Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in the Battle of Mohács against the Turks, his brother-in-law Archduke Ferdinand of Austria was elected the next King of Bohemia and Hungary. Names of the territory that became Austria-Hungary: Habsburg monarchy: This was an unofficial umbrella term, but frequent, name during that time.
The entity had no official name. Austrian Empire: This was the official name. Note that the German version is Kaisertum Österreich, i.e. the English translation empire refers to a territory ruled by an emperor, not just to a "widespreading domain". Austria-Hungary: This name was used in the international relations, though the official name was Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. An unofficial popular name was the Danubian Monarchy often used was the term Doppel-Monarchie meaning two states under one crowned ruler. Crownlands or crown lands: This is the name of all the individual parts of the Austrian Empire, of Austria-Hungary from 1867 on; the Kingdom of Hungary was not considered a "crownland" after the establishment of Austria-Hungary 1867, so that the "crownlands" became identical with what was called the Kingdoms and Lands represented in the Imperial Council. The Hungarian parts of the Empire were called "Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen" or "Lands of Holy Stephen's Crown"; the Bohemian Lands were called "Lands of the St. Wenceslaus' Crown".
Names of some smaller territories: Austrian lands or "Archduchies of Austria" – Lands up and below the Enns: This is the historical name of the parts of the Archduchy of Austria that became the present-day Republic of Austria on 12 November 1918. Modern day Austria is a semi-federal republic of nine states that are: Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Styria, Carinthia and Burgenland and the Capital of Vienna, a state of its own. Burgenland came to Austria in 1921 from Hungary. Salzburg became Austrian in 1816 after the Napoleonic wars. Vienna, Austria's capital became a state 1 January 1922, after being residence and capital of the Austrian Empire for the Habsburg monarchs for centuries. Upper and Lower Austria were split into "Austria above the Enns" and "Austria below the Enns". Upper Austria was enlarged after the Treaty of Teschen following the "War of the Bavarian Succession" by the so-called Innviertel part of Bavaria. Hereditary Lands or German Hereditary Lands or Austrian Hereditary Lands: In a narrower sense these were the "original" Habsburg Austrian territories, i.e. the Austrian lands and Carniola.
In a wider sense the Lands of the Bohemian Crown were included in the Hereditary lands. The term was replaced by the term "Crownlands" in the 1849 March Constitution, but it was used afterwards; the Er
Italians
The Italians are a Romance ethnic group and nation native to the Italian peninsula and its neighbouring insular territories. Most Italians share a common culture, ancestry or language. All Italian nationals are citizens of the Italian Republic, regardless of ancestry or nation of residence and may be distinguished from people of Italian descent without Italian citizenship and from ethnic Italians living in territories adjacent to the Italian Peninsula without Italian citizenship; the majority of Italian nationals are speakers of a regional variety thereof. However, many of them speak another regional or minority language native to Italy. In 2017, in addition to about 55 million Italians in Italy, Italian-speaking autonomous groups are found in neighbouring nations: a quarter million are in Switzerland, a large population is in France, the entire population of San Marino, there are smaller groups in Slovenia and Croatia in Istria and Dalmatia; because of the wide-ranging diaspora, about 5 million Italian citizens and nearly 80 million people of full or partial Italian ancestry live outside their own homeland, which include the 62.5% of Argentina's population, 1/3 of Uruguayans, 40% of Paraguayans, 15% of Brazilians, people in other parts of Europe bordering Italy, the Americas and the Middle East.
Italians have influenced and contributed to diverse fields, notably the arts and music and technology, cuisine, jurisprudence and business both abroad and worldwide. Furthermore, Italian people are known for their localism, both regionalist and municipalist; the Latin name Italia according to Strabo's Geographica was used by Greeks to indicate the southwestern tip of the Italian peninsula, corresponding to the current region of Calabria, from the strait of Messina to the line connecting the gulf of Salerno and gulf of Taranto. It most originates with Oscan Víteliú, meaning "land of young cattle"; the bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. The name was extended to include all the Italian peninsula south of the Rubicon, still by the end of the 1st century BC, to all of the peninsula and beyond. Latin Italicus as a substantive meaning "a man of Italy" is first recorded in Pliny the Elder, Letters 9.23.
The adjective italianus, from which are derived the Italian name of the Italians is medieval. The Italian peninsula was divided into a multitude of tribal or ethnic territory prior to the Roman conquest of Italy in the 3rd century BC. After a series of wars between Greeks and Etruscans, the Latins, with Rome as their capital, gained the ascendancy by 272 BC, completed the conquest of the Italian peninsula by 218 BC; this period of unification was followed by one of conquest in the Mediterranean, beginning with the First Punic War against Carthage. In the course of the century-long struggle against Carthage, the Romans conquered Sicily and Corsica. In 146 BC, at the conclusion of the Third Punic War, with Carthage destroyed and its inhabitants enslaved, Rome became the dominant power in the Mediterranean; the process of Italian unification, the associated Romanization, culminated in 88 BC, when, in the aftermath of the Social War, Rome granted its Italian allies full rights in Roman society, extending Roman citizenship to all Italic peoples.
From its inception, Rome was a republican city-state, but four famous civil conflicts destroyed the republic: Lucius Cornelius Sulla against Gaius Marius and his son, Julius Caesar against Pompey, Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus against Mark Antony and Octavian, Mark Antony against Octavian. Octavian, the final victor, was accorded the title of Augustus by the Senate and thereby became the first Roman emperor. Augustus created for the first time an administrative region called Italia with inhabitants called "Italicus populus", stretching from the Alps to Sicily: for this reason historians like Emilio Gentile called him Father of Italians. In the 1st century BC, Italia was still a collection of territories with different political statuses; some cities, called municipia, had some independence from Rome, while others, the coloniae, were founded by the Romans themselves. Around 7 BC, Augustus divided Italy into eleven regiones. During the Crisis of the Third Century the Roman Empire nearly collapsed under the combined pressures of invasions, military anarchy and civil wars, hyperinflation.
In 284, emperor Diocletian restored political stability. The importance of Rome declined; the seats of the Caesars were Augusta Treverorum for Constantius Chlorus and Sirmium (on the Riv
Great Northern War
The Great Northern War was a conflict in which a coalition led by the Tsardom of Russia contested the supremacy of the Swedish Empire in Northern and Eastern Europe. The initial leaders of the anti-Swedish alliance were Peter I of Russia, Frederick IV of Denmark–Norway and Augustus II the Strong of Saxony–Poland–Lithuania. Frederick IV and Augustus II were defeated by Sweden, under Charles XII, forced out of the alliance in 1700 and 1706 but rejoined it in 1709 after the defeat of Charles XII at the Battle of Poltava. George I of Great Britain and of Brunswick-Lüneburg joined the coalition in 1714 for Hanover and in 1717 for Britain, Frederick William I of Brandenburg-Prussia joined it in 1715. Charles XII led the Swedish army. Swedish allies included Holstein-Gottorp, several Polish magnates under Stanisław I Leszczyński and Cossacks under the Ukrainian Hetman Ivan Mazepa; the Ottoman Empire temporarily hosted Charles XII of Sweden and intervened against Peter I. The war began when an alliance of Denmark–Norway, Saxony and Russia, sensing an opportunity as Sweden was ruled by the young Charles XII, declared war on the Swedish Empire and launched a threefold attack on Swedish Holstein-Gottorp, Swedish Livonia, Swedish Ingria.
Sweden parried the Danish and Russian attacks at Travendal and Narva and in a counter-offensive pushed Augustus II's forces through the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth to Saxony, dethroning Augustus on the way and forcing him to acknowledge defeat in the Treaty of Altranstädt. The treaty secured the extradition and execution of Johann Reinhold Patkul, architect of the alliance seven years earlier. Meanwhile, the forces of Peter I had recovered from defeat at Narva and gained ground in Sweden's Baltic provinces, where they cemented Russian access to the Baltic Sea by founding Saint Petersburg in 1703. Charles XII moved from Saxony into Russia to confront Peter, but the campaign ended in 1709 with the destruction of the main Swedish army at the decisive Battle of Poltava and Charles' exile in the Ottoman town of Bender; the Ottoman Empire defeated the Russian-Moldavian army in the Pruth River Campaign, but that peace treaty was in the end without great consequence to Russia's position. After Poltava, the anti-Swedish coalition revived and subsequently Hanover and Prussia joined it.
The remaining Swedish forces in plague-stricken areas south and east of the Baltic Sea were evicted, with the last city, falling in 1710. The coalition members partitioned most of the Swedish dominions among themselves, destroying the Swedish dominium maris baltici. Sweden proper was invaded from the west by Denmark–Norway and from the east by Russia, which had occupied Finland by 1714. Sweden defeated the Danish invaders at the Battle of Helsingborg. Charles XII opened up a Norwegian front but was killed in Fredriksten in 1718; the war ended with the defeat of Sweden, leaving Russia as the new dominant power in the Baltic region and as a new major force in European politics. The Western powers, Great Britain and France, became caught up in the separate War of the Spanish Succession, which broke out over the Bourbon Philip of Anjou's succession to the Spanish throne and a possible joining of France and Spain; the formal conclusion of the Great Northern War came with the Swedish-Hanoverian and Swedish-Prussian Treaties of Stockholm, the Dano-Swedish Treaty of Frederiksborg, the Russo-Swedish Treaty of Nystad.
By these treaties Sweden ceded her exemption from the Sound Dues and lost the Baltic provinces and the southern part of Swedish Pomerania. The peace treaties ended her alliance with Holstein-Gottorp. Hanover gained Bremen-Verden, Brandenburg-Prussia incorporated the Oder estuary, Russia secured the Baltic Provinces, Denmark strengthened her position in Schleswig-Holstein. In Sweden, the absolute monarchy had come to an end with the death of Charles XII, Sweden's Age of Liberty began. Between the years of 1560 and 1658, Sweden created a Baltic empire centred on the Gulf of Finland and comprising the provinces of Karelia, Ingria and Livonia. During the Thirty Years' War Sweden gained tracts in Germany as well, including Western Pomerania, the Duchy of Bremen, Verden. During the same period Sweden conquered Norwegian provinces north of the Sound; these victories may be ascribed to a well-trained army, which despite its comparatively small size, was far more professional than most continental armies, to a modernization of administration in the course of the 17th century, which enabled the monarchy to harness the resources of the country and its empire in an effective way.
Fighting in the field, the Swedish army was able, in particular, to make quick, sustained marches across large tracts of land and to maintain a high rate of small arms fire due to proficient military drill. However, the Swedish state proved unable to support and maintain its army in a prolonged war. Campaigns on the continent had been proposed on the basis that the army would be financially self-supporting through plunder and taxation of newly gained land, a concept shared by most major powers of the period; the cost of the warfare proved to be much higher than the occupied countries could fund, Sweden's coffers, resources in manpower, were drained in the course of long conflicts. The foreign interventions in Russia during the Time of Troubles resulted in Swedish gains in the Treaty of
Lubusz Voivodeship
Lubusz Voivodeship, or Lubusz Province, is a voivodeship in western Poland. It was created on January 1, 1999, out of the former Gorzów Wielkopolski and Zielona Góra Voivodeships, pursuant to the Polish local government reforms adopted in 1998; the province's name recalls the historic Lubusz Land, although parts of the voivodeship belong to the historic regions of Silesia, Greater Poland and Lusatia. Until 1945, it formed the Neumark within the Prussian Province of Brandenburg; the functions of regional capital are shared between two cities: Gorzów Wielkopolski and Zielona Góra. Gorzów serves as the seat of the centrally appointed voivode or governor, while Zielona Góra is the seat of the elected regional assembly and the executive elected by that assembly, headed by a marshal; the region is flat, with many lakes and woodlands. In the south, around Zielona Góra, grapes are cultivated. Lubusz Voivodeship borders West Pomeranian Voivodeship to the north, Greater Poland Voivodeship to the east, Lower Silesian Voivodeship to the south, Germany to the west.
By conquest the first leaders of the Polans, Mieszko I and Boleslaw I added a number of surrounding territories to the newly established core Polish state, Lebus Land or Lubusz in Lusatia came under Polish rule. Part of the historic province was located on the western bank of the Oder River, where the main settlement Lubusz known as the German town of Lebus, was located. In 1226 Lebus Land came under direct jurisdiction of the Holy Roman Empire, around 1250 it was acquired by the Ascanian margraves of Brandenburg; the Lebus Land stayed with Brandenburg throughout (as Electorate within the Holy Roman Empire until 1806, as Prussian Province of Brandenburg since 1815, with Prussia as part of the new Empire of Germany since 1871 and thereafter as a part of the newly created Weimar Republic. In 1945, the conquest of eastern Germany by the Soviet Red Army was followed by the redrawing of Poland's borders; the east part of the Lubusz region was transferred to Poland, where in communist propaganda it was referred to as part of the "Regained" or "Recovered Territories".
That part of the population which had not fled west of the Oder or been killed was expelled, replaced by Poles from central and former eastern Poland. In the administrative reforms of 1998, the original proposals made no provision for a separate Lubusz voivodeship – Gorzów would have been part of West Pomeranian Voivodeship, Zielona Góra would have been in Lower Silesian Voivodeship, other parts of the region were assigned to Greater Poland Voivodeship. However, as a result of popular protests, these proposals were amended to increase the number of voivodeships to 16, leading to the creation of Lubusz Voivodeship; the voivodeship contains 42 towns. These are listed below in descending order of population: Lubusz Voivodeship is divided into 14 counties: 2 city counties and 12 land counties; these are further divided into 83 gminas. The counties are listed in the following table. Protected areas in Lubusz Voivodeship include eight Landscape Parks; these are listed below. Drawa National Park Ujście Warty National Park Ujście Warty Landscape Park Barlinek-Gorzów Landscape Park Gryżyna Landscape Park Krzesin Landscape Park Łagów Landscape Park Muskau Bend Landscape Park Przemęt Landscape Park Pszczew Landscape Park Roman Catholic Diocese of Zielona Góra-Gorzów German exonyms Polish Government Link, Lands conquered by Mieszko I and Boleslaw I Official website of Lubusz Voivodeship - Tourism in Lubuskie - TURYSTYKA
Gmina
The gmina is the principal unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. As of 2010 there were 2,478 gminy throughout the country; the word gmina derives from the German word Gemeinde, meaning "community". The gmina has been the basic unit of territorial division in Poland since 1974, when it replaced the smaller gromada. There are three types of gminy: urban gmina consisting of just one city or town, mixed urban-rural gmina consisting of a town and surrounding villages and countryside; some rural gminy have their seat in a town, outside the gmina's division. For example, the rural Gmina Augustów is administered from the town of Augustów, but does not include the town, as Augustów is an urban type gmina in its own right; the legislative and controlling body of each gmina is the elected municipal council, or in a town: rada miasta. Executive power is held by the directly elected mayor of the municipality, called wójt in rural gminy, burmistrz in most urban and urban-rural gminy, or prezydent in towns with more than 400,000 inhabitants and some others which traditionally use the title.
A gmina may create auxiliary units. In rural areas these are called sołectwa, in towns they may be dzielnice or osiedla and in an urban-rural gmina, the town itself may be designated as an auxiliary unit. For a complete listing of all the gminy in Poland, see List of Polish gminas; each gmina carries out two types of tasks: commissioned ones. Own tasks are public tasks exercised by self-government, which serve to satisfy the needs of the community; the tasks can be twofold: compulsory – where the municipality cannot decline to carry out the tasks, must set up a budget to carry them out in order to provide the inhabitants with the basic public benefits optional – where the municipality can carry them out in accordance with available budgetary means, set out only to specific local needs. Own high objectives include matters such as spatial harmony, real estate management, environmental protection and nature conservation, water management, country roads, public streets, bridges and traffic systems, water supply systems and source, the sewage system, removal of urban waste, water treatment, maintenance of cleanliness and order, sanitary facilities and council waste, supply of electric and thermal energy and gas, public transport, health care, care homes, subsidised housing, public education, cultural facilities including public libraries and other cultural institutions, historic monuments conservation and protection, the sports facilities and tourism including recreational grounds and devices and covered markets, green spaces and public parks, communal graveyards, public order and safety and flood protection with equipment maintenance and storage, maintaining objects and devices of the public utility and administrative buildings, pro-family policy including social support for pregnant women and legal care and popularising the self-government initiatives and cooperation within the commune including with non-governmental organizations, interaction with regional communities from other countries, etc.
Commissioned tasks cover the remaining public tasks resulting from legitimate needs of the state, commissioned by central government for the units of local government to implement. The tasks are handed over on the basis of statutory by-laws and regulations, or by way of agreements between the self-government units and central-government administration. Abbreviations used for voivodeships:LS: Lower Silesian Voivodeship, KP: Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, LBL: Lublin Voivodeship, LBS: Lubusz Voivodeship, ŁD: Łódź Voivodeship, LP: Lesser Poland Voivodeship, MS: Masovian Voivodeship, OP: Opole Voivodeship, SK: Subcarpathian Voivodeship, PD: Podlaskie Voivodeship, PM: Pomeranian Voivodeship, SL: Silesian Voivodeship, ŚWK: Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, WM: Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, GP: Greater Poland Voivodeship, WP: West Pomeranian Voivodeship. Official report from the Central Statistical Office of Poland dated January 1, 2006
Royal city in Poland
In the history of Poland, a royal city or royal town was an urban settlement within the crown lands. The most influential royal cities enjoyed voting rights during the free election period in Poland; these cities were Gdańsk, Kraków, Poznań, Lwów, Toruń, Kamieniec Podolski and Elbląg. Other important royal cities included Gniezno, Płock, Grodno and Piotrków. On April 18, 1791, the Great Sejm adopted the Free Royal Cities Act, included as Article III into the Constitution of May 3, 1791; the law granted a number of privileges for the residents of royal cities. Many of these privileges and rights have been enjoyed by major royal cities, the law equalized all royal cities in this respect, it includes some rights earlier enjoyed only by szlachta. Examples of Polish royal castles and residences found in former royal cities of Poland: Examples of Polish royal cities historic centers include: Royal burgh Royal town Royal free city, Hungary
Poland
Šalčininkai, Lithuania
