History of Galicia (Eastern Europe)


With the arrival of the Hungarians into the heart of the Central European Plain around 899, Slavic tribes of Vistulans, White Croats, and Lendians found themselves under Hungarian rule. In 955 those areas north of the Carpathian Mountains constituted an autonomous part of the Duchy of Bohemia and remained so until around 972, when the first Polish territorial claims began to emerge. This area was mentioned in 981, when Vladimir the Great of Kievan Rus' claimed the area on his westward way. In the 11th century the area belonged to Poland, then reverted to Kievan Rus'. However, at the end of the 12th century the Hungarian claims to the principality turned up. Finally Casimir III of Poland annexed it in 1340–1349. Low Germans from Prussia and Middle Germany settled parts of northern and western Galicia from the 13th to 18th centuries, although the vast majority of the historic province remained independent from German and Austrian rule.
The territory was settled by the East Slavs in the Early Middle Ages and, in the 12th century, the Rurikid principality of Galicia was formed, and was merged at the end of the century with the neighboring principality of Volhynia into the Principality of Galicia–Volhynia that existed for the next century and half. By 1352, when the principality was partitioned between the Polish Kingdom and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, most of Galicia belonged to the Polish Crown, where it still remained after the 1569 union between Poland and Lithuania. Upon the partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1772 the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, or simply Galicia, became the largest, most populous, and northernmost province of the Austrian Empire, where it remained until the dissolution of Austria-Hungary at the end of World War I in 1918.

Tribal area

The region has a turbulent history. In Roman times the region was populated by various tribes of Celto-Germanic admixture, including Celtic-based tribes – like the Galice or "Gaulics" and Bolihinii or "Volhynians" – the Lugians and Cotini of Celtic, Vandals and Goths of Germanic origins. Beginning with the Wandering of the nations, the great migration coincident with the fall of the Roman Empire, various groups of nomadic people invaded the area:
Overall, Slavs came to dominate the Celtic-German population.

Red Ruthenia

In 891–892, the territories of the White and Red Croats came under the control of Great Moravia, a Slavic state. The region of what later became known as Galicia appears to have been incorporated, in large part, into the Empire of Great Moravia. It is first attested in the Primary Chronicle in A.D. 981, when Vladimir the Great of Kievan Rus' took over the Red Ruthenian strongholds in his military campaign on the border with the land of the Lendians, incorporated into the Duchy of Polans, and the land of the White Croats, ruled by the Duchy of Bohemia.
In the following century, the area shifted briefly to Poland and then back to Kievan Rus'. As one of many successors to Kievan Rus', the Principality of Galicia existed from 1087 until 1199, when Roman the Great finally managed to unite it with Volhynia in the state of Galicia–Volhynia. However, the Hungarian claims to the Ruthenian principality emerged in 1188. Despite the anti-Mongol campaigns of Daniel of Galicia, who was crowned the king of Galicia–Volhynia, his state occasionally paid tribute to the Golden Horde. Daniel moved his capital from Galicia to Kholm, and his son Leo moved it to Lviv. Daniel's dynasty also attempted to gain papal and broader support in Europe for an alliance against the Mongols, but proved incapable of competing with the rising powers of Great Duchy of Lithuania and Poland.
At the start of the 13th century, the king of Galicia–Volhynia, Roman Mstislavich, became the main military ally of the Byzantine Empire led by Alexios III, who referred to him as "igemon of Galicia". Roman also married Alexio's niece, the elder daughter of the overthrown emperor Isaak II. The relation with Byzantium helped to stabilize Galicia's relations with the Russian population of the Lower Dniester and the Lower Danube.

14th-Century wars

A succession wars were fought in the years 1340–1392 concerning succession to the rule of the Principality of Galicia–Volhynia. After Boleslaw-Yuri II was poisoned by local nobles in 1340, both the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland advanced claims over the principality. After a prolonged conflict, Galicia–Volhynia was divided between Poland and Lithuania and the principality ceased to exist as an independent state. Poland acquired a territory of approximately with 200,000 inhabitants.

Galicia under the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

After 1346, the region comprised a Polish possession divided into a number of voivodeships. This began an era of Polish settlement among the Ruthenian population. Armenian and Jewish immigration to the region also occurred in large numbers. Numerous castles were built during this time and some new cities were founded: Stanisławów and Krystynopol.
Galicia was many times subjected to incursions by Tartars and Ottoman Turkey in the 16th and 17th centuries, devastated during the Khmelnytsky Uprising and the Russo-Polish War, disrupted by Swedish invasions during The Deluge and Great Northern War of the early 18th century.

Galicia

Princes

  • Roman the Great, prince of Galicia–Volhynia united Galicia and Volhynia into a single principality
  • Daniel of Galicia, prince of Galicia–Volhynia, king of Galicia-Volhynia, moved the capital from Galicia to Kholm in 1240.
  • Leo I of Galicia, prince of Galicia–Volhynia, moved the capital from Kholm to Lviv in 1272.
  • Yuri I of Galicia, prince of Galicia–Volhynia
  • Andrew of Galicia and Leo II of Galicia, the last Ruthenian princes of Galicia–Volhynia
  • Yuri II Boleslav, Mazovian-Ruthenian prince of Galicia–Volhynia, ruled with Maria, Andrew's and Leo's II sister.
  • Liubartas, Lithuanian prince of Galicia and prince of Volhynia, prince of eastern Volhynia.
After the death of Yuri II, Galicia was gradually annexed by the Kingdom of Poland, between 1340 and 1366, during the reign of Casimir III of Poland.

Kings

In 1772, Galicia was the largest part of the area annexed by the Habsburg monarchy in the First Partition of Poland. All annexed territories were organized as the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, in order to underline traditional Hungarian claims to the region. However, a large portion of non-galician and ethnically Polish lands to the west was also incorporated by the same annexation, and added to the province, which changed the geographical reference of the term Galicia, expanding it much to the west. Lviv served as capital of Austrian Galicia, which was dominated by the Polish aristocracy, despite the fact that the population of the eastern half of the province was mostly Ukrainian. In addition to the Polish aristocracy and gentry who inhabited almost all parts of Galicia, and the Ruthenians in the east, there existed a large Jewish population, also more heavily concentrated in the eastern parts of the province.
The newly arrived Austrians were shocked by the relationships between nobles and peasants in the former Polish territory. The peasants were seen, by the Austrians, as being treated as slaves over whom the nobles had limitless power, and examples of the nobles' alleged barbarism and "wildness", described with "artistic liberty", were distributed in the Austrian press and pamphlets in order to legitimize Habsburg regime in Galicia. The new Habsburg rulers and their supporters thus portrayed themselves as civilizing those whom they described as the savage Polish nobility. Blaming the Polish nobility for Galicia's economic backwardness, the Austrian rulers brought in Austrian Germans and Germanized Czechs to reform the province; until 1849 no native Galician was appointed vice-governor. In 1786, Polish laws were abolished and Austrian code introduced instead; all levels of administration were staffed by German speakers, while major urban centers were filled with Austrian soldiers. During these first decades of Austrian rule, while Galicia was firmly governed from Vienna, many significant reforms were carried out by a bureaucracy. The aristocracy was guaranteed its rights, but these rights were considerably circumscribed. The former serfs were no longer mere chattel, but became subjects of law and were granted certain personal freedoms, such as the right to marry without the lord's permission. Their labour obligations were defined and limited, and they could bypass the lords and appeal to the imperial courts for justice. The Eastern Rite "Uniate" Church, which primarily served the Ruthenians, was renamed the Greek Catholic Church to bring it onto a par with the Roman Catholic Church; it was given seminaries, and eventually, a Metropolitan. Although unpopular with the aristocracy, among the common folk, Polish and Ukrainian/Ruthenian alike, these reforms created a reservoir of good will toward the emperor which lasted almost to the end of Austrian rule. At the same time, however, Austria extracted from Galicia considerable wealth and conscripted large numbers of the peasant population into its armed services.
In 1795, after the Third Partition of Poland, newly annexed polish territory was named "West Galicia" in order to legitimize the annexation. That area was lost in 1809, by the Treaty of Schönbrunn.