Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland were three partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that took place between 1772 and 1795, toward the end of the 18th century. The partitions ended the existence of the state, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland and Lithuania for 123 years. The partitions were conducted by the Habsburg monarchy, the Kingdom of Prussia, and the Russian Empire, which divided up the Commonwealth lands among themselves progressively in the process of territorial seizures and annexations.
The First Partition was decided on August 5, 1772, after the Bar Confederation lost the war with Russia. The Second Partition occurred in the aftermath of the Polish–Russian War of 1792 and the Targowica Confederation when Russian and Prussian troops entered the Commonwealth and the partition treaty was signed during the Grodno Sejm on January 23, 1793. The Third Partition took place on October 24, 1795, in reaction to the unsuccessful Polish Kościuszko Uprising the previous year. With this partition, the Commonwealth ceased to exist.
In English, the term "Partitions of Poland" is sometimes used geographically as toponymy, to mean the three parts that the partitioning powers divided the Commonwealth into, namely: the Austrian Partition, the Prussian Partition and the Russian Partition. In Polish, there are two separate words for the two meanings. The consecutive acts of dividing and annexation of Poland are referred to as rozbiór, while the term zabór refers to parts of the Commonwealth that were annexed in 1772–1795 and which became part of Imperial Russia, Prussia, or Austria. Following the Congress of Vienna in 1815, the borders of the three partitioned sectors were redrawn; the Austrians established Galicia in the Austrian partition, whereas the Russians gained Warsaw from Prussia and formed an autonomous polity known as Congress Poland in the Russian partition.
In Polish historiography, the term [|"Fourth Partition of Poland"] has also been used, in reference to any subsequent annexation of Polish lands by foreign invaders. Depending on source and historical period, this could mean the events of 1815, or 1832 and 1846, or 1939. The term "Fourth Partition" in a temporal sense can also mean the diaspora communities that played an important political role in re-establishing the Polish sovereign state after 1918.
History
During the reign of Władysław IV, the liberum veto was developed, a policy of parliamentary procedure based on the assumption of the political equality of every "gentleman/Polish nobleman", with the corollary that unanimous consent was needed for all measures. A single member of parliament's belief that a measure was injurious to his own constituency, even after the act had been approved, became enough to strike the act. Thus it became increasingly difficult to undertake action. The liberum veto also provided openings for foreign diplomats to get their ways, through bribing nobles to exercise it. Thus, one could characterise Poland–Lithuania in its final period before the partitions as already in a state of disorder and not a completely sovereign state, and almost as a vassal state, with Polish kings effectively chosen in diplomatic maneuvers between the great powers Prussia, Austria, Russia, and France. This applies particularly to the last Commonwealth King Stanisław August Poniatowski, who for some time had been a lover of Russian Empress Catherine the Great.In 1730, the neighbors of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, namely Prussia, Austria and Russia, signed a secret agreement to maintain the status quo: specifically, to ensure that the Commonwealth laws would not change. Their alliance later became known in Poland as the "Alliance of the Three Black Eagles", because all three states used a black eagle as a state symbol. The Commonwealth had been forced to rely on Russia for protection against the rising Kingdom of Prussia, which demanded a slice of the northwest in order to unite its Western and Eastern portions; this would leave the Commonwealth with a Baltic coast only in Latvia and Lithuania. Catherine had to use diplomacy to win Austria to her side.
The Commonwealth had remained neutral in the Seven Years' War, yet it sympathized with the alliance of France, Austria, and Russia, and allowed Russian troops access to its western lands as bases against Prussia. Frederick II retaliated by ordering enough Polish currency counterfeited to severely affect the Polish economy. Through the Polish nobles whom Russia controlled and the Russian Minister to Warsaw, ambassador and Prince Nicholas Repnin, Empress Catherine the Great forced a constitution on the Commonwealth at the so-called Repnin Sejm of 1767, named after ambassador Repnin, who effectively dictated the terms of that Sejm. This new constitution undid the reforms made in 1764 under Stanisław II. The liberum veto and all the old abuses of the last one and a half centuries were guaranteed as unalterable parts of this new constitution. Repnin also demanded the Russian protection of the rights of peasants in private estates of Polish and Lithuanian noblemen, religious freedom for the Protestant and Orthodox Christians and the political freedoms for Protestants, Orthodox Christians and Eastern Catholics, including their right to occupy all state positions, including a royal one. The next king could be a member of the Russian ruling dynasty now. The Sejm approved this. Resulting reaction among some of Poland's Roman Catholics, as well as the deep resentment of Russian intervention in the Commonwealth's domestic affairs including the exile to Russia of the top Roman Catholic bishops, the members of the Polish Senate, led to the War of the Confederation of Bar of 1768–1772, formed in Bar, where the Poles tried to expel Russian forces from Commonwealth territory. The irregular and poorly commanded Polish forces had little chance in the face of the regular Russian army and suffered a major defeat. Adding to the chaos was a Ukrainian Cossack and peasant rebellion in the east, which erupted in 1768 and resulted in massacres of Polish noblemen, Jews, Uniates, ethnic minorities and Catholic priests, before it was put down by Russian and governmental Polish troops. This uprising led to the intervention of the Ottoman Empire, supported by Roman Catholic France and Austria. Bar confederation and France promised Podolia and Volhynia and the protectorate over the Commonwealth to the Ottoman Empire for armed support.
In 1769, the Habsburg monarchy annexed a small territory of Spisz and in 1770 it annexed Nowy Sącz and Nowy Targ. These territories had been a bone of contention between Poland and Hungary, which was a part of the Monarchy. Nevertheless, the Ottoman Empire, the Bar confederation, bolstered by French volunteers, were defeated by Russian and Polish government forces. As Russia moved into the Crimea and the Danubian Principalities, King Frederick II of Prussia and Maria Theresa were worried that the defeat of the Ottoman Empire would severely upset the balance of power in Eastern Europe. Frederick II began to construct the partition to rebalance the power in Eastern Europe.
First Partition
In February 1772, the agreement of partition was signed in Vienna. Early in August, Russian, Prussian and Austrian troops occupied the provinces agreed upon among themselves. However, fighting continued as Bar confederation troops and French volunteers refused to lay down their arms. On August 5, 1772, the occupation manifesto was issued, to the dismay of the weak and exhausted Polish state; the partition treaty was ratified by its signatories on September 22, 1772.Frederick II of Prussia was elated with his success; Prussia took most of Royal Prussia that stood between its possessions in Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg, as well as Ermland, northern areas of Greater Poland along the Noteć River, and parts of Kuyavia.
Despite token criticism of the partition from Empress Maria Theresa, Austrian statesman Wenzel Anton, Prince of Kaunitz-Rietberg, was proud of wresting as large a share as he did, with the rich salt mines of Bochnia and Wieliczka. To Austria fell Zator and Oświęcim, part of Lesser Poland embracing parts of the counties of Kraków and Sandomir and the whole of Galicia, less the city of Kraków.
Empress Catherine II of Russia was also satisfied despite the loss of Galicia to the Habsburg monarchy. By this "diplomatic document", Russia received Polish territory east of the line formed roughly by the Dvina and Dnieper rivers, including Polish Livonia and parts of the eastern Grand Duchy of Lithuania, including the cities of Vitebsk, Polotsk, and Mstislavl.
File:Jan_Matejko_-_Upadek_Polski_.jpg|thumb|upright=1.4|Rejtan at Sejm 1773, oil on canvas by Jan Matejko, 1866,, Royal Castle in Warsaw
By this partition, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth lost about 30% of its territory and half of its population, of which a large portion had not been ethnically Polish. By seizing northwestern Poland, Prussia instantly gained control over 80% of the Commonwealth's total foreign trade. Through levying enormous customs duties, Prussia accelerated the collapse of the Commonwealth.
After having occupied their respective territories, the three partitioning powers demanded that King Stanisław and the Sejm approve their action. When no help was forthcoming and the armies of the combined nations occupied Warsaw to compel by force of arms the calling of the assembly, the only alternative was passive submission to their will. The so-called Partition Sejm, with Russian military forces threatening the opposition, on September 18, 1773, signed the treaty of cession, renouncing all claims of the Commonwealth to the occupied territories.
In 1772, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was invited to present recommendations for a new constitution for the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the Considerations on the Government of Poland, which was to be his last major political work.