12. Return to Poland of Mieszko and Bolesław the Brave - Polish historical sciences towards the areas of western and northern Poland annexed in 1945
The 8th congress will be held in Gniezno under the slogan "Power - crown - territory". Both the place and the main theme of this "medievalists' holiday" refer to the jubilee of the first Polish royal coronation in 1025. But also in 2025, 80 years will have passed since the so-called Recovered Territories. This is a good moment to look at the work of Polish archaeologists, historians and art historians who have taken steps to create scientific, museum and conservation structures in these areas and have finally started researching the past of these lands. For many of them this was unknown territory, they had almost no publications on this subject. Why is this topic worth discussing at the anniversary meeting of medievalists in Gniezno? The annexation of the Western and Northern Lands was carried out under the slogan of returning to the Piast lands, returning to Poland of Piasts. Therefore, if we want to better know and understand not only our past, but also the achievements of our predecessors in research, it is appropriate, in addition to the 1000th ann. of the coronation of Bolesław the Brave, to at least outline the activities of science based on the so-called Piast tradition.
The concept of 'Polish motherlands' developed by Zygmunt Wojciechowski in the pre-war period played its main role after World War II, when, on the one hand, it was implemented within the borders of the Polish People's Republic, and on the other hand, it was the starting point for the activities of the Western Institute in Poznań. However, the paper will serve to outline the socio-political sources of Wojciechowski's concept, related to his political activity before the war - first in the Camp of Greater Poland, and then the Union of Young Nationalists. The scholar's views will be presented against the background of the Western program and the historical policy of the national camp at that time, with particular emphasis on two issues. Firstly, the discussion with German science about the ethnohistorical belonging of Greater Poland to Polish lands, and secondly, the so-called ‘Piast policy’, built in opposition to the internal and external policy of the 'Jagiellonian' Sanation.
The date and place of the paper will be announced soon, along with the detailed schedule of the Congress.
Annexation to Poland of the so-called The Recovered Territories in 1945 was an impulse for creating new tasks for Polish historical sciences. And the history of the Polish state was so arranged that the Middle Ages had the greatest potential for searching for national traditions. Polish scientists, who took steps to create scientific, museum and conservation structures in these areas, also began researching the past of these lands. For many of them this was unknown territory, they had almost no publications on this subject. They had to face the results of earlier German work, developing a new Polish narrative about the past. A similarly pioneering stage took place in the work on securing monuments and remnants of the cultural heritage of these areas. The community of archaeologists, historians, art historians and conservators was not numerous in pre-war Poland, and many died during the war.
2025-09-19 16:00-16:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
Powojenne badania historii średniowiecznego Śląska znalazły się pod przemożnym wpływem idei narodowych czerpanych głównie, choć nie wyłącznie z myśli Romana Dmowskiego. Idee te miały decydujące znaczenie dla doboru tematów, metod badawczych oraz interpretacji wydarzeń. Słowem na warsztat historyków. „Myśl narodowa” narzucała określone tematy a pomijała inne. Inspirowała ale też ograniczała historyków, co prowadziło do jednostronnych uproszczeń, anachronizmów i prezentyzmu. Uzależniała historiografię od aktualnej polityki i skłaniała historyków do wystawiania postaciom z przeszłości swego rodzaju „świadectwa moralności”.
2025-09-19 09:00-09:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
Muzeum Archeologiczne, Oddział Muzeum Miejskiego Wrocławia
One of the key turning points in the history of Silesian archaeology was the year 1945, specifically the early years after the end of World War II. It was then that Polish archaeologists first took possession of, secured, and later “utilised,” everything that survived of the German archaeological heritage produced (over the course of 150 years) for Silesia. This material heritage consisted of collections of artefacts, archival resources, and libraries. This took place in Wrocław, the most important archaeological centre in Silesia. During this period – the “Return of the Western and Northern Lands to the Motherland” – archaeology, particularly that which was taken over, was meant to demonstrate the Slavic and Polish character of Silesia. Therefore, after the initial organization of all the material, the early medieval items were first selected and studied, to the extent allowed by the knowledge of Polish archaeologists at the time.
2025-09-19 17:00-17:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The aim of the paper is to present artifacts from the Middle Ages that have survived for centuries in Lower Silesia in two perspectives. The propaganda one spread in the years 1945-1989, where the communist goverments were "looking for Polishness", clearly distorting historical facts, and the unrestrained way after 1989, which today constitutes many wonderful tourist attractions.
2025-09-19 10:00-10:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The Western Institute (WI) was established as an institution dedicated to the research of the Recovered Territories. One of the first tasks assigned to the Institute was the scientific "development" of the Recovered Territories. The scientists focused within WI undertook the formidable task of describing the regions of Recovered Territories in the series "Lands of Old Poland," with the work being preceded by the first interdisciplinary field studies in the territories annexed to Poland as a result of World War II. The aim of the paper is to analyze the positions of historians, art historians, and representatives of other disciplines, who traveling throug lands dominated by German cultural heritage, had to confront the top-down imposed narrative of a return to the "lands of Mieszko and Bolesław." The primary source materials will consist of archival documents stored in the archives of the Western Institute and the personal documents of researchers involved in scientific expeditions.
2025-09-19 09:30-10:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The aim of this paper, based on an extensive archival search, will be to discuss the beginnings of Polish research on early medieval Western Pomerania after World War II. A special place will be given to the presentation of the continuation of research topics already undertaken during the interwar period in the academic centre in Poznan and their influence on research directions after the war. This continuation was often the result of a kind of genealogy of historical and archaeological schools and the succession of the masters' interests despite the changing political situation. The second plot that will be given increased emphasis will be the portrayal of the Poznan academic centre as a promoter of research on Pomerania both before and after 1945, whose graduates largely colonised many scientific institutions in the western lands, especially in Pomerania.
2025-09-19 11:30-12:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The paper will offer a concise assessment of Polish art-historical research on the cultural heritage of the main regions in Poland’s Western and Northern territories: Upper and Lower Silesia, the New March, Farther Pomerania, Royal Prussia, and the Duchy of Prussia. The current state of the historic buildings recording survey on the area in question will be presented and the extent to which the cultural phenomena existing there have been recognised so far, with special emphasis on comprehensive treatments of regional and supra-regional scope, already published or still under preparation. New postulates for future research, based on the theories of cultural transfer, e.g. along the Royal Highway, or the River Oder, will be proposed. Future research should strive to overcome a sort of ‘cultural schizophrenia’ currently prevailing in Poland, which gives preference to research on the ‘lost heritage’ in the Eastern Borderlands over the heritage of the Western and Northern territories – fully under control of our state, but not fully assimilated yet.
2025-09-19 12:00-12:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
In the history of Poland, Upper Lusatia belonged to our country only for a short time – it was annexed by Bolesław the Brave during the war with Germany in the years 1003-1018. It found itself again within the borders of Poland after 1945, precisely its eastern part. A natural consequence of this situation, from the perspective of historiography, is an attempt to scientifically study the history of the region. While Silesia has rich historical studies, Upper Lusatia still remains a poorly researched area, which is surprising if it take into account how the importance of the border on the Oder and Lusatian Neisse was emphasized during the communist era. The history of the area that is the subject of this presentation was most often talked over together with Silesia, with a lively interest observed only since the beginning of the 21st century. This lecture is an attempt to summarize Polish research interests in Upper Lusatia, as well as a field for reflection on the reasons for this state of affairs and comparison with the achievements of German and Czech science.
2025-09-19 12:30-13:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
With the exception of local researchers, the history of the Nysa-Otmuchów Duchy remained for a long time (and perhaps still does) rather on the margins of historians' interests. The initial interest of Polish historians after the incorporation of these lands into Poland following World War II must have faced not only a lack of broader memory but also a rather limited body of earlier historical works, which often differed from the perspective that post-war historiography sought to present. What possibilities did Polish scholarship have at the outset, which older (including "German") authors and works could it draw upon, and did it effectively do so?
2025-09-19 13:00-13:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The paper will present an outline of the intellectual biography of Andrzej Feliks Grabski (1934–2000), a historian from Łódź associated not only with the local university but also with the Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Grabski is primarily remembered by contemporary scholars as the author of monumental works in the field of historiography, but his contributions to medieval studies also deserve recognition. In this area, he wrote treatises on military history and devoted considerable attention to biographical studies. He authored three popular biographies of medieval Polish rulers: Bolesław Chrobry (Bolesław the Brave), Mieszko I, and Bolesław Krzywousty (Bolesław the Wrymouth). In the context of the conference theme, I would like to focus particularly to the first of these biographies .
2025-09-19 15:30-16:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
After World War II, archaeology in the so-called Recovered Territories faced a dramatic situation. Many artefacts were destroyed or lost, some museums were demolished, and the lack of qualified professionals hindered the protection of cultural heritage. The academic centre in Poznań, led by Professor Józef Kostrzewski, played a key role in rebuilding archaeology in these territories, particularly in the region temporarily incorporated into the Poznań Voivodeship. The paper focuses on three main areas of the center’s activity: rescuing and securing artefacts, conducting scientific research, and promoting archaeology among local communities. The analysis, based primarily on the archives of the Archaeological Museum in Poznań, considers organizational, financial, and political-ideological aspects that influenced the scope and implementation of activities during the early post-war period.
2025-09-19 17:30-18:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
Archaeological studies of early Piast Poland (in the reign of Mieszko and Bolesław the Brave) started in earnest only a. 1945, in a country greatly altered after WW 2 in terms of its territory, ethnic make-up and political regime. This would have a significant impact on the study both of the so-called Recovered Territories and of Polish-Rus’ borderlands. Contrary to the early declarations made by the Committee for the Research in the Origins of Poland the primary focus of research proved to be on the region of Poland to the west of the river Vistula. The medieval archaeology of eastern Poland was - and continues to be - less well recognized than in Silesia, G. Poland and Pomerania. Similarly poorly understood is the organization of this research in eastern Poland - the extent to which it was organized by state authorities or was the result of grassroots initiatives. In the paper we focus on the history of archaeological research completed at Drohiczyn, Cherven’ Towns, and Przemyśl.
2025-09-19 18:30-19:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
Immediately after the liberation of Kraków, dr. Rudolf Jamka, informal leader of Kraków archaeology during the war (in 1932, a doctorate from Włodzimierz Demetrykiewicz, the founder of the Department of Prehistoric Archaeology at the Jagiellonian University), became involved in the campaign to secure museum collections in Upper Silesia, which had been devastated by war operations, and later, as the frontline moved, in Lower Silesia. In May 1945, he arrived in Wrocław, which was still burning, and here he built Polish archaeology from scratch, establishing the Department of Prehistory at the University of Wrocław; after he obtained his habilitation in 1947, it was transformed into the Department of Prehistory. Didactic classes in prehistory began here as early as early December 1945. He also organized the Prehistoric Museum, of which he became the director, and in June 1946, he opened the first exhibition on the territory of Polish Wrocław devoted to the prehistory of Silesia.
2025-09-19 16:30-17:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
The title quotations capture the spirit of the actions taken in that part of East Prussia which became part of post-war Poland in 1945. The emphasised links with Polishness perfectly complemented the pool of arguments, chief among which was the ‘redress of Poland's just pretensions’. At the same time, the cultural scenery of these lands did not readily allow for this ‘eminently Polish patina’ to be perceived, which was a challenge for the state and local administration, and confronted scholars with new tasks.
Archaeology there was not as well equipped as in the western lands, where Slavic roots dating back to Early Middle Ages supported the ‘we did not come here, we came back here’ argument. In the case of the Prussian lands, the main difficulty was the Baltic character of the indigenous communities, which were more divided from the Piast domain than united with it. In spite of this, the activities undertaken laid the foundation for the so-called Polish school of archival archaeology.
2025-09-19 10:30-11:00, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
When considering the state of archaeology in Upper Silesia one can observe a persisting disparity in archaeological research stemming from the plebiscite division (1922). Following this division part of the region remained within the German state, while the other was incorporated into Poland. On one hand, there was a professional museum staff, archaeologists and a conservation office; on the other, it was not even possible to establish a prehistory department in the newly founded museum in Katowice.
In the post-war period similar to the pre-war years, a politically driven narrative about the past of this area was imposed on archaeology. Fortunately a significant portion of the collections and archival materials survived of the war. During this initial period, the individuals who played a key role in establishing archaeological structures were R. Jamka, followed by J. Szydłowski. The extensive work of the latter continues to influence the development of Upper Silesian archaeology.
2025-09-19 18:00-18:30, Instytut Kultury Europejskiej UAM, Aula IKE
