The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at its greatest extent

At the end of World War II, the blue territories were transferred from Poland to the Soviet Union, and the yellow territories from Germany to Poland.

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Poland (Polish: Polska), officially the Republic of Poland (Polish: Rzeczpospolita Polska), is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, and the Baltic Sea, Russia (in the form of the Kaliningrad Oblast exclave) and Lithuania to the north. It also shares a maritime border with Denmark and Sweden. The total area of Poland is 312,683 sq km (120,728 sq mi) making it the 69th largest country in the world with population over 38.5 million people concentrated mainly in large cities, including the historical capital of Poland, KrakÃ³w, and the present capital, Warsaw.

The first Polish state was born in 966, within territory very similar to the present boundaries of Poland. Poland became a kingdom in 1025, and in 1569 it cemented a long association with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by uniting to form the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Commonwealth collapsed in 1795, and the Poles were without a state for 123 years. Poland regained its independence in 1918 after World War I but lost it again in World War II, emerging several years later as a communist country within the Eastern Bloc under control of the former Soviet Union. In 1989 communist rule was overthrown and Poland became what is informally known as the "Third Polish Republic". Today, as the 6th most populated member state of the European Union, Poland is a liberal democracy made up of sixteen voivodeships (Polish: wojewÃ³dztwo). Poland is also a member of NATO, the United Nations, and the World Trade Organization.

History

From Homo Erectus and then during the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages and throughout the Late Antiquity, the lands of present day Poland were populated by many different peoples, often known archeologically, but of uncertain ethnicity or linguistic affiliation. Celtic, Germanic and Baltic peoples were among the prominent groups. The most famous archeological finding is the Biskupin fortified settlement on the lake, of the Lusatian culture of the early Iron Age, by some past researchers erroneously considered to be a proto-Slavic development.

Poland began to form into a recognizable unitary and territorial entity around the middle of the 10th century under the Piast dynasty. Poland's first historically documented ruler, Mieszko I, was baptized in 966, adopting Catholic Christianity as the nation's new official religion, to which the bulk of the population converted in the course of the next century. In the 12th century Poland fragmented into several smaller states, which were later ravaged by the Mongol armies of the Golden Horde in 1241, 1259 and 1287. In 1320 WÅ‚adysÅ‚aw I became the King of a reunified Poland. His son, Casimir III, repaired the Polish economy, constructed new castles, and won the war against the Ruthenian duchy (Lviv (LwÃ³w) became a Polish city).