Silesia

SILESIA. - Historical region of Central Europe, formerly German and now divided between Poland, which includes almost all of it, and Czechoslovakia, which retains the modest strip (4,423 sq km with 800,000 inhabitants) assigned to it at Versailles.

I. GEOGRAPHY

As a whole Silesia, whose boundaries are rather indefinite, covers about 50,000 sq km and essentially embraces the basin of the upper Oder, from the Sudetes to the Trzebnica Hills, which separate it from the plains of Poznania and Kuyavia. Its wealth of minerals (coal, iron, zinc, lead, nickel) has made it one of the most important centers of European heavy industry.

The greater part of Silesia is divided among the Polish voivodeships of Wrocław (Breslau), Opole (Oppeln) and Katowice. Its population (6-7 million inhabitants in all) is concentrated to a large extent in the cities; of these, no fewer than 7 now exceed 100,000 inhabitants: Wrocław, Chorzów, Katowice, Zabrze (Hindenburg), Gliwice, Bytom and Częstochowa.

II. HISTORY

In the age of the late Empire various Germanic tribes were settled there, among them the Silingi Vandals, in the territories of Wrocław, Schweidnitz, Nimptsch, which later formed the pagus Silensis. The movement of the Germanic tribes toward the west in the 4th and 5th centuries allowed the advance of Slavic tribes. Slavic groupings existed in the region in the 7th and 8th centuries. In the 9th century Silesia was perhaps part of the vast

Moravian state and, after its disintegration at the end of the century, passed under the dominion of the dukes of Poland. In the 10th century the Christianization of the Poles brought with it also that of the Silesians: the religious center was Wrocław, perhaps built by the Czechs in the preceding century. Without secure geographical limits, the plain of the Oder was exposed to the dominion of the strongest neighboring Slavic groupings. Under Casimir I (1038-58), when the various Polish tribes were united into a political unity, the Silesians of the Oder were also included in it.

At the beginning of the 12th century the emperor Henry V, in his struggle with Poland, sought to seize Silesia; he was repulsed by King Boleslav III (1102-58). When the latter divided his domains among his sons, he gave Silesia to his eldest son Vladislav. Boleslav intended that the domains of the various sons should remain bound by the higher authority of whoever held the central government of Kraków. Silesia, however, felt this bond very little and lived under the princes of the Piast house in ever greater isolation. On the death of Vladislav (1159) Silesia was divided into two duchies: Boleslav received Wrocław, Mieczko received upper Silesia. Duke Boleslav gave origin to the dynasty of Wrocław with Henry and Henry II; the latter then divided his duchy among his sons Boleslav and Henry III, who gave origin to the dynasty of Liegnitz and of lower Silesia. These principalities of the Piasts in the valley of the Oder from the 12th century began to feel the influence of Germanism, which advanced through the parallel work of colonists and Cistercian monks. The Silesian dukes favored this German infiltration, which seemed economically useful, especially after the great invasion of the Mongols in 1241. When the Mongols withdrew, leaving a desert behind them, German immigration became compact and soon threatening to the Slavic population. The Piast dukes permitted the formation of German communities that settled with their own customs; the dukes exempted them from the payment of tributes. The cities became Germanized, thus Wrocław became Breslaw. In the agrarian transformation of the country the Cistercian monks distinguished themselves.

Thus in the second half of the 13th century Silesia entered the framework of the economic life of Germany, while the ties of the dukes with Poland weakened. A new fact was the investiture of the vacant Duchies of Wrocław and lower Silesia, granted by the king of the Romans to his son-in-law Wenceslaus II, king of Bohemia (1290), who in 1296 was proclaimed king by the Poles. Now the Silesian dukes began to orient themselves toward Bohemia; and the kings of Bohemia of the house of Luxembourg took advantage of this. Several Piast dukes recognized their dependence on King John and then others on Charles IV. The latter in 1348 definitively incorporated Silesia into the Kingdom of Bohemia, together with Moravia and upper Lusatia. In the 15th century under Sigismund the war of the Hussite heretics in Bohemia had grave repercussions in Silesia, and the heresy too had a notable diffusion. When in 1459 George of Poděbrady was proclaimed king of Bohemia, Wrocław attempted to resist. In the conflict between Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary, and Vladislav, king of Poland and Bohemia, an attempt was made in 1478 to detach Silesia from Bohemia in order to unite it with Hungary. Silesia continued in its ties with Bohemia, and in 1526, on the death of Louis, son of Vladislav, Bohemia and Silesia passed to Ferdinand of Habsburg, brother of Charles V. Now the Germanization, which had halted in the 14th century under the sovereigns of Luxembourg, was resumed, and together with it came also the diffusion of Lutheranism. Only at the beginning of the 17th century did Charles of Habsburg, bishop of Wrocław, energetically begin the work of Catholic reaction. The Thirty Years' War was disastrous for Silesia, which became a field of open war between imperial and Swedish forces: the economy of the country was ruined. After the war the Habsburgs introduced new elements into Silesia, granting fiefs to Austrian families; in 1675 the last branch of the Piasts of Liegnitz disappeared. The peace of Silesia was suddenly broken by the invasion of Frederick II of Prussia in 1740. The attempts of the government of Vienna to reconquer the region were vain: in the Treaties of Berlin (1741), of Dresden (1745), of Hubertusburg (1763) the Prussian occupation was recognized, and to the Habsburgs there remained only the Duchy of upper Silesia with Troppau (Opava). The Prussian occupation led to a deeper Germanization of Silesia, especially when in the 19th century the great textile and metallurgical industry developed there. The collapse of Germany in the war of 1914-18 awakened the appetites of the two countries that had dominated Silesia in the Middle Ages, the Poles and the Czechs. The Treaty of Versailles (28 June 1919) established the plebiscite in upper Silesia (district of Oppeln), in which the population was mixed of Germans and Poles. The plebiscite of 20 March 1921 gave 705,000 votes for Germany and 479,000 for Poland. The League of Nations, by decision of 20 Oct. 1921, recognized for Germany the centers of Oppeln, Glewitz, Hindenburg, Beuthen, and for Poland part of the district of Ratibor with Rybnick, Pless, Katowice. The Duchy of Troppau was divided between Poles and Czechoslovaks. Of upper Silesia Poland received 3221 sq km and Germany 316 sq km; of lower Silesia Poland received the territories of Reschtal and Bralin with 512 sq km. The situation of Silesia remained such until the Second World War. After the Soviet occupation, any eventual modifications are unknown.
BIBL. - M. Morgenbesser, Gesch. von Schlesien, Breslau 1908; A. Kutsch, Die Stellung Schlesiens zum deutschen Reich im Mittelalter, Berlin 1924; A. O. Meyer, Schlesien in d. deutsch. Gesch., in Histor. Zeitschr., 155 (1936), pp. 278-95; I. Klapper, Schlesische Volkskunde, ibid. 1925. In addition: K. Piwarski, Hist. Śląska w zarysie, Katowice-Breslau 1947. Other specific works: F. Hanus, Church and State in Silesia under Frederick II, Washington 1944; id., Die ältere Gesch. der Zisterzienser, Breslau 1947; F. Stumpe, Schlesien, Kitzingen 1951.

Francesco Cognasso