The three divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1772, 1793, 1795) between Austria, Prussia and Russia led to the fact that the Polish state was absent for 123 years. political map Europe. Throughout the 19th century, Polish politicians and historians argued about who was more to blame for the loss of independence. The majority considered the external factor to be decisive. And among the powers that divided Poland, the role of the main organizer was assigned to the Russian Empire and Catherine II. This version is popular to this day, and is layered with events in the history of Poland in the twentieth century. As a result, a stable stereotype was formed: Russia for several centuries was the main enemy of Poland and the Poles. Why is this myth so persistently promoted by some Polish politicians today?

What were the true reasons for its division?

What is stated on this topic in publicly available information sources.

Prelude to the section

From 1669 to 1673 the ruler was Mikhail Vishnevsky. Researchers conclude that he was an unprincipled man, since he played along with the Habsburgs and simply gave Podolia to the Turks. Jan III Sobieski, who was his nephew and reigned from 1674 to 1696, waged war with Ottoman Empire, which was successful. He also liberated Vienna from the Turks in 1683. But, based on the treaty, which was called “Eternal Peace,” Yan had to cede some lands to Russia, in exchange for these lands he received a promise that Russia would help them in the fight against the Crimean Tatars, as well as the Turks. After Jan III Sobieski passed away, the state was ruled by foreigners for seventy years.

The third section of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth became the last of the three sections of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, as a result of which it ceased to exist.

The defeat of the Kosciuszko uprising in 1794, directed against the divisions of the country, served as the reason for the final liquidation of the Polish-Lithuanian state.

On October 24, 1795, the states participating in the partition determined their new boundaries. Simultaneously with this condition, a secret agreement was signed in St. Petersburg between Austria and Russia, clearly hostile to Prussia - on military assistance in the event that Prussia attacked any of the allied states.

As a result of the Third Partition, Russia received lands east of the Bug and the Nemirov-Grodno line, total area 120 thousand km² and a population of 1.2 million people. Prussia acquired territories inhabited by ethnic Poles to the west of pp. Pilica, Vistula, Bug and Neman, together with Warsaw (referred to as South Prussia), as well as lands in Western Lithuania (Zemaitija), with a total area of ​​55 thousand km² and a population of 1 million people. Krakow and part of Lesser Poland between Pilica, Vistula and Bug, part of Podlasie and Mazovia, with a total area of ​​47 thousand km² and a population of 1.2 million people, came under Austrian rule.

King Stanisław August Poniatowski, who was taken to Grodno, resigned on November 25, 1795. The states that participated in the divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth concluded an agreement 1797 "St. Petersburg Convention", which included regulations on the issues of Polish debts and the Polish king, as well as a commitment that the monarchs of the contracting parties would never use the name "Kingdom of Poland" in their titles.

The Russian Empire received the lands of Western Belarus, part of Lithuania, Western Volyn and part of the Kholm land with a population of about 1 million 200 thousand people.

In Prussia, three provinces were created from former Polish lands: West Prussia, South Prussia and New East Prussia. Official language became German, Prussian land law and the German school were introduced, the lands of the “royalty” and ecclesiastical estates were taken to the treasury.

The lands that came under the rule of the Austrian crown were called Galicia and Lodomeria, they were divided into 12 districts. The German school and Austrian law were also introduced here.

As a result of the three sections of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Russian lands of White Rus' (except for the part with the city of Bialystok, which went to Prussia) and Little Rus' (except for Galicia, which went to Austria) with the Russian indigenous population passed to Russia, and the indigenous Polish lands, we want to draw attention to this , inhabited by ethnic Poles, were divided between Prussia and Austria. And for some reason Russia is considered the main enemy of the Poles. Why?

WHAT IS MODERN POLISH HISTORIOGRAPHY, THE PRESS AND THE AUTHORITY SILENT?

The divisions of Poland in the 18th century were carefully dealt with by Soviet historians: the Poles’ version of the role of Russia was shared by Karl Marx, with whom it is impossible to argue with in Marxist historiography. Some archival documents about the divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were declassified only starting in the 1990s, and modern researchers received additional documentary grounds for an objective analysis of the processes that led to the disappearance of one of the largest states of what was then Europe.

Let's start with the fact that the mere desire of three powerful neighbors for the divisions of Poland was completely insufficient.

Unlike Austria, Russia and Prussia, in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth there were neither prerequisites for the imperial development of the state nor a strong regular army, no consistent foreign policy. Therefore, it was the internal factor of the collapse of the state that was of utmost importance. And this is true in relation to the collapse of any state, regardless of the external factors influencing it: if there is internal weakness, you can break it, if there is no weakness, you cannot.

The famous Polish historian Jerzy Skowronek (in 1993-1996 - chief director of the state archives of Poland) noted:

“The partitions and fall of Poland were a tragic refutation of one of the “brilliant” principles of the foreign policy of the gentry of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. He said that it is precisely the powerlessness of the state that is the basis and condition for unlimited democracy and the freedom of each of its citizens, which at the same time serves as a guarantee of its existence... In fact, it turned out the other way around: namely the impotence of the Polish state pushed its neighbors to liquidate Poland».

So, the very quality of the Polish state made it possible for external factors to play.

Let us note that the initiator of the process was not Catherine II at all. Russia was quite happy with the policy of “tough and comprehensive guardianship” over the weakening Polish state that had developed since the time of Peter the Great. But in Berlin and Vienna they had a completely different attitude.

Jerzy Skowronek logically emphasized:

“The main instigator of the divisions of Poland was Prussia; Austria willingly supported it. Both powers feared that Russia, implementing its policy, would firmly draw the entire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth into the orbit of its unlimited influence.”

That is, the Russian Empire did not pursue the goal of erasing its centuries-old geopolitical enemy in the person of Poland from the geographical map at any cost. A similar desire was experienced primarily by the Prussian king Frederick II, and for obvious reasons.

Part of the Prussian lands with Königsberg, formed on the basis of the possessions of the Teutonic Order, was in vassal dependence on Poland until the middle of the 17th century. Russian Field Marshal I.F. Paskevich reasonably argued that:

“Prussia is a concession from Poland to the Elector of Brandenburg.”

But even later, in the conditions of separation of East Prussia from other territories with a center in Berlin, the full existence of Prussia without the seizure of Polish lands was impossible.

Naturally, the main initiator of all three divisions of Poland was the Prussian Kingdom.

The final version of the first partition was imposed on Austria and Russia in January 1772 by the Prussian king. Catherine II resisted these plans of Frederick II for some time. But in conditions when the Polish authorities and the weak king Stanislav Augustus could not provide Russia with stable support for its positions against the backdrop of growing resistance from Berlin and Vienna to Catherine’s new successes in the great war with Turkey (1768-1774), the empress accepted the partition project. The Russian Empress assumed that Poland, albeit in a reduced form, retaining its capital Warsaw, would remain an independent state.

But Prussia did not want to stop there and became the main initiator and organizer of the two subsequent sections. Taking advantage of the fact that the only possible opponent of such a development of events - France - had been engulfed in revolution since 1789, his nephew Frederick William II, who replaced Frederick II on the throne who died in 1786, brought the matter of eliminating Polish statehood to completion.

Prussia in the early 1790s, as Jerzy Skowronek wrote,
“showed particular cynicism: by luring the Poles with the prospect of a supposedly possible union, she encouraged the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to quickly formally leave Russia’s tutelage (even accompanied by anti-Russian gestures) and to begin quite radical reforms, and then abandoned it to the mercy of fate, agreeing on a second partition "

While Russia in 1772-1795 received territories with a non-Polish peasant majority of the population (Ukrainians, Belarusians, Lithuanians, Latvians), Prussia included the most important part of the original Polish lands with the capital Warsaw, capturing the most economically and culturally developed Polish regions.

SOME CONCLUSIONS ABOUT THE REASONS FOR THE COLLAPSE OF THE RICHE POSPOLITA

The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is a state that was formed in 1569 by the unification of Lithuania and Poland. Main role Poles played in this union, which is why historians often call the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Poland. At the beginning of the 18th century, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth experienced a process of disintegration into two states. This was the result Northern War between the Russian Empire and Sweden. Thanks to the victory of Peter I, Poland retained its existence, but became heavily dependent on its neighbors. In addition, since 1709, monarchs from Saxony were on the throne in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which indicated the country’s dependence on the German states, the main of which were Prussia and Austria. Therefore, Russia's participation in the Partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth must be studied on the basis of connections with Austria and Prussia, which laid claim to this territory. These 3 countries have clearly and secretly influenced the state for many years.

One of the reasons why Russia agreed to the partitions of Poland was the potential alliance of Turkey and Austria against the Russian Empire. As a result, Catherine accepted Austria's offer to partition the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in exchange for renouncing an alliance with Turkey. In fact, Austria and Prussia forced Catherine II to partition the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Moreover, if Russia had not agreed to the conditions of Poland’s western neighbors, they would have begun the division on their own, and this created a great threat in eastern Europe.

The reason for the beginning of the partitions of Poland was also a religious issue: Russia demanded that Poland provide rights and privileges to the Orthodox population. In Poland itself, supporters and opponents of the implementation of Russia's demands have formed. The country has actually started civil war. It was at this time that the monarchs of three neighboring countries gathered in Vienna and made a secret decision to begin the divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

Thus, one of the problems of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which led to the decline and further disappearance, was the system of political structure. The fact is that the main state body of Poland, the Sejm, consisted of the gentry - large landowners who even elected the king. Each nobleman had the right of veto: if he did not agree with the decision government agency, then the decision was reversed. This could lead to the fact that the state body could stop for several months, and in conditions of war or military aggression from neighbors this could have tragic consequences.

However, the structure of society was crowd-“elite” both in the Russian Empire and in the included territories, for some reason the subjective vector of goals of the current bloc control center (the tsarist government) did not correspond to the objective general bloc vector of goals (the mission of Russian civilization http://inance. ru/2017/08/missiya-russkoy-civilizacii/), this was the reason for management errors and the subsequent collapse of management of the Russian Empire.

The Russian authorities were concerned with the issue of integrating new lands into the state in accordance with their subjective vector of goals. An administrative reform was carried out: the lands were divided into 5 provinces, which in turn were united into two general governorates: Belarusian (Vitebsk, Mogilev) and Lithuanian (Vilna, Grodno and Minsk provinces).

An attempt was made to integrate the population of new territories into the empire without conflict. The entire population took an oath. The nobles who did not want to do this had the right to sell their property and go abroad within three months. Those who remained received the rights and privileges that the Russian nobility enjoyed and came under the jurisdiction of Russian state. Their privileged status was guaranteed by the “Certificate of Nobility” issued by Catherine II in 1785. At the same time, some privileges enjoyed by the gentry in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were eliminated: privileges that undermined the foundations of a centralized state were abolished (the right to elect a monarch, gather in povet sejmiks, elect judges, maintain one’s own troops and fortresses).

Russian legislation was gradually introduced on Belarusian lands. The local gentry and merchants were allowed to elect their deputies to develop a new national code; in 1777, district and provincial noble assemblies were created, and leaders of the nobility were elected.

Privately owned cities were bought by the authorities, residents were given equal rights with the rest of the population of the Russian Empire, Magdeburg law was abolished, and legal laws were also abolished. Cities were governed by city dumas: it was an elected body of city self-government, created on the basis of class representation. The Russian tax system also extended to the Belarusian lands: all state taxes were replaced by a poll tax and zemstvo tax. Due to extreme poverty, Belarusian peasants were exempted from taxes for two years, in the next 10 years they were levied at half the amount, and then they began to be levied in full, and recruitment kits were introduced.

At first, the Russian authorities took into account the peculiarities of the socio-economic and public life in the region and did not switch to an open Russification policy, therefore the national policy of the authorities was moderate, office work, book printing, and children’s education were carried out in Polish language, as before.

At first, a very restrained policy was also pursued regarding religion. At the end of the 18th century, 38% of Catholics, 39% of Uniates, 10% of Jews, 6.5% of Orthodox Christians and representatives of other faiths lived in Belarusian lands. All confessions were allowed, but Orthodoxy became the state religion. The local Orthodox Church came under the jurisdiction of the Holy Synod, which was the highest governing body in the Russian Orthodox Church. Catholicism was widespread in Belarus, and the activities of the Jesuit order, which was banned by the Pope in 1773, developed. With permission Russian authorities Jesuits were engaged in missionary activities, charity, and opened pharmacies, colleges, and libraries. The order was expelled after the War of 1812 due to the collaboration of the Catholic clergy with the French occupation administration.

The social structure of the Belarusian provinces was class-based.

Estates:

Privileged - nobility, clergy, merchants and honorary citizens (famous scientists, artists, educated children of nobles and clergy).
The tax-paying classes included peasants (privately owned, state-owned and free) and townspeople.
In the first half of the 19th century, a legally formalized category of the population emerged in Belarus - raznochintsy (not a tax-paying, but also not a privileged group of the population, as a rule, these were educated people who were engaged in mental work - lower officials, gymnasium teachers, representatives of science, literature and art) .

The class policy on the territory of Belarus was aimed at strengthening the position of Russia and was carried out through the introduction of Russian land ownership. Even Catherine II distributed the bulk of state lands, together with peasants (over 180 thousand people), to Russian nobles and officials. In relation to the Belarusian nobility, the Russian authorities pursued a very moderate policy, hoping to strengthen the loyalty of the gentry to the throne. True, this did not apply to the minor nobility, in relation to whom the so-called “analysis of the gentry” was carried out, which consisted of checking the availability and validity of documents confirming noble origin. The gentry who did not pass the test were transferred to the tax-paying estates.

In general, the policy of the Russian authorities at the end of the 18th century and the first third of the 19th century was moderate. However, after the War of 1812, when many gentry and townspeople greeted Napoleon as a liberator, the discovery of secret student societies and the gentry uprising of 1830-31, Polish influence began to be driven out and a policy of Russification was pursued.

The Polonized gentry did not have support from the population and they were reoriented and divided into the pro-Belarusian and pro-Lithuanian parts. Some of the gentry turn to Belarusian spoken language and begins its literary processing. The appeal to the Belarusian folk language and customs is accompanied by a gradual, albeit rather painful, abandonment of the names “Lithuania” and “Litvins”, which are assigned to ethnic Lithuania. At the same time, the appeal to the “Litvinian” heritage remains a structure-forming element of this version of the Belarusian national ideology: the polytonym “Litvinians” is “privatized” as an ancient ethnonym of Belarusians, state language The Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which contemporaries called Russian, is declared “Old Belarusian” (accordingly, the “new” Belarusian language becomes its direct successor), and the only candidate for the role of the capital of the future Belarusian state is the city of Vilna. It was from this time that disputes began between ethnic Lithuanians and Belarusian “Litvins” about who “belonged” to medieval Lithuania.

Thus, the political and ideological monopoly of the Polonized “Litvinian” aristocracy in the region was undermined. Competing with Polo-Litvinism are Western Russianism, as well as the Belarusian and Lithuanian movements, which, claiming ownership of the heritage of historical Lithuania, laid the preconditions for the division of the region between the ethnic groups inhabiting it.

That is, in general, we see a process of more or less peaceful entry of Belarusian lands into Russia, taking into account local specifics, until the War of 1812, when a vector of goals was identified among the gentry, aimed at destroying the bloc, and not at increasing the stability of management and solving problems society. For what reason has policy become tougher towards the “elite” strata of society. In relation to the common people, since the advent of serfdom in Rus', it has always been tough.

MEANWHILE…

Throughout the 19th century, powerful pressure was exerted on Russia, the purpose of which was to force it to accept, as God’s good providence, the biblical project of buying up the world on the basis of a monopoly on usury, the ideological basis of which is the Old Testament. Even the Decembrists took part in this process. Our Orthodoxy was based on the New Testament and the Psalter, and not on the Old Testament. But the activities of the Bible Society and Masonic lodges, aimed at changing the ideological position of part of the clergy and intelligentsia, bore fruit, and another sacred book appeared in Russia - the Old Testament, under the same cover as the New Testament. The Holy Synod for the most part did not understand the essence of what was happening and even approved the Jew Khvolson and Rabbi Levinson as translators, and the secular power that came after Nicholas I not only did not interfere with this process, but itself contributed to the acceleration of events. The clergy argued about what was the standard for translating the Old Testament. Some believed that it was the Hebrew Bible, others that it was the Septuagint, and some preferred the Church Slavonic version. But by that time this was no longer of fundamental importance: all options had been adjusted, including New Testament. The struggle for the standard of translation was provoked to divert attention from main goal masters of the biblical project, which consists in the adoption by the Orthodox country as scripture The Old Testament, into which was inserted the ideological basis for the enslavement of not only Russia, but the entire planet through the usurious stranglehold.

What does this have to do with the Jews?

Under Catherine II, the bulk of the Jews ended up in Russia as a result of the division of Poland, which was a surprise to her, and no one understood how to behave in relation to this mass. But it was Catherine II who laid the foundation for the Jewish Pale of Settlement with a decree of December 23, 1791 (January 3, 1792), which formally was the final reaction of the imperial government to the letter of the Vitebsk Jewish merchant Tsalka Faibishovich; The decree allowed Jews to permanently reside in Belarus and Novorossiya, then a region recently annexed to Russia, and prohibited registration as merchants, in particular in Moscow (which was what local merchants, fearing competition, demanded).

A researcher of the history of Jewry in Russia, Heinrich Sliozberg, noted that Catherine’s decree of 1791 was evidence of only this:

“that they did not consider it necessary to make an exception for Jews: restrictions on the right of movement and free choice of residence existed for everyone, to a large extent even for the nobles.”

With the third partition of Poland, the provinces of Vilna and Grodno, where a significant number of Jews lived, became part of the border. Alexander “established a special committee to discuss the issue of improving the life of Jews in Russia. Final legal registration The Pale of Settlement was informed by the “Regulations on the Organization of the Jews” of 1804, which listed those provinces and territories where Jews were allowed to settle and trade.

The “Regulations” strictly ordered all Jews to enroll in one of the “states”: farmers, manufacturers, artisans, merchants, and philistines. This was a mistake, because the division into these classes did not meet the task of protecting Russia from the biblical project and neutralizing its activists and bearers. The “Regulations” of 1804 were partly based on the “Opinion” of Senator Gavrila Derzhavin on the causes of food shortages in Belarus, and to a large extent on Polish bills of the 18th century. Educational measures are in the foreground in this “Regulation”: Jews are given access to Russian educational institutions and the spread of the Russian language among them is encouraged.

Nicholas I also did not realize this and tried in every possible way to make the Jews normal residents of Russia, thinking that they would become Christians, serve in the army and fulfill all civic duties. But all in vain: a lack of understanding of global politics even by such an outstanding Russian figure had sad consequences for the country and its people as a whole.

Here is what Andrei Dikiy writes about this time:

“At the beginning of the 19th century, when Russia received more than a million Jewish subjects, Jews who did not know the Russian language, did not have any large capital, were generally alien to the pan-European culture and did not want to join it - have any influence on state policy and did not they could, and they didn’t want to. But in less than one century everything has changed. Large capitals were accumulated in Jewish hands; a cadre of Jews has been created who have fully mastered the Russian language and graduated from higher and secondary schools; With the help of accumulated capital, Jews penetrated into all sectors of the country's economic and cultural life. To this we must add the fact that in Europe, starting from the middle of the 19th century, Jewish capital sometimes acquired decisive importance not only internally, but also externally. foreign policy in many states. And Russia urgently needed foreign investment to develop its industry. From the Rothschilds, French, English, Austrian; Much depended on the German Mendelssohn in resolving certain financial issues in the policies of these states towards Russia. The largest and most influential newspapers and publishing houses in Europe, telegraph agencies (which made “political weather”) were either purely Jewish or with a strong influence of Jews. The issue of loans or trade agreements was often made directly dependent on the policy of the Russian government on the “Jewish question.” Five and a half million Jewish Russian subjects took an active part in economic life not only in the Pale of Settlement, but throughout Russia and, despite all the existing restrictions, achieved enviable success. At the beginning of the 19th century, when they became subjects of Russia, all Jews were exclusively traders, various tenants, brokers, intermediaries and owners of drinking establishments (taverns, taverns). There were neither the big bourgeoisie nor people with a secular education among them. There were no people involved in agricultural labor (personal, physical) or landowners. In just one century, the picture has changed dramatically. On the eve of the Revolution of 1917, almost all the most important and largest sectors of trade and industry in the Pale of Settlement, and to a large extent throughout Russia, were either completely in Jewish hands, or with a significant and sometimes dominant influence of Jewish capital in them.”

This is how social processes develop if they have a purposefully built ideological basis.

One can appreciate the long-range aim of those who pushed Russia to absorb part of Poland:

The involvement of Russia ensured the disloyalty of the Polish population, which served as the basis for the promotion of Nazi views in Poland already in the 20th century;
The policy of the tsarist government, which did not take into account the peculiarities of the development of bloc-type civilizations, being moderate and copying the principles of development of a conglomerate, planted time bombs in Polish society, which card was played by Hitler, in fact, a policy similar to a conglomerate was partially pursued;
The involvement of Russia to some extent legitimized the predatory actions of Austria and Prussia towards the Poles;
The Pale of Settlement appeared, creating the potential for Jewish expansion into central Russia, which occurred already at the beginning of the 20th century, after restrictions were lifted. But this is another story and a topic for another article.

AFTERWORD

We see the interconnection of processes from the global to the local level. Russian civilization, which represented an alternative to the Western one, was largely uncontrollable for the owners of the Western concept, for which reason it was decided to introduce biblical management tools on its territory - the Old Testament and its bearers, which was carried out by the hands of authorities who did not fully understand what she got herself into. The potential for disaster has not yet been eliminated and the biblical concept of governance is still in effect in Belarus, Poland and Russia.

Belarus, like Russia, is a battlefield between Russian and Western civilizations. Of course, the main criterion for development - the level of education - increased after joining the Russian Empire, but it continued to remain insufficient, so Belarus was at the level of the inhabitants of the empire itself, who were under the yoke of serfdom and the absence of a universal education system.

Today, Belarus and Russia have sufficient potential to transition to their own management concept. After overcoming illiteracy in the USSR, the potential was laid for the subsequent acquisition of real sovereignty - the power to manage according to one’s own concept of development, and not according to the concept of “divide and conquer” with pseudo-sovereignty, in which the development potential is successfully channeled in the interests of the biblical concept of management.

Thus, Belarus and Russia today need to improve management literacy. At this stage, the process takes place within the framework of self-government (self-education) with the subsequent prospect of reaching the state level.

). But she did not resume the war with Prussia, but firmly and decisively established Russia’s neutrality in the Seven Years’ War.

Soon events in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth required Catherine's special attention. King Augustus III of Poland was living out his life; The time of “kinglessness” was approaching. The Russian government, which since the time of Peter the Great had established its influence in Poland, had to identify a candidate for king convenient for Russia and prepare for his election at the Sejm. Moreover, internal anarchy in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth by the middle of the 18th century. became so obvious and serious that neighboring governments had to closely monitor the progress of Polish-Lithuanian affairs and be prepared to intervene in the event of the final disintegration of the Rech. There was a call for such intervention from Poland and Lithuania itself. Thus, at the beginning of her reign, the Belarusian Bishop (George of Konissky) turned to Empress Catherine with a plea for the protection of the Orthodox population in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which was subjected not only to individual violence and abuse, but also to systematic persecution by the authorities. (So, it was forbidden not only to build, but also to correct orthodox churches; censorship of Orthodox church books was entrusted to Catholics; taxes were established from Orthodox Christians in favor of the Catholic clergy; the Orthodox were subject to the ecclesiastical Catholic court; finally, the right of Russian Orthodox people to hold public positions and be deputies to the Sejm was taken away.)

It has already been shown (§91) that the main cause of the disasters of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was the “golden liberty” of the gentry people, who did not recognize either royal authority or the human rights of the lower classes. Sharing with the king the right of supreme control at the diets, the gentry often refused to obey the king, formed open alliances against the king and the government to defend their rights and liberties - “confederations” - and even took up arms against their sovereign and started a “rokosh”, or uprising . At the same time, she considered confederations and rokoshes to be their legal right, because the law actually allowed to refuse obedience to the king if the king violated the rights of the gentry. With such customs of the unbridled gentry, the king in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth had essentially no power and could rely only on his personal means and strength. And since the gentry were headed by the richest and most powerful “magnates” (princes and lords), the king’s personal resources and strength were never enough to break the willfulness of the dominant class in the country. On the contrary, the king himself had to seek support and support in foreign courts in order to stay in his state. (August III in this respect imitated his father Augustus II and willingly sought Russian protection.) Thus, the political order in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was shaken to the last degree, and the country became a victim of anarchy.

Among the ruling class itself, this lack of leadership led to sad consequences. Equal in their political rights, the gentry people were not homogeneous in social terms. It was headed by a strong nobility - magnates who owned vast lands and wealth, accustomed to independent rule in their domains. And next to them in the gentry were small, insignificant landowners, ready to seek favors and affection from noble people, their neighbors, patrons and benefactors. The everyday dependence of small nobles on large lords was expressed in the fact that a circle of clients formed around the magnates, ready to do anything on the orders of their lord. The lords turned the gentry as they wanted, and at the diets they turned out to be the true masters of affairs. Each of them stood at the head of the gentry party obedient to him and led it without considering the means and techniques. Sejms turned into the arena of petty and selfish struggle between individuals and circles with complete oblivion of state benefits. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, a gentry republic, degenerated into an oligarchy of gentry who enslaved the gentry.

The decline of the political order was especially clearly expressed in the fact that the Sejms lost the character of a serious representative assembly and usually could not come to certain decisions. The old Sejm custom required unanimous resolution of cases. (Each vote at the Sejm represented some part of the state: the large gentlemen, who were universally present at the Sejm, voted for their large estates; the noble elected “ambassadors” voted for their “povet”, that is, the district, otherwise for their noble “povet” Sejmik, who sent them to the general Sejm. It was necessary that the entire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, with all its voices, participate in the decision made at the Sejm.) At that time, when order at the Sejm was still strong, the issue of unanimity was taken seriously and conscientiously. In the 18th century. the most common thing was to “disrupt the Sejm” by bribing or persuading some member of the Sejm to disagree with by decision. He exclaimed: “I do not allow,” and the decision fell. This custom, in which each member of the Sejm had the right of “free prohibition” (liberum veto), completely ruined the Sejm’s activities. No reform, no useful resolution could be passed through the Sejm, since it was always possible to disrupt the decision of the Sejm with a simple and base intrigue.

The natural consequence of political anarchy was a complete rampant of arbitrariness and violence in public life. Everywhere and in everything the strong offended the weak. The magnates quarreled among themselves and almost waged wars against each other. Neighbor offended neighbor; landowners tortured their “claps” - the peasants; the gentry raped the townspeople and Jews; Catholics and Uniates crowded out “dissidents,” that is, people who did not belong to the dominant church, otherwise Orthodox and Protestants. The innocently persecuted and offended did not find protection for their rights, their property and their lives anywhere. It is quite understandable that, having lost patience, they sought protection on the side, from foreign authorities, from foreign governments. The Polish kings themselves did this; dissidents did the same. This created not only the opportunity, but also the necessity for neighboring sovereigns to intervene in the internal affairs of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

In 1763, King Augustus III died. According to the wishes of Empress Catherine, the Diet elected the natural Pole Count Stanislav Poniatowski (who reigned under the name August IV) to the throne. Since Poniatowski was a personal acquaintance of Catherine and, moreover, was under her strong influence, the Russian ambassador in Warsaw (Prince Repnin) received very important importance under the new Polish king. Following a complaint from Bishop George of Konis, Catherine decided to raise her voice in defense of the Orthodox in Poland and Lithuania. Only, by agreement with the Prussian king, she did this in the general form of a petition to grant equality with Catholics to all dissidents (both Orthodox and Protestants). The Sejm treated the issue with extreme intolerance and refused to grant rights to dissidents.

Then Empress Catherine resorted to a very decisive means: she instructed Prince Repnin to try to ensure that the Orthodox and Protestant gentry formed a confederation to protect their rights. Repnin managed to organize three confederations: Orthodox, Protestant, and a third of Catholics inclined to support dissidents. However, this had little effect on the Sejm: the Sejm did not abandon its intolerance. Then Prince Repnin resorted to direct force. Russian troops were brought into Warsaw, and Repnin demanded that the king arrest the Catholic leaders of the Sejm. These leaders were captured and taken to Russia (including two Catholic bishops). The Diet gave in and gave in. A special law (1767) stipulated that the dissident gentry were equal to the Catholic nobility in all rights, but Catholicism remained the dominant confession and the king could be elected only from Catholics. It was a very major reform. Its implementation was ensured in 1768 by a special treaty between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russia, according to which Empress Catherine promised to protect the political system of Poland and Lithuania in the future without any changes. This promise of the empress established, as it were, a protectorate of Russia over the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: Russia received the right to supervise the internal life of the neighboring state.

Thus, Empress Catherine made a whole revolution in the political and religious relations of Polish-Lithuanian society. It was impossible to think that the gentry people could easily come to terms with violent influence on the Sejm and the king. Indeed, a number of confederations (with a center in the city of Bar) “for faith and freedom” were formed in Poland, that is, in defense of the diminished rights of the Catholic Church and the Sejm and against the patronage of Russia. In the struggle for their rights, the “lordly” confederates did not spare the Orthodox people and provoked “Koliivshchina” against themselves - an uprising of the so-called “Haydamaks”. (The nickname Haidamaks was then borne by the wandering bandits of peasants who “Cossacked” in Right Bank Ukraine, following the example of the Cossacks of the 16th–17th centuries.) The Haidamaks, like the gentry, stood up for their “faith and freedom” and with extraordinary cruelty began to smash priests, gentry and Jews, destroying entire cities (the city of Uman was completely slaughtered by the Haidamaks under the command of the Cossacks Zheleznyak and Gonta). A terrifying turmoil began in Poland (1768). The king had no means either to protect himself and the law from the Confederates, or to suppress the Koliivshchina. He asked Catherine to send her troops to restore order. By virtue of the treaty of 1768, Catherine sent military forces to Poland.

Russian troops soon pacified the Haidamaks, but for a long time they could not cope with the Confederates. Confederate detachments wandered from place to place, engaged in robbery, but did not engage in battles with regular troops, but simply ran away from them. Out of hostility towards Russia, France sent aid to the Confederates, and Austria gave them shelter. This made it even more difficult to fight them. Finally, the Polish government itself began to behave ambiguously and shied away from assisting the Russian troops. The Troubles dragged on, and this gave Prussia and Austria a reason to send their troops to Poland. When, finally, Suvorov inflicted a series of defeats on the Confederates and took Krakow from them, it became clear that the confederation had come to an end. But the powers did not withdraw their troops from Poland. Negotiations began between them about taking compensation from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth for the expenses and worries they had incurred. As a result of these negotiations, Prussia retained Pomerania and part of Greater Poland (those lands that separated Brandenburg and Prussia); Austria annexed Galicia, and Russia took Belarus.

Partitions of Poland. Map

This alienation of the lands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which occurred in 1773, is known as the “first partition of Poland.” Empress Catherine, apparently, was not entirely happy with this section. Prussia and Austria, taking advantage of the circumstances, received Polish provinces without any effort or expense, which was not at all part of Catherine’s plans. Moreover, Austria received the indigenous Russian region, which could not but upset those Russian people who understood the sad meaning of this loss.

Addition

V. O. Klyuchevsky about the first partition of Poland

Relations [Catherine II] to Poland

In the Western Russian or Polish question there were fewer political chimeras, but a lot of diplomatic illusions, self-delusion (misunderstandings) and most of all contradictions. The question was the reunification of Western Rus' with the Russian state; This is how it became back in the 15th century. and for a century and a half it was resolved in the same direction; This is how it was understood in Western Russia itself in the half of the 18th century.

From the messages of the Belarusian Bishop Georgy Konissky, who came to the coronation in 1762, Catherine could see that it was not a matter of political parties, not a guarantee of state structure, but of religious and tribal instincts, which were sore before the internecine massacre of the parties, and no treaties, no protectorates able to peacefully unravel this religious-tribal knot; armed engagement rather than diplomatic intervention was required.

To Ekaterina’s question, what benefits can be gained from Russian state out of defense of the Orthodox in Poland, one abbot there answered directly: The Russian state can righteously take away from the Poles 600 miles of the most fertile land with countless Orthodox people. Catherine could not relate such a crudely straightforward approach to the patterns of her political thinking and took the popular psychological question along the tortuous path of diplomacy. The general national-religious question is replaced by three partial tasks, territorial, protective and police: it was proposed to advance the north-western border to the Western Dvina and Dnieper with Polotsk and Mogilev, to achieve the restoration of the Orthodox in the rights taken from them by Catholics, and to demand the extradition of numerous Russian fugitives with the cessation of their further acceptance. This was the limit of the initial program of Russian policy.

The dissident case about the patronage of co-religionists and other dissidents, as they put it then, about equalizing their rights with Catholics was especially important for Catherine, as the most popular cause, but it was also especially difficult because it aroused many sick feelings and fervent interests. But it was precisely in this matter that Catherine’s policy revealed a particular lack of ability to adapt the course of action to the state of affairs. The dissident cause had to be carried out by a strong and with an imperious hand, and King Stanislaus Augustus IV, an already weak-willed man, was given neither strength nor power, having pledged under an agreement with Prussia not to allow any reforms in Poland that could strengthen the power of the king. Stanislav, out of powerlessness, remained, as he put it, “in complete inaction and non-existence,” he lived in poverty without Russian subsidies, sometimes without daily food from his household and surviving on small loans.

With their guarantee they supported the Polish constitution, which was a legalized anarchy, and they themselves were indignant that with such anarchy no sense could be achieved from Poland in anything. Moreover, Panin gave a very false presentation to the dissidents’ case. Their equal rights with Catholics, which the Russian government demanded, could be political and religious. The Orthodox expected from Russia, first of all, religious equality, freedom of religion, the return of dioceses, monasteries and churches taken from them by Catholics and Uniates, the right for involuntary Uniates to return to the faith of the Orthodox fathers. Political equality, the right to participate in legislation and governance was not so desirable and even dangerous for them.

In the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, only the gentry enjoyed political rights. The upper strata of the Orthodox Russian nobility became Polish and Catholicized; what survived was poor and uneducated; Among the Orthodox nobles it was difficult to find a person capable of being a deputy in the Sejm, sitting in the Senate, or holding any public office, because, as the Russian ambassador in Warsaw wrote to his court, all Orthodox nobles plow the land themselves and without any education. Even the Belarusian Bishop George of Konissky, the head of the Orthodox Christians of Western Rus', who according to his rank was supposed to sit in the Senate, could not have a place there without being of noble origin. Moreover, the political equation frightened the weak Orthodox nobility with the even greater embitterment of the ruling Catholic gentry, forced to share dominance with their enemies. All this restrained the dissidents' desire for political rights.

Panin, on the contrary, was most concerned about political equality. Speaking in the name of freedom of conscience as a minister of an Orthodox state, he found the strengthening of Orthodoxy, as well as Protestantism in Poland, harmful for Russia. The Protestant religion can lead the Poles out of their ignorance and lead to an improvement in their political system that is dangerous for Russia. “With regard to our co-religionists, this inconvenience cannot exist,” that is, from Orthodoxy one cannot fear either the eradication of ignorance or the improvement of the political system, but the Orthodox, who are excessively strengthened by us, will become independent of us. They need to be given political rights only in order to form them into a reliable political party with the legal right to participate in all Polish affairs, but not otherwise than under our patronage, “which we appropriate for ourselves forever.”

The dreamy idyllic of the northern system here is a positive Machiavellian. Through forced confederations, that is, armed uprisings organized under pressure from Russian troops, arrests of the most stubborn opponents like the Bishop of Krakow Soltyk, the Russian government achieved its goal, carried out at the Sejm, along with the Russian guarantee of the constitution and freedom of religion for dissidents, and their political equation with the Catholic gentry.

But Panin was wrong in his calculations, and the dissidents’ fears came true. The dissident equation set fire to all of Poland. The Sejm, which approved the treaty on February 13, had barely broken up when the lawyer Pulawski raised a confederation against it in Bar. With his light hand, anti-dissident confederations began to break out here and there throughout Poland. All the homeless and idle, from the tired gentry, from the gentlemen's household, from cities and villages, gathered under the banners of these confederations and, scattering throughout the country in small gangs, robbed anyone in the name of faith and fatherland; it was suffered by our own people, but dissidents and Jews suffered the most. According to customary confederal law, wherever confederations operated, they were abolished local authorities and complete anarchy reigned.

It was a kind of Polish-gentry Pugachevism, with morals and methods no better than the Russian peasantry, and it is difficult to say which of them brought more shame to the political system that gave birth to it, although the reasons for both movements were different to the contrary: there was robbery of the oppressors for the right oppression, here is the robbery of the oppressed for liberation from oppression. Russian Empress, for order and laws of the republic; The Polish government left it to her to suppress the rebellion, while she herself remained a curious spectator of the events.

There were up to 16 thousand Russian troops in Poland. This division fought with half of Poland, as they said then. Most of the army garrisoned the cities, and only a quarter pursued the Confederates; but, as the Russian ambassador reported, no matter how much they chase this wind, they cannot catch up and only suffer in vain.

The Confederates found support everywhere; the small and middle gentry secretly supplied them with everything they needed. Catholic fanaticism was heated to the highest pitch by the clergy; under its influence all social and moral ties were severed. The aforementioned Bishop Soltyk, before his arrest, volunteered to the Russian ambassador to persuade Catholics to make concessions to dissidents if the ambassador allowed him to continue to behave as a selfless fighter for the faith in order to maintain credit in his party, that is, allow him to be a rogue and a provocateur.

The Russian cabinet became convinced that it could not cope with the consequences of its own policy, and instructed the Russian ambassador to persuade the dissidents themselves to sacrifice part of the rights granted to them in order to preserve the rest, and to petition the Empress to allow them such a sacrifice.

Catherine allowed, that is, she was forced to refuse the admission of dissidents to the Senate and the Ministry, and only in 1775, after the first partition of Poland, was their right to be elected to the Sejm along with access to all positions approved. One of the reasons for the indirect presentation of the dissident question was the police considerations attached to it.

The orders of the autocratic-noble Russian rule fell so heavily on the lower classes that for a long time thousands of people fled to unemployed Poland, where life was more tolerable on the lands of the willful gentry. Panin especially considered it harmful to give the Orthodox in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth too broad rights, because then escapes from Russia would increase even more “with freedom of faith, combined with the benefits of a free people in everything.”

With the same lordly gaze, Russian politics looked at the Orthodox common people of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: in them, as in fellow believers, they saw a pretext for interfering in Polish affairs, but did not want to use them as material for political agitation against the dominant one, being themselves in such a position same class.

The dissident affair in Ukraine has intensified the long-standing continuous struggle between Orthodox Christians and Uniates and Catholics; it has emboldened the right as much as it has embittered the latter. The Orthodox response to the Bar Confederation was the Haidamak revolt (1768), in which, together with the Haidamaks, Russian fugitives who had fled to the steppes, the Cossacks, led by Zheleznyak, rose up, settled Cossacks and serfs with the centurion Gonta and other leaders. A forged letter from Empress Catherine also appeared with a call to rise up against the Poles for their faith. The rebels beat Jews and gentry in the old way, massacred Uman; Greek fanaticism and serfs, as King Stanislav put it about the uprising, fought with fire and sword against Catholic and gentry fanaticism. The Russian revolt was extinguished by Russian troops; The rebels, having escaped the stake and the gallows, returned to their previous states.

With such ambiguity in Russian policy, the Orthodox dissidents of Western Rus' could not understand what Russia wanted to do for them, whether she had come to completely liberate them from Poland or just to equalize them, whether she wanted to rid them of the Catholic priest and the Uniate priest or the Polish lord.

[First] partition of Poland

During the six or seven years of turmoil that arose in Poland after the death of King Augustus III (1763), the thought of the reunification of Western Rus' was invisible in Russian politics: it was obscured by questions about guarantees, dissidents, and confederations. Panin’s concern about assigning Russian protection to dissidents “for eternity” rather indicates that this idea was completely alien to him.

The Russian cabinet was at first content (thought only) with correcting the border on the Polish side and some kind of territorial reward for Frederick’s assistance in Poland. But Russian-Turkish war gave matters a wider course. Frederick was at first afraid of this war, fearing that Austria, angry at the Russian-Prussian alliance, would intervene in it, stand for Turkey, and involve Prussia. In order to ward off this danger from Berlin from the very beginning of the war, the idea of ​​dividing Poland was put into motion. This idea is a draw; it developed by itself from the entire system, life and neighboring environment of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and was worn in diplomatic circles for a long time, already from the 17th century.

Under the grandfather and father of Frederick II, Peter I was offered the division of Poland three times, and always with a concession to the Prussian king of western Prussia, which separated Brandenburg from eastern Prussia by an annoying gap. Frederick II did not own the idea itself, but its practical development. He himself admitted that, fearing the strengthening of Russia, he tried to benefit from its successes without war, without sacrifices and risks, only with dexterity. The war between Russia and Turkey gave him the desired opportunity, which he, as he put it, grabbed by the hair. According to his plan, Austria, hostile to both of them, was involved in the alliance between Russia and Prussia for diplomatic - but not at all armed - assistance to Russia in the war with Turkey, and all three powers received land compensation not from Turkey, but from Poland, which gave the reason for the war.

After three years of negotiations conducted with “feigned good faith,” as Panin put it, the participants, shuffling regions and populations, playing cards, summed up the results of the game. Moldavia and Wallachia, Christian principalities conquered from the Turks by Russian troops, returned precisely at the insistence of Frederick, an ally, under the Turkish yoke, liberation from which they were solemnly promised, and in return for this concession the Russian cabinet, pledging to protect the territorial integrity of Christian Poland from predatory neighbors, forced Russia to participate with them in its plunder.

It turned out that some Polish regions went to Russia in exchange for Turkish ones for military costs and victories, while others went to Prussia and Austria for nothing, or to the first, as it were, for a commission and for a new approach to the matter, for style, and to the second in the form of compensation for hostility towards Russia caused by its alliance with the same Prussia.

Finally, in 1772 (July 25), an agreement followed between the three shareholder powers, according to which Austria received all of Galicia with the districts captured even before the division, Prussia received Western Prussia with some other lands, and Russia received Belarus (now the provinces of Vitebsk and Mogilev ).

The share of Russia, which bore the brunt of the Turkish war and the fight against the Polish turmoil, was not the largest: according to the calculations presented by Panin, it occupied the middle place in terms of population, and the last in terms of profitability; the most populous share was Austrian, the most profitable - Prussian.

However, when the Austrian ambassador announced his share to Frederick, the king could not resist exclaiming, looking at the map: “Damn it, gentlemen! You, I see, have an excellent appetite: your share is as great as mine and the Russians together; truly You have a great appetite." But he was more pleased with the division than the other participants. His pleasure reached the point of self-forgetfulness, that is, to the desire to be conscientious: he admitted that Russia has many rights to do the same with Poland, “which cannot be said about us and Austria.” He saw how poorly Russia used its rights in both Turkey and Poland, and felt how his new strength grew from these mistakes.

Others felt it too. The French minister maliciously warned the Russian commissioner that Russia would eventually regret the strengthening of Prussia, to which it had contributed so much. In Russia, Panin was also blamed for the excessive strengthening of Prussia, and he himself admitted that he had gone further than he wanted, and Gr. Orlov considered the treaty on the division of Poland, which so strengthened Prussia and Austria, a crime deserving of the death penalty.

Be that as it may, a rare fact in European history will remain the case when a Slavic-Russian state during its reign with a national direction helped the German electorate with a scattered territory to turn into a great power, a continuous wide strip stretching across the ruins of the Slavic state from the Elbe to the Neman.

Thanks to Frederick, the victories of 1770 brought Russia more glory than benefit. Catherine emerged from the first Turkish war and from the first partition of Poland with independent Tatars, with Belarus and with great moral defeat, having raised and not justified so many hopes in Poland, in Western Russia, in Moldavia and Wallachia, in Montenegro, in Morea.

V. O. Klyuchevsky. Russian history. Full course lectures. Lecture 76

Sections of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (briefly)

Sections of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (brief history)

The actual division of Poland began during the first Russian-Turkish war. The Russian Empire, busy with battles in the south, could not resist this turn of events.

First section of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

In 1770, Prussia and Austria sent their armies into Poland. According to the Convention of 1772, Galicia went to Austria, Russia – Eastern Belarus, and Prussia received part of the Polish territories of the “Baltic corridor”, which led to East Prussia from Prussia.

Thus, the territory of the independent (albeit formally) Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was significantly reduced, and the state itself was on the verge of destruction.

In 1791, Polish patriots adopted an updated version of the constitution at the Sejm, which eliminated the former division of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth into Lithuania and Poland, proclaiming a single kingdom. In addition, royal power was significantly strengthened, and hostile powers of the confederation were completely prohibited. Since Protestants and Orthodox Christians quite often acted as allies of Prussia and Russia, Catholicism was proclaimed the main religion. All privileges of the nobles were preserved.

All participants in the Polish partition feared the revival of the country's former strength. Prussian and Russian troops entered the Polish borders, and Orthodox nobles, together with disgruntled gentry and magnates, formed a pro-Russian confederation.

Second section of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

At the beginning of 1793, according to the Russian-Prussian treaty, the second partition of Poland began. As a result of this, Central Belarus and Right Bank Ukraine go to Russia, and the cities of Poznan, Torun and Gdansk go to Prussia. The result of this section was the Kosciuszko War of Liberation.

Third section of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

In 1795, the third partition of Poland took place. During this period, Russia lost Courland (the Baltic duchy it desired).

Thus, such a long struggle for the Baltic states of Russia, as well as the annexation of Belarusian and Ukrainian lands to it, was completely completed. All of the sections of Poland described above were able to strengthen the economic, military and political positions of Russia, although this was done to the detriment of the Polish-Lithuanian state, which disappeared from the map of Europe.

However, at that time in world politics, “the wise and the mad” were defeated only by the power and force with which all the countries that remained active in the European arena were reckoned with.

By the end of the 18th century, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was one of the largest states in Europe. The full name sounded like “The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (from the late Latin respublica - republic) of two Nations”, referring to the peoples of the “Crown” (Kingdom of Poland) and the “Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Russia and Zhemoytka”, which formed a federation after the Union of Lublin in 1569, which existed until Section III.

Three territorial divisions of the Polish state were carried out in 1772, 1793 and 1795 by the neighboring states of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: Russia, Austria and Prussia. After the death of Augustus III (1763), two political camps formed in Poland: the Movement led by the Czartoryskis, which proposed a program of reforms to restore the glory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which assumed that Russia would become Poland's ally in the struggle for reforms, and the Republicans, whose program defended Golden Liberty and resistance to any changes in the political system. The Republicans were led by the Potocki family. The Republicans sought an alliance with Austria and France, and their ideas coincided with the interests of Poland's neighboring states. Already since 1732, there was an agreement (Treaty of Loewenwold) between the future states participating in the division to prevent changes in the state structure of the country.

Initially, Catherine II wanted to personally rule Poland, but frequent internal unrest, especially lasting from 1768 to 1772 The Bar Confederation convinced the queen that she could not keep the Poles in subjection. Finally, on August 5, 1772, Russia, Prussia and Austria created a convention to dismantle large areas of Poland.

I partition of Poland

As a result of the division, Prussia received: Warmia (a region in Prussia) and the voivodeships of Pomerania, Malbor and Chelmin (without Gdansk and Torun), as well as the territories lying above Notetia and Hopl, including 36 thousand km 2 and 580 thousand inhabitants. Russia occupied the territories lying east of the Dvina, Druya ​​and Dnieper, which included 92 thousand km 2, and 1 million 300 thousand people. Austria - the southern part of the Krakow and Sandomierian voivodeships, the Auschwitz and Zatorsk principalities, the Russian voivodeship (Galicia) (without the Chełm lands), as well as parts of the Bielskie voivodeship, totaling 83 thousand km 2, and 2 million 600 thousand people.

At the request of the countries participating in the partition, the partition agreement had to be approved by the Polish Sejm. Negotiations between Stanisław August Poniatowski and the European kings did not bring results, and the Sejm had to agree to this, as well as accept unfavorable economic and trade conditions. However, the Sejm managed to attempt state reform, created the National Education Commission, reduced the army to 30 thousand soldiers and carried out its reorganization. In addition, he carried out financial reform.

II partition of Poland

The immediate cause of the Second Partition of Poland was the lost Polish-Russian War of 1792, which was fought in defense of the Constitution of May 3. The king yielded to the wishes of Catherine II and in July 1792 joined the Targowitz confederation. Representatives of the Patriotic Reform Party were forced to leave the country. On January 23, 1793, Prussia and Russia signed a convention on the second partition of Poland, which was approved by the Grodno Sejm founded by the Targovichans (1793).

As a result of the Second Partition of Poland, Prussia occupied: the voivodeship of Poznań, Kalisz, Gnieznin, Szczaradskie, Lechicke, Inowroclaw, Brest-Kujaw, Plock, Dobryn lands, part of the Rawa and Mazowieckie voivodeships, as well as Toruń and Gdansk, a total of 58 thousand km 2 and almost 1 million population. The Russian part included Belarusian and Ukrainian lands east of the Druya-Pinsk-Zbruch line, a total of 280 thousand km 2 and 3 million inhabitants.

III partition of Poland

The defeat of the Kosciuszko uprising (1794), directed against the partitions of the country, served as the reason for the final liquidation of the Polish state. After resolving controversial issues, on October 24, 1795, the states participating in the division established the boundaries of the remaining Polish lands. As a result of Partition III, Russia received the remaining Lithuanian, Belarusian and Ukrainian lands east of the Bug, and the Nemirov-Grodno line, with a total area of ​​120 thousand km 2 and 1.2 million people. Prussia - the remaining part of Podlasie and Mazovia with Warsaw, Samogitia (Western Lithuania) and Lesser Poland, with a total area of ​​55 thousand km 2 and 1 million population. Austria - Krakow and part of Lesser Poland between Pilica, Vistula and Bug, part of Podlasie and Mazovia, with a total area of ​​47 thousand km 2, and 1.2 million population.

King Stanisław August Poniatowski, who was taken to Grodno, resigned on November 25, 1795. The empires participating in the partitions concluded the “St. Petersburg Convention” (1797), which included regulations on the debts of the state and the Polish king, as well as an obligation that the monarchs of the contracting parties the parties will never use the name "Kingdom of Poland" in their titles.

I partition of Poland

During the first partition of Poland, Russia occupied: Polish Inflants (south-eastern territories of Latvia), the northern part of the Polotsk voivodeship, as well as the Vitebsk and Mstislav voivodeship, and the south-eastern part of the Minsk (total about 92 thousand km 2).

II partition of Poland

In the second division - Ukrainian and Belarusian lands to the east of the Druya-Pinsk-Zbruch line, i.e. Kiev and Bratslav voivodeship, part of Podolsk, eastern part of Volyn and Brest-Litovsk, Minsk and part of Vilna (about 250 thousand km 2).

III partition of Poland

Under the III partition of Poland, Russia received: Lithuanian, Belarusian and Ukrainian lands east of the Bug and the Nemirov-Grodno line (about 120 thousand km 2). In 1807, Russia's possessions also included the Bialystok region received from Prussia. The final formation of the borders of Russian possessions was influenced by the creation of the Principality of Warsaw (1807-1814), and then the Kingdom of Poland (from 1815).

Russian possessions covered 81% of the former territories of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, i.e. Lithuanian-Belarusian-Ukrainian lands, as well as the territory of central Poland with Warsaw. The Kingdom of Poland, created on territory that belonged to Russia, lost its autonomy as a result of popular uprisings in 1830 and 1863.

After World War I and the Peace of Riga (1921), which ended in the Polish-Bolshevik War, a significant part of the former Russian possessions remained in the USSR, except for Lithuania and Latvia.