Polish

The Polish group includes the Poles of Lesser Poland, Greater Poland, Mazovia and Silesia, and the Kashubians of the Baltic coast. Poland had been reunited as a kingdom in 1320, and in 1337 Casimir III the Great was on the throne. He expanded into Galicia and founded a university at Kraków in 1364.

His death in 1370 ended the Piast dynasty. Jogaila of Lithuania married Queen Jadwiga in 1386 and founded the Jagiellonian dynasty, and in 1410 the joint army defeated the Teutonic Knights at Grunwald. The Union of Lublin created the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569. Partitions among Russia, Prussia and Austria in 1772, 1793 and 1795 ended it.