[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] More on Germans in Poland.

[Otto]

This is all. I'm going fishing in the morning.

A robin pulled a fat night-crawler out of my lawn. Fat worms  
fascinate robins and so they go for them-Yum!
Most do research as that robin, myself not excluded. Concentration  
will be on our specific interest. All I ask is one broaden their  
spectrum and enrich the experience of their research efforts.
Most are arm-chair adventurers ready to conquer the keyboard and  
monitor, my favorite weapon also these days, so perhaps I can outline  
an adventure following keyword stepping stones.

The following is just a basic sketch-
History is but memory of events written down and passed to us. The  
more opinions we compare, the more flesh is added to the bones.

Use Wikipedia, also google.com on your web-browser
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki
http://www.google.com/

An example: Please do the following- type 'God's playground' into  
google, add 'in Poland' to create the search phrase>   God's  
playground in Poland   -Click Search button.  Neat, Huh?

Do that with other thought-conveying words.  Have fun.

Researchers quickly discover 'German' is a broad category generic  
term. 'Germanic' people would be more fitting. Readily one begins  
using tribal or area specific names of identity in reference to their  
relatives and clan.  Names in a non-specific order as Prussian,  
Saxon, Pomeranian, Dutch, Angle, Frisian, Dane, Swedish, Norwegian,  
Swabian, Bavarian, Hessian, Austrian, Swiss and so on... All Germanic  
people.  How many sub-groups can you claim?

There is also a multi-ethnic mix of peoples,German, Lithuanian, Pole,  
Italian, English, Scottish, French, Russian, Czech, Bohemian, Jews,   
Romany, and so on. Same question again...

Villages and Clans united under social constructs, considered the  
'first freedom', such as Protestant  and Catholic beliefs.  
Evangelical Lutherans[Evangelische Augsburgische], Mennonites,  
Baptists, Swiss, Moravian, and Polish Brotherhood to outline a  
partial list of non-catholic constructs.

Poland was called "God's Playground" in a book title. Did you google  
it? The foregoing are some of the people of Poland.

The 'Drang nach Osten', the 'drive to the East' in Germany began in  
the 12th. and 13th. centuries to express the 'second freedom',  
economic self-interest, Land.  Emigration is basically west to east.   
Migration in 1500's Poland was basically from the lowland North to  
the highland South with influx from the west. See Teutonic Order to  
grasp the economic structure of the area. Look up the topics in my  
last E-letter.

My mnemonic device is what I refer to as the big serpent of time from  
which history springs in Poland- The Weichsel River [A German/ 
Scandinavian name for that ancient waterway]. The Amber Road/ 
Bernsteinstraße-the Bronze Age-and those old south shore vikings. It  
stretches from lowland Gdansk south to beyond Krakow.  It was named  
also after the Vistulans (the Vistula River) who were a Lechitic  
tribe. (Lechitic was spoken in Poland, Brandenburg, Mecklenburg and  
Vorpommern.)  The present day name of the river is the Polish form of  
Vistula, that is, Wisla River, named after the Wislanie. (Vistulans)   
Connect the Vistulans to Krakow.  While you are at it look up the  
Polans of the Warta river basin and Polonia.

 From the 1500's forward the settlers (not all) migrated southward up  
the Weichsel from the coast; for freedom of belief, looking for land,  
because of wars, conscription, taxation, plagues, change of national  
rule and so on. From the end of the 1700's to the end of the 1800's  
this migration was extended to south of the Weichsel, to Volhynia,  
the Black Sea, up the Volga to delta lands, to Saratov and Samara and  
beyond.  In the 1900's political strife (guns, bullets, plus the  
horsemen and dogs of war) was the main factor behind dissemination or  
death.



. . .   Otto

             " The Zen moment..." wk. of April 1, 2007-
              ________________________________
              "Like fishing. . . always beyond the surface."