History of Poland (1569–1795)

A golden age ensued during the sixteenth century after the Union of Lublin which gave birth to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The szlachta (nobility) of Poland, far more numerous than in Western European countries, took pride in their freedoms and parliamentary system. For 10 years between 1619 and 1629 the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was at its greatest geographical extent in history, incorporating most of what today is Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and some parts of modern Russia. The period starts in 1619 when the Russo-Polish Truce of Deulino came into effect, whereby Russia conceded Commonwealth control over Smolensk and several other border territories. In 1629 the Swedish-Polish Truce of Altmark came into effect, whereby the Commonwealth conceded Swedish control over most of Livonia, which the Swedes had invaded in 1626.

In the mid-seventeenth century, a Swedish invasion ("The Deluge") and the Cossacks' Chmielnicki Uprising which ravaged the country marked the end of the golden age. Famines and epidemics followed hostilities, and the population dropped from roughly 11 to 7 million.[14]

Numerous wars against Russia coupled with government inefficiency caused by the Liberum veto—a right which had allowed any member of the parliament to dissolve it and to veto any legislation it had passed—marked the steady deterioration of the Commonwealth from a European power into a near-anarchy controlled by its neighbours. Despite the erosion of its power, the Commonwealth was able to deal a crushing defeat to the Ottoman Empire in 1683 at the Battle of Vienna.

The reforms, particularly those of the Great Sejm, which passed the Constitution of May 3, 1791—the world's second modern constitution and the first in Europe—were thwarted with the three partitions of Poland (1772, 1793, and 1795) which culminated in Poland's being erased from the map of Europe and its territories being divided between Russia, Prussia, and Austria.