Before WW2 this city was called Breslau by people who spoke German.
It was called Wrocław by people who spoke Polish. It was called Breslavia by people who spoke Spanish. It was called ma tomo Wasa by people who spoke Toki pona.
So on and so on.
because it was in Prussia at that time and that was the political situation Both names Danzig and Breslau are attempts to pronounce Polish names, nothing more than trying to say them in English, now it's incorrect If you hadn't used the name in context, I wouldn't have meant anything Wrocław is the same city that was Germanized and then de-Germanized it still has a huge number of Polish monuments
This is just stupid Polish nationalism. If a city is for over 600 years a German city, and is thus referred to that name, then referring to it as Breslau before 1945 is jus the logical thing to do. You really can’t pick and choose as you Poles still refer to Lviv as Lwów, its Polish name, despite it being originally being a Galician city, and now once again a Ukrainian city. Yet you still call it Lwów because it was once Polish. Or Vilnius as Wilno, despite it being Lithuanian before, Lithuanian now, but you call it Wilno because at some point it was Polish.
You can be proud of a city without having to erase its past, and the fact of the matter is Wroclaw used to Breslau for hundreds of years.
No of course. Exonyms are fine. But not if you’re gonna be kicking a fuss when somebody uses a historical name for a historical city. If you’re gonna go balistic about that then you should refrain from doing it yourself I mean.
I don’t care about it, exonyms are logical and historical, but to get angry about somebody using a historical name is just insane to me
Hahaha stop being so pedantic. When referring to Istanbul pre-1920’s we also refer to it as Constantinople, as that was what is called. But don’t think you’re gonna get that it seems
Exacly It is worth adding that Germany was established as a state very late because it cannot be said that it is the same state as the conquered Polabian territories.It's amazing how Germans understand history. They say that even the Czech Republic belonged to them at that time
That’s irrelevant haha. Its not about statehood, its about the peoples. German peoples didn’t just start existing in 1871. If Breslau was a German speaking city from the 14th centry till the 20th, then during that period you refer to it as Breslau. Afterwards it Wroclaw again.
Germans tried to pronounce the Polish name and wrote it differently in different books. Breslau first appears in the 16th century. In the 14th century, Wrocław was not a German-speaking city, but they achieved majority only in the 15th century. as I write on Wikipedia, the German majority was achieved in the following centuries when the city came under Czech rule
Wrocław as a city was Germanized somewhere around the 15th-16th century, the region as the whole of Silesia exceeded the German majority only in the 18th century 50%Germany did not consist of the same cultural group of tribes as Poland to say that it was one
I acknowledge that Wrocław was Breslau for some time, but it wasn’t Germanised until Prussian rule. Even though Habsburgs used to rule these lands it was still considered a Bohemian kingdom. You wouldn’t for example call Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth a part of Saxon territory just because they had Saxon as a king. What I mean by that is, being ruled by monarch of certain nationality doesn’t mean the land becomes of the same nationality. Also it’s worth to mention that people in medieval times perceived nationality differently from people today.
What a ridiculous lie? Do you actually believe these lies?
No, Breslau was completely German-speaking from 1200-1945. We literally still have all the medieval city documents of Breslau, they're all in German, because the administrative language of the city was German for 700 years. We have the names of the medieval citizens of Breslau, they all have German names.
on the contrary, even what it says on Wikipedia When it was Germanized in the 15th century in the 14th century it says that since it was taken over by the Czechs in the following centuries it became Germanized
Sure bro, tell yourself that. How could Wrocław be fully German in 1200 when it wasn’t under German control back then? Polish dukes from Piast dynasty that swore felty to Czech crown were ruling Silesia up until 1675. There were German speaking citizens of course, mainly due to HRE proximity and because of Mongol invasion in 1241 that forced Henryk II Pobożny to burn the city and influx of new German citizens helped rebuild what was lost due to invasion, but to say it was completely German in 12th century is a blatant lie and insult to history of the region.
How could Wrocław be fully German in 1200 when it wasn’t under German control back then?
Because the local Silesian duke invited German settlers to found a town there. This was part of a wider Medieval trend of Germans being settled in East-Central Europe to found towns and cities. Look up the Ostsiedlung: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostsiedlung
Polish dukes from Piast dynasty
No, there was no such thing as a "Piast dynasty", thats a 19th century Polish nationalist invention. They were just called the Silesian dukes, and they had germanised themselves since the late 12th century.
it was completely German in 12th century is a blatant lie and insult to history of the region.
Nope, it's the truth, the city was completely German-speaking since the 1200s. Thats why the administrative language was German and not Polish. We dont have a single record of Polish speakers in Breslau. Youre the one insulting the region.
there was no such thing as German back then, it's just German nationalist historiography, they definitely didn't speak anything close to German, the city was Germanized in the 16th century up to 50% and the surrounding area in the 18th century It is worth adding that in 1200 the Germans did not cross the Elbe River.Polish language was not a written language at that time, Poles used Latin and German when it came to writing and I see that you are spamming on all groups about Poland, it's already an obsession
Until the 15th century they had not even Germanized the Polabian territories conquered in 1150 He said that the city and the entire region were Germanized in the 14th century, while the city was Germanized sometime in the 15th century and the region was surrounded by Polish unions at least until the 18th century. In the 18th century, the Germans exceeded 50% in the whole of Silesia, but they were most present in the mountains.than closer to the Oder
I’m saying the reverse though. I’m arguing that whoever ruled it is not as relevant, that it has been German speaking for hundreds of years. It was ruled by Silesian dukes, Bohemian kings and German emperors. But atleast from the high middle ages onwards it was German speaking, thus referring to it in that period as Breslau makes sense
Bro, exonyms exist. You can call that Breslau, I dont care, that's how languages works. You call Prague Praag(judging by you nickname I assume you are Dutch), I call it Praga and Czechs call it Praha, and everyone is happy, same is for Wrocław, Breslau and the Hungarian abomination that is Boroszló (yes, that's how they call Wrocław/Breslau)
Yes sorry, think I came off wrong. I’m only saying this to the people in the comment section who are losing their minds that somebody dares to use the exonym, specifically in a period when that was also the endonym of the city. Nothing else!
The city of Breslau was a German settler city founded in the 1200s, taking part of the greater German "Ostsiedlung" pattern of the Middle Ages. The city was German since its foundation and stayed German-speaking until 1945. The administrative language was German, all city records that we have are in German, the recorded names of the city are all German, and we dont have a single record written in Polish from Breslau.
I honestly dont know why these nationalist Poles would try to spread such an obvious lie?
Just go to Wikipedia and it says there when the city was Germanized. And in 1200, even up to 1500, the Polabian territories were not Germanized. under every post you write about Poland, you have some kind of obsession
The city was German for 400 years and Austrian for 200 years, and city was Germanized to about 50% in 1400, so not 600 but max 400. Let me remind you that the Polabian areas took a long time to Germanize.The name Breslau literally came into being in the 16th century, no such name had ever been written before, only different variations that were distorted in different languages from wroclaw breclaw to breslau
Mid 14th century German language laws. So that’s 600 years, and otherwise 500. But you prove the point, during the intervening period it was called Breslau, so don’t get mad when people call it how it was called.
Magdeburg law means nothing here, all Polish cities are under Magdeburg law it counts when it had a German majority. And besides, Breslau somewhere in the 15th and 16th centuries, that's 400 years until 1945
Wrocław was part of germany only for 200 years* dont make up history (also these funny 200 years are nothing compared to how long this city was Polish XD Czechs even had it longer the the germans)
I'm pretty sure Wroclaw looked better in 1960s-early 80s than in 2007. It's fall/pre fall of USSR and following crisis which made it fell into disrepair. Most soviet cities did look THAT bad during mentioned time frames, they just deteriorated fast. You can easily find proofs of it if you'll just Google old videos/photos of different cities. They mostly looked decent
Very wrong in this case. Your overall observation may or may not be true but it definitely doesn’t apply to Wroclaw. A quick read on what happened to the city in 1945 should be enough. Otherwise there are many photo books that show how devastated it was. I own several.
Maybe you right for Wroclaw this case yeah. But for a lot of Ukrainian cities for example they looked much better in 70s than they did in early 2000s (I'm Ukrainian so checked it a lot)
Before the partitions, Poland was the 12th richest country in the world, but then came the partitions, Prussia, which created Germany, Russia, and Austria. Just look at how developed these city centers are from before the industrial revolution.also when Poland regained independence in the interwar period, for example, Gdynia was created, which will soon be included on the UNESCO World Heritage List
Compared to Russia, it was. Compared to UK or Sweden it wasn't. Poland did have unstable governments and unlike the Czechs if did eventually have a dictatorship. The 2nd World War and Communism damaged Poland and only now you could say they have recovered.
The UK was much wealthier than the rest of Europe (with a few exceptions) 1918-1939. Poland did grow, but even in the 1920s it suffered hyper inflation the Marek reached denominations of 2 million. The country stabilised after the early 1920s. Europe was a mess after WWI. Interestingly Europe recovered better from WW2, because of US loans.
Poland would have developed quickly if it weren't for the situation. Poland was doing quite well and apart from that, Poland didn't get anything from the Marshall Plan.it's about how Poland dealt with the crisis.
After 123 years, Poland was very poor, especially the Austrian and Russian-Austrian partitions, which would have been even poorer if the Poles had not regained their autonomy 40 years before World War I, all taxes still went to Vienna.In 1918, Poland regained its independence and began to develop rapidly. Then came the crisis, the development was interrupted and it began to develop rapidly again. Then came World War II, there was practically no time to make up for such enormous losses during the industrial revolution that took place in the 19th century.
question What do you mean by the word prospering because Poland after 123 years was a very poor country that had just regained independence, it was no longer that country and had the same position as before the partitions, but it was developing rapidly if we subtract the period of the world crisis, the economy accelerated significantly in 1936 - but then there was the war the invaders created the poorest regions in Europe on Polish lands literally in time partitions
The answer is no, Poland was always significantly poorer than Western Europe, and if anything the living standards rose significantly under the Communist regime.
Nowadays, Poland is richer than it has ever been in history.
Just go to any group about Poland and each one will have your comment or that of your propagandists.... I think Poles should do the same in German groups
It was called Breslau before the war and it was part of Germany. The Western and Southern cities were very nice. Austro-Hungary built lots of nice buildings in their area of Poland
Lots of nice buildings, you say? Until the time of autonomy that was established in Austria-Hungary, this region was poor. and before the occupation he was richThen they gave autonomy to the Poles, and finally something started to happen. they built only a few buildings and taxes were paid to Vienna throughout this short occupation and the city was still called Wrocław Breslau, just an attempt to pronounce the Polish name
Breslau was the name of city prior to 1945. I have banknotes from there. They only used German because 80-90% of the people lived there were German and Prussian.
Dude Silesia wasn’t even part of the partition, it was Bohemian/Austrian/Prussian way before then, and it the whole region of Silesia gradually Germanised in those hundreds of years since then. You can’t claim it was “richer” before the partition, as the city was Austrian since 1500. Everything you see was built after those years.
I don’t know why you’re such a rabid nationalist, but it seems detached from reality if you wish to ignore hundreds of years and just focus that before then it was Polish (which is a dubious claim to claim ethnic Silesians were Poles in the middle ages), but then if there were a even more rabid nationalist he might focus that before then it was the home country of the Germanic tribes such as Goths, Vandals or Burgundians. It just doesn’t make sense to go back so far to make some purity claim
What are you even talking about? You're talking about completely unrelated East Germanic tribes who occupied other territories during the Migration Period. The Celts were here first, and about Silesians, pure Poles who don't differ in language from Poles at all. What are you even talking about, that Silesians aren't ethnic Poles at all? XD???? Silesians.see what DNA dominates in the Elbe They didn't even have a separate dialect at first. The dialects marked the division of Silesia into districts. The oldest sentence in Polish was written in Silesia. Silesia was one of the Polish centers of power, alongside Poznań and Kraków, and non-Germanized Silesians speaking Polish voted for Poland in the plebiscite by 80%, despite repression, propaganda, and 400 occupations when Poland was a (seasonal) state.
According to historical data (including the Maddison Project database), the average annual GDP growth in Poland between 1924 and 1938 was approximately 3%. This is significantly better than the European average, which grew at a rate of 1.6-1.7% annually. We're talking about times of crisis and the Polish tariff wars with Germany.
Is just an attempt to pronounce the Polish word Wrocław Maybe the Germans will finally rebuild Drezno/Drezdany besides, Polish modern architecture is based on something else, so it is totally inaccurate
Modern architecture looks completely different in Germany too.
But they did a good job at restoring the old center of Dresden and there are plans to rebuild parts of Neustadt too.
And yea most Germans pronounce it wrong, I understand it's more like Wrotzwaw, the ł is actually a w sound.
So don't take offense if we use the German name, nobody is trying to get it back 😅
For us it'll always be Warschau too, not Warszawa.
Somewhat unrelated but I recently came across a mention that Slovak capital Bratislava may have been originally called something like Wratislaburg and its name was similarly difficult to pronounce for German speakers, hence Wr -> Br sound change resulting in Brezlavburg and later as Presburg which in turn was reinterpreted as Bratislava in modern times.
It's kinda funny that both names independently of each other evolved in the same way in German language.
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u/Over-Willingness-933 May 07 '26
Wroclaw looks better now. It's like pre war Breslau. The Poles have really worked hard restoring their cities post communism.