On the Emerging Polish Diaspora and its Development in Siberia in the First Half of the 19th Century

Abstract

The Russian and Polish historical sciences focus closely on studying the ways that the Polish diaspora emerged and evolved outside areas where they traditionally resided. Polish communities actively formed as the government had implemented its punitive policies since the late 13th century. One of the areas settled by many natives of Poland was Siberia. While historiography traditionally devotes much attention to the study of the Polish community in the second half of the 19th century, there are few works dealing with the community's early beginnings in various Siberian provinces (guberiya). As a result the article basing on a variety of archival data is aimed at defining essential features characteristic of the Siberian Polish diaspora in the pre-reform period before the 1850s 'Great Reforms'.