The Formation of Modern Cracow (1866–1914)

Abstract

Poland's medieval and Renaissance capital and a mainspring of humanist learning in east central Europe, Cracow, suffered from neglect and decay after the Baltic-oriented Vasa dynasty transferred the court to Warsaw at the end of the sixteenth century. The first partition of Poland established the new border with Austria along the Vistula River, at the very gates of Cracow. Deprived of its hinterland, the city lost both suppliers and markets, and its commerce dried up. Local nobles and patricians abandoned the city for the more glittering and bustling life at the court of Stanislaw August in Warsaw. Russian troops seized Cracow toward the end of the Kościuszko Insurrection and then ceded it to Austria in Poland's third partition. By the beginning of the nineteenth century, its population had shrunk to barely ten thousand. Ensuing Germanization was halted only when Cracow was joined in 1809 to the short-lived Duchy of Warsaw.