In the second half of the 2nd millennium BC (late Bronze Age), Silesia belonged to the Lusatian culture. About 500 BC Scyths arrived, and later Celts in the South and Southwest. During the 1st century BC Silingi and other Germanic people settled in Silesia. For this period we have written reports of antique authors who included the area.
Slavs arrived in this territory around the 6th century.
The first known states in Silesia were those of Greater Moravia and Bohemia. In the 10th century, Mieszko I incorporated Silesia into Civitas Schinesghe, a Polish state. It remained part of Poland until the Fragmentation of Poland. Afterwards it was divided between Piast dukes, descendants of Władysław II the Exile, High Duke of Poland.
In the Middle Ages, Silesia was divided among many duchies ruled by various dukes of the Piast dynasty. During this time, cultural and ethnic German influence increased due to immigrants from the German-speaking components of the Holy Roman Empire, as the region's economy developed, and towns were founded under German town law.
Between the years 1289–1292 Bohemian king Wenceslaus II became suzerain of some Upper Silesian duchies. Silesia subsequently became a possession of the Crown of Bohemia under the Holy Roman Empire in the 14th century, and passed with that Crown to the Habsburg monarchy in 1526. The Duchy of Crossen was inherited by the Margraviate of Brandenburg in 1476 and, with the renunciation by King Ferdinand I and estates of Bohemia in 1538, it became an integral part of Brandenburg.
In 1742, most of Silesia was seized by King Frederick the Great of Prussia in the War of the Austrian Succession and subsequently made the Prussian Province of Silesia.
After World War I, Lower Silesia, having by far a German majority, remained with Germany while Upper Silesia, after a series of insurrections by the Polish inhabitants, was split. Part joined the Second Polish Republic and was administered as the Silesian Voivodeship. The Prussian Province of Silesia within Germany was divided into the Provinces of Lower Silesia and Upper Silesia. Austrian Silesia (officially: Duchy of Upper and Lower Silesia; almost identical with modern-day Czech Silesia), the small portion of Silesia retained by Austria after the Silesian Wars, became part of the new Czechoslovakia. During the Second World War, Nazi Germany invaded Polish parts of Upper Silesia. Jews were subject to genocide in the Holocaust, while German plans towards Poles involved ethnic cleansing and biological extermination.Element polski zaś miał być ze Śląska usunięty przez zastosowanie różnych form wysiedleń do Generalnej Gubernii do biologicznej eksterminacji włącznie.Górny Śląsk: szczególny Mirosława Błaszczak-Wacławik J. Szumacher, 1990, page 44 -
In 1945 both provinces were occupied by the Soviet Union. Under the demands in the Potsdam Agreement, most of this territory was afterwards transferred to the Polish People's Republic. Most of the German population, who had not been evacuated or had fled, were expelled by the newly arrived Polish administration, while Poles expelled from the eastern Polish Borderlands then settled in the region.
Prehistory
The first signs of humans in Silesia date to between 230,000 and 100,000 years ago. The Silesian region between the upper Vistula and upper Oder was the northern extreme of the human penetration at the time of the last glaciation. The anatomically modern human is estimated to have arrived in Silesia about 35,000 years ago.Cavalli Sforza, "Genes, Peoples, and Languages", Scientific American, November 1991 Subsequently, Silesia was inhabited by people who belonged to changing archaeological cultures in the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages. The civilization of Old Europe included Silesia. In the late Bronze Age, the Lusatian culture (in the past, variously speculated to be either 'pre-Germanic', Proto-Slavic, Thracian, Karpo-Dacian or Illyrian) covered Silesia. Later, the Scythians and Celts (the tribes of Boii, Gotini and Osi)Harry Mountain, The Celtic Encyclopedia, Vol. 1, Universal Publishers, Version 1.0, May 1, 1998, (google books). played a role within the Silesian territory. Still later Germanic tribes migrated to Silesia, possibly from Northern Germany or Scandinavia.
Celts in Silesia (4th-1st centuries BC) The Celts migrated to parts of Silesia in at least two waves. The first wave of Celtic settlers came to areas north of the Sudetes at the beginning of the 4th century BC.R. Żerelik (in:) M. Czpliński (red.) Historia Śląska, Wrocław 2007, s. 34-35 They represented the La Tène culture. Archaeologists found evidence of Celtic presence dating to that period in areas of loess soils to the south of modern Wrocław, between the Bystrzyca river and the Oława river, as well as on the Głubczyce Plateau,Bronze Age and Roman Age Finds From Site 35 At Dzierżysław, Distr. Głubczyce where for example a lot of Celtic coins have been found. Perhaps the largest Celtic settlement in Silesia, was the one excavated at Nowa Cerekwia siteMarcin Rudnicki, Nowa Cerekwia. A Celtic Centre for Craft and Commerce of Interregional Importance north of the CarpathiansMarcin Rudnicki, Nowa Cerekwia – the Middle La Tène centre of power north of the Carpathians in Upper Silesia - it was comparable in size to Boii settlements at Němčice in Moravia and at Roseldorf in Lower Austria. Another Celtic migration to areas of modern Poland occurred probably in parallel with the invasions of Greece and Macedonia in 279-277 BC. At that time Celtic colonization extended also into modern Lesser Poland and Subcarpathia.The Celts in Poland (Journal of Celtic Studies in Eastern Europe and Asia-Minor)
Celtic culture in Silesia flourished during the 4th, 3rd and most of the 2nd centuries BC, but archaeological evidence points to a dramatic population crash - and even to complete depopulation of some areas of Celtic settlement - by the end of the 2nd century BC. Those changes coincided in time with the migrations of the Cimbri and the Teutones, who crossed Silesia on their way south. At that time all evidence of habitation on the Głubczyce Plateau disappeared, and the region remained uninhabited for the next 150 years. In other parts of the Celtic territory in Silesia the population also experienced very sharp declines, but not as total as in the Głubczyce region. Minting of Celtic coins continued in some settlements until the end of the 1st century BC. However, from the 1st century CE onward all evidence of Celtic material culture disappears from Silesia.
The La Tène culture in Silesia was succeeded (replaced) by the Przeworsk culture.
Ancient history The first written sources about Silesia came from the Egyptian Ptolemy (Magna Germania) and the Roman Tacitus (Germania). According to Tacitus, the 1st century AD Silesia was inhabited by a multi-ethnic league dominated by the Lugii. The Silingi were also part of this federation, and most likely a Vandalic people (Germanic) that lived south of the Baltic Sea in the Laba, later Elbe, Oder and Vistula river areas. Other East Germanic tribes also inhabited the region.
After , the Migration Period had induced the bulk of the East Germanic tribes to continue their migration and leave Silesia for Southern Europe, while Slavic tribes began to appear and spread into Silesian lands.
Early Medieval Slavic tribes
Sources describing Silesia of the 9th and 10th centuries, such as the Bavarian Geographer () or Thietmar's Chronicle, indicate that the area which later became known as Silesia, was back then inhabited by several Lechitic tribes, known from written sources under their Latinised names. The Sleenzane (Slenzans; Ślężanie) lived in lands near modern Wrocław and along the Ślęza river, as well as near mount Ślęża. They probably numbered 60–75,000 peopleCheck also: Ludwik Krzywicki, Primitive society and its vital statistics, the 1934 English edition (but this edition does not have the sub-chapter on Slavic tribes) and according to the Bavarian Geographer, they were divided into 15 civitates. The Opolini (Opolans; Opolanie) lived in lands near modern Opole, their population was perhaps 30–40,000 and comprised 20 civitates. The Dadodesani or Dedosize (Dyadosans; Dziadoszanie) lived in areas near modern Głogów, numbered probably 30,000 people, as well as 20 civitates. The Golensizi (Golensizians; Golęszyce) dwelled near modern Racibórz, Cieszyn and Opawa - they consisted of five civitates. The Lupiglaa (Głubczyce) probably lived on the Głubczyce Plateau, near Głubczyce, and comprised 30 civitates. The Trebouane (Tryebovians; Trzebowianie), mentioned by the Prague Document (which describes the situation as of year 973 or earlier),On the Prague Document of 1086 (jassa.org) occupied areas near modern Legnica and could number some 25–30,000 individuals. The Poborane (Bobrans; Bobrzanie) - mentioned by the same document - lived along the lower and middle course of the Bóbr river. The Psyovians (Psouane; Pszowianie) lived near Pszów, to the east of the Opolans and to the west of Kraków.
At the turn of the 10th and 11th centuries (), the total population of Silesia is estimated as around 250,000 people.
Great Moravia and Duchy of Bohemia
In the 9th century, parts of Silesia's territory came under the influence of Great Moravia, the first historically attested state in the region. After Great Moravia's decline one of its successors, Bohemia, gradually conquered Silesia. At the beginning of the 10th century Vratislaus I subdued the Golensize and soon afterwards seized Middle Silesia. Wrocław was possibly founded by and named after him. His son Boleslaus I subdued the Boborane between 950 and 965 and later also the Opolane and Dedosize. The town of Bolesławiec bears his name. The Bohemian rulers also tried to evangelize the region and opened up Silesia for international trade. In 973, when he travelled from Prague to Kraków, explorer/historian Abraham ben Jacob crossed Southern Silesia on a road which later became one of the major East/West trading routes.
Kingdom of Poland
At the end of the 9th century Silesia came within the sphere of influence of two neighbours, the Holy Roman Empire and Poland. In 971, in order to proselytise Silesia to Christianity, Holy Roman emperor Otto I donated the tithe of the Dziadoszyce area to the Diocese of Meissen, and in 996 Otto III defined the Oder up to the spring as the border of the Margraviate of Meissen. This was without practical consequences as the expanding Polish state of Mieszko I conquered Silesia at the same time. The Dziadoszyce area was already incorporated . In 990 in the Polish-Bohemian War Mieszko annexed Middle Silesia and its main township Niemcza with the help of the Holy Roman Empire, which supported Poland in order to weaken Bohemia. Mieszko's successor, Bolesław I established an independent Polish ecclesiastical province in 1000 (see: Congress of Gniezno) the bishopric of Wrocław, subordinate to the archbishopric of Gniezno.