A major new assessment of the "vanished kingdom" of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth--one which recognizes its achievements before its destruction Richard Butterwick tells the compelling story of the last decades of one of Europe's largest and least understood polities: the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Drawing on the latest research, Butterwick vividly portrays the turbulence the Commonwealth experienced. Far from seeing it as a failed state, he shows the ways in which it overcame the stranglehold of Russia and briefly regained its sovereignty, the crowning success of which took place on 3 May 1791--the passing of the first Constitution of modern Europe.

In the period between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries a considerable number of Scots migrated to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Some sojourned there for some time, while others stayed permanently and exercised commercial business and crafts. The migration stopped in the eighteenth century, and the Scots who remained in Poland seem to have lost their ethnic identity. This book offers an examination and assessment of this migration: numbers of migrants; patterns of settlement; laws regulating Scottish presence in Poland-Lithuania; their commercial, academic, religious and military activities; their social advancement into the Polish nobility; their assimilation and then the eventual disappearance as a distinct ethnic group in Poland-Lithuania.

This collection of essays explores more than five centuries of Scottish-Polish interactions. It focuses on the two main moments of contact: the early modern experiences of Scottish pedlars, merchants, mercenaries and diplomats in the Polish-Lithuanian commonA--wealth and the Polish presence in Scotland during the twentieth and early twenty-first century. The latter period includes the Polish military presence in Scotland during World War II and the new Polish migration to Scotland after Poland's accession to the European Union in 2004. The book will be of interest to students and researchers who focus on the boom subject of early modern Scottish emigration to the European continent, and also to more general readers outside the scholarly community. It will be of value to the Polish community in Scotland and to anyone interested in the joint history of these two countries.

A study of national identity in Royal Prussia - the 'other Prussia', part of the Polish state from 1454 to 1793.