 Poles in Shanghai, c. 1931 | |
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 1,000 [1] (2012, est.) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Shanghai [1] historically also: Harbin, Hailar, Tianjin |
Poles in China form a small population, estimated at 1,000 (as of 2012) and mostly concentrated in the major cities of Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Shanghai. [1] First noted Polish people lived in China in the 17th century.
In the mid-17th century, notable Polish Jesuit missionaries Michał Boym and Jan Mikołaj Smogulecki arrived to China. Boym significantly expanded the knowledge of China in Europe with his works, among which were the pioneering botany book Flora Sinensis [3] and detailed maps of China. [2] He also introduced Chinese medicine in Europe, including the analysis of the pulse. [3] Smogulecki taught European mathematics and astronomy in China, and introduced logarithms to China. [4] Both Boym and Smogulecki had contacts with the Imperial Court of China. [4]
In the 1820s and 1830s, Polish physician Józef Wojciechowski was active in Beijing, and became renown for successfully curing a prince from the imperial court deemed incurably ill by local doctors, for which he was honoured with a memorial in Beijing in 1829. [5]
In the late 19th century and early 20th century, when Poland remained partitioned and occupied by neighbouring powers, thousands of Polish emigrants, including engineers, architects, doctors, teachers, many of them political refugees, settled in Manchuria (Northeast China) and greatly contributed to the foundation and development of the Chinese Eastern Railway and the city of Harbin. [6] The founder of the city was Polish engineer Adam Szydłowski, who also was Harbin's first mayor, [7] while the city's layout was planned by Polish engineer Stanisław Jokisz, and other Polish engineers were also responsible for its construction. [6] Poles established a prosperous and influential community in the city, with Polish press, schools, organizations, churches [7] (including the present-day Sacred Heart of Jesus Cathedral) and sports teams, and peacefully co-existed with the city's other ethnicities including the Chinese. [6] Many Poles were employed at the Chinese Eastern Railway, which was managed at the time by Polish railway engineer Stanisław Kierbedź. [6] Tadeusz Nowkuński was the head physician of the central hospital of the Chinese Eastern Railway, active in fighting the plague and cholera epidemics in Manchuria. [8] Poles introduced sugar beet cultivation to China and established the country's first brewery, [6] now known as the Harbin Brewery. Poles also established the first steam mills, metallurgical plants, and furniture factories in Manchuria. [6] Several Polish writers, including Teodor Parnicki, Edward Kajdański [9] and Kazimierz Grochowski, either were born or spent part of their childhood or adulthood in Harbin, before eventually moving to Poland, where they popularized knowledge about China and East Asia.
The largest Polish communities in China, outside of Harbin, were in Shanghai, Hailar and Tianjin, and numbered about 500, 100 and 100, respectively. [10] The first Polish organizations in Shanghai and Hailar were established in 1917 and 1918, respectively. [11] Poles in Hailar also had a Catholic church, and a Polish library and school, although the school was closed in 1922 after many Poles left for Poland. [12] The Polish community in Tianjin was considered the wealthiest of the Polish communities in China in the 1920s, and among its members were industrialists, merchants and employees of foreign banks and enterprises, plus some refugees from Russian exile. [13] As of 1929, some 5,000 Poles still lived in China. [13] The Polish community in Harbin remained strong, until many Poles gradually left for Poland in the 1930s, and the remaining Poles were mostly repatriated to Poland by the Polish government in 1949. [6]
Braniewo, is a town in northern Poland, in Warmia, in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, with a population of 16,907 as of June 2021. It is the capital of Braniewo County.
Nałęcz is a Polish coat of arms. It was used by associated szlachta families in the Kingdom of Poland and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569–1795).
Wincenty Witos was a Polish statesman, prominent member and leader of the Polish People's Party (PSL), who served three times as the Prime Minister of Poland in the 1920s.
Pilawa is a Polish coat of arms. It was used by many noble families known as szlachta in Polish in medieval Poland and later under the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, branches of the original medieval Piława Clan (Pilawici) family as well as families connected with the Clan by adoption.
The Collegium Hosianum was the Jesuit collegium founded in 1565, 1566 by Polish Cardinal Stanislaus Hosius in Braunsberg (Braniewo), Kingdom of Poland. The town was then part of the Polish Prince-Bishopric of Warmia under rule of Cardinal Hosius. The Collegium Hosianum was one of the biggest Jesuit schools and one of the most important centres of Counter-Reformation in Europe and was particularly established to educate Catholic clergy of different countries.
Education has been of prime interest to Poland's rulers since the early 12th century. The catalog of the library of the Cathedral Chapter in Kraków dating from 1110 shows that Polish scholars already then had access to western European literature. In 1364, King Casimir III the Great founded the Cracow Academy, which would become one of the great universities of Europe. The Polish people have made considerable contributions in the fields of science, technology and mathematics. The list of famous scientists in Poland begins in earnest with the polymath, astronomer and mathematician Nicolaus Copernicus, who formulated the heliocentric theory and sparked the European Scientific Revolution.
Teodor Parnicki (1908–1988) was a Polish writer, notable for his historical novels. He is especially renowned for works related to the early medieval Middle East, the late Roman and the Byzantine Empires.
Michał Piotr Boym, SJ was a Polish Jesuit missionary to China, scientist and explorer. He was an early Western traveller within the Chinese mainland, and the author of numerous works on Asian fauna, flora and geography. The first European Chinese dictionary, published in 1670, is attributed to Boym.
Jan Mikołaj Smogulecki (1610–1656), of the Grzymała coat of arms, was a Polish nobleman, politician, missionary, scholar and Jesuit credited with introducing logarithms to China.
Relations between the People's Republic of China and Poland officially began on October 5, 1949.
Polish settlement in the Philippines began during the Spanish colonial period, mostly with the arrival of Catholic clergy destined for missionary work in other Asian countries. As of 2010 the 2010 census, there are 93 persons in the Philippines who claim Polish citizenship, and the Polish community in the Philippines is the fourth-largest Central European community in the country, after the local communities of Germans, Hungarians and Albanians.
The Duninowie or Dunin also Łabędzie was a Polish noble family, whose members were Magnates in medieval Poland. Members of the family held the title of Count in Poland.
10th Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment of the Polish Army. It existed from 1918 until 1939. Garrisoned in Łowicz, the unit belonged to the 26th Infantry Division from Skierniewice.
Kazimierz Grochowski (1873-1937) was a Polish mining engineer, explorer, geologist, ethnographer, archaeologist, and writer specializing in studies of Siberia, Mongolia, and Manchuria.
The Cimetière des Champeaux de Montmorency, at Montmorency, Val-d'Oise in Île-de-France, is a cemetery first established in the 17th century. It has the particularity of being the largest Polish burial place in France, hence its appellation as the "Pantheon of the Polish Emigration". It is located 15 km north of Paris and adjacent to the spa resort of Enghien-les-Bains. That it fell to Montmorency to become the main necropolis of the Polish diaspora in the country is due to two Polish political exiles, who happened to be staying at the nearby spa at the time of their death and were buried in the local cemetery. They were the statesman and poet, Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, one time Polish envoy to the United Kingdom and Karol Kniaziewicz, politician and brigadier general in Napoleon's Grande Armée. Since their interments in the early part of the 19th century, a succession of noted exiled Poles found their final resting place in the cemetery. There are over 276 Polish burials, among them the poets Adam Mickiewicz, the national bard, and Cyprian Kamil Norwid, statesman Adam Jerzy Czartoryski, and the diplomat and head of the Polish resistance in France during WWII, Aleksander Kawalkowski. The cemetery has become one of the national symbols of Polish resistance to all forms of oppression, and each Spring, it is the rallying place for Poles living in the Paris area, who go there to commemorate their historical leaders and artists.
Poles in Japan form a small population of 1,510, yet the largest Polish diaspora in East Asia.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)| From Asia |  | |
|---|---|---|
| From elsewhere | ||
| See also | ||
For immigrants and expatriates in Hong Kong, see: Hong Kong people | ||
