page_title: Katowice
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Katowice / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Great Synagogue of Katowice, built in 1900 and destroyed by the nazis in 1939
context_page_description: Katowice is a city in southern Poland, the capital city of the Silesian Region, and a center of the Upper Silesia and Dąbrowa Basin Metropolis. With the population of 292,774, it is the eleventh-largest city in Poland. The wider Katowice urban area has the population of approximately 2 to 3 million people.
  Throughout the mid-18th century, Katowice had developed into a village upon the discovery of rich coal reserves in the area. In 1742 the First Silesian War transferred Upper Silesia, including Katowice, to Prussia. Subsequently, from the second half of the 18th century, many German or Prussian craftsmen, merchants and artists began to settle in the region, which had been inhabited mostly by Poles over the past hundreds of years. Simultaneously Silesia experienced the influx of the first Jewish settlers. In the first half of the 19th century, intensive industrialization transformed local mills and farms into industrial steelworks, mines, foundries and artisan workshops. This also contributed to the establishment of companies and eventual rapid growth of the city.
context_section_description: The area around Katowice, in Upper Silesia, has been inhabited by ethnic Polish Silesians from its earliest documented history. Initially it was ruled by the Polish Silesian Piast dynasty until its extinction. The settlement of the area surrounding Katowice dates back to the end of the 12th century. From 1138, the Bytom castellany encompassed territories where Katowice is now located. In 1177 the lands were legally handed over by Duke Casimir II the Just to his nephew Mieszko I Tanglefoot; this justified their incorporation into the medieval Silesian provinces. At the turn of the 14th century, new villages called Bogucice, Ligota, Szopenice and Podlesie were established, as well as the village of Dąb, mentioned in 1299 in a document issued by Duke Casimir of Bytom.
  From 1327, the region was under Czech administration as part of the Kingdom of Bohemia. In historical documents dating from 1468, there was a reference to the settlement of Podlesie, which, at present, is one of the city districts, whereas the village of Katowice (or "Katowicze" in older records) was first mentioned in the year 1598. Historians assume that Katowice was founded on the right bank of the Rawa river by Andrzej Bogucki in around 1580.
  In 1598 a village called Villa Nova was also documented to stand in the area now occupied by the city of Katowice. By this time the territory had changed from the Bohemian Crown to the domain of the Austrian Habsburg dynasty.
  Kattowitz gained city status in 1865 in the Prussian Province of Silesia. The city flourished due to large mineral (especially coal) deposits in the nearby mountains. Extensive city growth and prosperity depended on the coal mining and steel industries, which took off during the Industrial Revolution. The city was inhabited mainly by Germans, Silesians, Jews and Poles. In 1884, 36 Jewish Zionist delegates met here, forming the Hovevei Zion movement. Previously part of the Beuthen district, in 1873 it became the capital of the new Kattowitz district. On 1 April 1899, the city was separated from the district, becoming an independent city.
  Under the Treaty of Versailles after World War I, the Upper Silesia plebiscite was organised by the League of Nations. Though Kattowitz proper voted 22,774 to remain in Germany and 3,900 for Poland, it was attached to Poland as the larger district voted 66,119 for Poland and 52,992 for Germany. Following the Silesian uprisings of 1918–21 Katowice became part of the Second Polish Republic with some autonomy for the Silesian Parliament as a constituency and the Silesian Voivodeship Council as the executive body).
  During the early stages of World War II and the Poland Campaign, Katowice was essentially abandoned, as the Polish Army had to position itself around Kraków. Under the Nazi occupation many of the city's historical and iconic monuments were destroyed, most notably the Great Katowice Synagogue, which was burned to the ground on 4 September 1939. This was followed by the alteration of street names and the introduction of strict rules. Additionally, the use of Polish in public conversations was banned. The German administration was also infamous for organising public executions of civilians and by the middle of 1941, most of the Polish and Jewish population was expelled. Eventually, Katowice was occupied by the Red Army in January 1945. Significant parts of the downtown and inner suburbs were demolished during the occupation. This, however, cannot be compared with Warsaw, where the level of destruction reached 85%. As a result, the authorities were able to preserve the central district in its prewar character.
  The postwar period of Katowice was characterised by the time of heavy industry development in the Upper Silesian region, which helped the city in regaining its status as the most industrialised Polish city and a major administrative centre. As the city developed so briskly, the 1950s marked a significant increase in its population and an influx of migrants from the Eastern Borderlands, the so-called Kresy. The city area began to quickly expand by incorpor
caption: The Great Synagogue in Katowice was destroyed by the German Nazis during the invasion of Poland on 4 September 1939
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