Despite a number of cultural similarities, such as being prominent old medieval European kingdoms, belonging to Western civilization and sharing a common Roman Catholic religion, relations between France and Poland have only become relevant since the Renaissance era.

From the 16th century onward, the two countries made more frequent attempts at alliances and political cooperation, and the French and Polish ruling houses intermarried several times.

Polish–French relations were nascent until the 18th century, due to geographical distance and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth's lack of involvement in the wars of Western Europe.

French and Polish troops fought together as part of a larger European coalition against the Ottoman invasion of Europe at the Battle of Nicopolis in 1396.

In 1524, a Franco-Polish alliance was formed, however it fell through after King Francis I of France was defeated and captured by troops of Charles V of Austria and Spain in the Battle of Pavia in 1525.

[1] The first large wave of migration from France to Poland, consisting of persecuted Huguenots, occurred following the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre of 1572.

Two Polish kings, Władysław IV Vasa and John II Casimir, were married to French princess Ludwika Maria Gonzaga.

In the late 17th century, King John III Sobieski married French princess Marie Casimire Louise de la Grange d'Arquien and tried to forge a Polish–French alliance.

[4] Napoleon's creation of the Duchy of Warsaw gave every appearance of resurrecting the Polish nation from the political grave to which it had been consigned in the partitions that ended in 1795.

[citation needed] Critical was the contribution the Napoleonic period made towards the creation of a national legend or myth, which was to sustain and comfort Poles down the decades that followed.

Amongst other things, it contributed to a belief that the rest of Europe had an abiding interest in the fate of Poland, arising from Bonaparte's support in 1797 for the formation of Polish Legions, recruited from amongst émigrés and other exiles living in Italy.

After the Treaty of Lunéville in 1801, they were sent to the West Indies to suppress the slave revolt in the French colony Saint-Domingue, or modern Haiti.

However, the Poles were most enthusiastic about the 1812 war against Russia-which Napoleon called the Second Polish War-as they formed by far the largest foreign contingent of the Grand Army.

[citation needed] There is no precise information on what form the peace would have taken if Napoleon had won his war against Alexander, but many Poles held to the belief that it would, at the very least, have led to a fully restored Poland, including Lithuania; a return, in other words, to the situation prior to the first partition in 1772.

Polish national determination did impact Czar Alexander I, as he accepted that there could be no return to the position prevailing in 1795, when Poland had been extinguished.

[citation needed] It received fresh encouragement in 1918, as France was the only western power that offered unqualified support to the newly independent Poland.

Since the end of the 18th century, people who carried out their activities outside the country as emigres played a major role in Polish political life.

[6] It was during that era that some celebrated Poles came to live in France, such as the composer Frédéric Chopin, writers like Adam Mickiewicz, Cyprian Norwid or entrepreneurs like Louis Wolowski and Citroen and much later, the scientist Maria Skłodowska-Curie (Marie Curie).

[10] During the subsequent German occupation of Poland, a new Polish Army formed in France under the command of General Władysław Sikorski in late 1939.

The French companies with the largest presence in Poland include Orange, Vivendi, Carrefour, Casino, Crédit Agricole, Saint Gobain and Auchan.