Poland in the Early Middle Ages

Timeline of Polish history The most important phenomenon that took place within the lands of Poland in the Early Middle Ages, as well as other parts of Central Europe was the arrival and permanent settlement of the West Slavic or Lechitic peoples.

Initially based in the central Polish lowlands around Giecz, Poznań and Gniezno, the Polans went through a period of accelerated building of fortified settlements and territorial expansion beginning in the first half of the 10th century.

[20] Scythia, "stretching far and spreading wide" in the eastern and southern directions, had at the west end, as seen at the time of Jordanes' writing (first half to mid-6th century) or earlier, "the Germans and the river Vistula".

[24] The largest of the earliest Slavic (Prague culture) settlement sites in Poland that have been subjected to systematic research is located in Bachórz, Rzeszów County, and dates to the second half of 5th through 7th centuries.

The food production economy was based on millet and wheat cultivation, hunting, fishing, gathering and cattle breeding (swine, sheep and goats bred to a lesser extent).

[1] The earliest Slavic settlers from the east reached southeastern Poland in the second half of the 5th century, specifically the San River basin, then the upper Vistula regions, including the Kraków area and Nowy Sącz Valley.

The Sukow-Dziedzice group shows significant idiosyncrasies, such as no graves and (typical for the rest of the Slavic world) rectangular dwellings set partially below the ground level were found within its span.

Jordanes' 6th-century description of the "populous race of the Venethi"[21] includes indications of their dwelling places in the regions near the northern ridge of the Carpathian Mountains and stretching from there "almost endlessly" east, while in the western direction reaching the sources of the Vistula.

[38] According to Jordanes, the Heruli nation traveled in 512 across all of the Sclaveni peoples territories, and then west of there through a large expanse of unpopulated lands, as the Slavs were about to settle the western and northern parts of Poland in the decades to follow.

[39][40] Byzantine writers held the Slavs in low regard for the simple life they led and also for their supposedly limited combat abilities, but in fact they were already a threat to the Danubian boundaries of the Empire in the early 6th century, where they waged plundering expeditions.

[46] A monumental and technically complex border protection area gord of over 3 hectares in size was built around 770–780 in Trzcinica near Jasło on the site of an old Bronze Age era stronghold, probably the seat of a local ruler and his garrison.

Wheat, millet and rye were most important crops; other cultivated plant species included oat, barley, pea, broad bean, lentil, flax and hemp, as well as apple, pear, plum, peach and cherry trees in fruit orchards.

The agricultural practices of the Slavs are known from archeological research, which documents progressive increases over time in arable area and resulting deforestation,[51] and from written reports provided by Ibrahim ibn Yaqub, a 10th-century Jewish traveler.

[52] An anonymous Arab writer from the turn of the 10th century mentions that the Slavic people made an alcoholic beverage out of honey and their celebrations were accompanied by music played on the lute, tambourines and wind instruments.

7th– to 9th-century collections of objects have been found in Bonikowo and Bruszczewo, Kościan County (iron spurs, knives, clay containers with some ornamentation) and in the Kraków-Nowa Huta region (weapons and utensils in Pleszów and Mogiła), among other places.

Thietmar of Merseburg wrote in the early 11th century of the Veleti, a tribe of Polabian Slavs, with a report that their assembly kept deliberating till everybody agreed, but this "war democracy" was gradually being replaced by a government system in which the tribal elders and rulers had the upper hand.

[56] When social and economic evolution reached this level, the concentration of power was facilitated and made possible to sustain by parallel development of a professional military force (called at this stage "drużyna") at the ruler's or chief's disposal.

[63] The first Slavic state-like entity, the realm of King Samo, originally a Frankish trader, flourished close to Poland in Bohemia and Moravia, parts of Pannonia and more southern regions between the Oder and Elbe rivers during the period 623–658.

Slavic Carantania, centered on Krnski Grad (now Karnburg in Austria), was more of a real state, developed possibly from one part of the disintegrating Samo's kingdom, but lasted under a native dynasty throughout the 8th century and became Christianized.

[65] In the 9th century the Polish lands were still on the peripheries of medieval Europe as regards its major powers and events, but a measure of progress did take place in levels of civilization, as evidenced by the number of gords built, kurgans raised and movable equipment used.

Writing in the 11th century, Adam of Bremen recognized Wolin as one of the largest European cities, inhabited by honest, good-natured and hospitable Slavic people, together with other nationalities, from Greeks to barbarians, including the Saxons, as long as they did not demonstrate their Christianity too openly.

The archeological findings there include a great variety of imported goods (even from the Far East) and locally manufactured products and raw materials; amber and precious metals figure prominently, as jewelry was one of the mainstay economic activities of the Wolinian elite.

The settlement covered an area of 20 hectares and consisted of a two-dock seaport, the craft-trade portion, and the peripheral residential development, all protected by a wood and earth bulwark separating it from the mainland.

The multi-ethnic Truso had extensive trade contacts not only with distant lands and Scandinavia, but also the Slavic areas located to the south and west of it, from where ceramics and other products were transported along the Vistula in river crafts.

Such separation was probably a positive factor by facilitating the efforts of a lineage of leaders from an elder clan of a tribe there, known as the Piast House, which resulted in the early part of the 10th century in the establishment of an embryonic Polish state.

Masovia and parts of Pomerania found themselves increasingly under the Piast influence, while the southbound expansion was for the time being stalled, because large portions of Lesser Poland and Silesia were controlled by the Czech state.

The scale of the human trade practice is arguable, however, because much of the population from the defeated tribes was resettled for agricultural work or in the near-gord settlements, where they could serve the victors in various capacities and thus contribute to the economic and demographic potential of the state.

By the end of Mieszko's life, his state included the West Slavic lands in geographic proximity and connected by natural features to the Piast territorial nucleus of Greater Poland.

Silver objects, coins and decorations, often cut into pieces, are believed to have served as currency units, brought in by Jewish and Arab traders, but locally more as accumulations of wealth and symbols of prestige.

[111] A treasure located in Góra Strękowa, Białystok County, hidden after 901, includes dirhem coins minted between 764 and 901 and Slavic decorations made in southern Ruthenia that show Byzantine influence.