Belarus and its 5 neighbouring countries
In 862 the Slavic tribes united with Scandinavian tribes and formed the medieval Kievan Rus state, existing from C9th-C13th. Rus’ was not Russia, nor Ukraine or Belarus, but the 3 East Slavic peoples once shared a common home. The main part that became Belarus was the Principality of Polotsk on the River Dvina which dominated trade with Baltic Latvia.
The Grand Duchy became a powerful state spanning Belarus; Lithuania; Kiev; Ukrainian Chernigov and Volyn; and Western Russia from the Baltics to the Black Sea. The Grand Duchy began acquiring power in the C13th and only began to lose its authority after C16th wars. In 1569 the Grand Duchy and the Kingdom of Poland signed the Union of Lublin: on equal terms the Duchy and the Crown federated in a state.
In the C15th Litva grew into the largest state in Europe, covering Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, Ukraine, Poland and Russia, a multi-ethnic state of Poles, Lithuanians, Belarusians and Jews, collectively called Litvins (Litvaks in Yiddish).
Rzecz Pospolita/Polish Commonwealth (1569-1795) was a stormy time; the state fought wars with Sweden & Russia. The Commonwealth’s long wars weakened the state and it lost independence. In 1772 part of Belarus was annexed to The Russian Empire (1772-1917); the Commonwealth was divided into Russia, Austria and Prussia in 1795.
Nesvizh Castle, residence of the Radziwiłł family.
183 metres above sea level. Built in C17th
Most Belarusians belonged to the Greek Catholic Church. This Church had a strong Baroque culture, influenced by the Jesuits and central European notions of Magdeburg Legal Code. Then note the split between Roman Catholics and Orthodox. Many Catholics supported the Litvin idea and local patriotism, while the Orthodox argued for kinship with the Russians against the Poles.
Built in the old Russian Orthodox style
Closed in 1949 and fully functioning again in 1990
main railway station, Minsk
1873
My grandmother knew Odessa was the world’s cultural centre, but my aunts knew Minsk was. Progress there was boosted by modern transport: a Moscow-Warsaw road was laid via Minsk; as was a Moscow-Warsaw railway link, and a Ukraine-Baltic Sea railway. Thus Minsk became an important rail junction-manufacturing hub, with trams, telephones, generators, factories, newspapers, theatres, colleges and religious centres. Literature and drama were important. Magnificant Gorki Park got a beautiful summer theatre before WW1.
In 1906 Russian PM Stolypin’s agrarian reform began. The mass movement of peasants (1906–16) saw 33,000+ men leave Belarusian territory for Siberia, before their land was the scene of bloody battles between German and Russian forces in 1915-6.
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk marked Belarus’ early exit from WW1 in Mar 1918 when the Belarusian People’s Republic lasted for a few weeks, but ended. After the Polish-Soviet War (1919-21), Belarus lost half of its territory to Poland. In 1921, the Riga Peace Treaty caused Belarus to be divided between the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic and Poland. A national movement grew briefly in the 1920s.
Prior to WW2, Jews remained the third largest ethnic groups in Belarus in general and Jews accounted for 50+% in Minsk, Pinsk, Vitebsk and Homiel in particular. But tragedy hit again. The Holocaust murdered 800,000+ Belarus Jews and destroyed the multi-ethnic basis of Litvinism. Belarusian resistance slowed the German advance in 1941, to protect Moscow, and in mid 1944 the German army was decimated by the Russians in Belarus!
Belarusians had a very Soviet view of WW2. Unlike Ukraine or Lithuania, there was no nationalist resistance movement i.e partisans were pro-Soviet and they dominated the post-war leadership of Belarus’ Communist Party. Note Minsk's City Gates, two 11-storey towers completed by 1953. The buildings are one of the most remarkable examples of Russian Empire style, appropriate since the heart of Minsk was located near the huge railway station. The lack of the threat of invasion from the West meant high levels of Russian investment, well into the 1980s. Thus Belarus became the industrial hub of the western USSR, at least until the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Chernobyl was in Ukraine, but very close to the Belarus border.
In 1906 Russian PM Stolypin’s agrarian reform began. The mass movement of peasants (1906–16) saw 33,000+ men leave Belarusian territory for Siberia, before their land was the scene of bloody battles between German and Russian forces in 1915-6.
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk marked Belarus’ early exit from WW1 in Mar 1918 when the Belarusian People’s Republic lasted for a few weeks, but ended. After the Polish-Soviet War (1919-21), Belarus lost half of its territory to Poland. In 1921, the Riga Peace Treaty caused Belarus to be divided between the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic and Poland. A national movement grew briefly in the 1920s.
Prior to WW2, Jews remained the third largest ethnic groups in Belarus in general and Jews accounted for 50+% in Minsk, Pinsk, Vitebsk and Homiel in particular. But tragedy hit again. The Holocaust murdered 800,000+ Belarus Jews and destroyed the multi-ethnic basis of Litvinism. Belarusian resistance slowed the German advance in 1941, to protect Moscow, and in mid 1944 the German army was decimated by the Russians in Belarus!
Belarusians had a very Soviet view of WW2. Unlike Ukraine or Lithuania, there was no nationalist resistance movement i.e partisans were pro-Soviet and they dominated the post-war leadership of Belarus’ Communist Party. Note Minsk's City Gates, two 11-storey towers completed by 1953. The buildings are one of the most remarkable examples of Russian Empire style, appropriate since the heart of Minsk was located near the huge railway station. The lack of the threat of invasion from the West meant high levels of Russian investment, well into the 1980s. Thus Belarus became the industrial hub of the western USSR, at least until the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Chernobyl was in Ukraine, but very close to the Belarus border.
City Gates, Minsk
Built 1947-53
Victory Square, Minsk, 1954
in honour of the soldiers of the Soviet Army and partisans of Belarus
Until independence in 1991, Belarus was the smallest of the 3 Slavic republics included in the Soviet Union, after Russia and Ukraine. While Belarusians shared a distinct ethnic identity and language, they had almost never enjoyed unity and political sovereignty. Belarus history was thus a study of regional forces and their interplay. The territory underwent partition and changed hands.. often!!
Since 1994, Belarus was ruled by Alyaksandr Lukashenka who promised to preserve the best of the Soviet system; its social contract, historical memory and stability. He could marginalise the nationalist movement, which had been unable to displace the Communists in 1991-4, and reshaped it under his own authoritarianism. He consolidated power in the early 2000s and he could enjoy huge Russian subsidies of cheap oil and gas in return for political loyalty. But this union began to collapse after the Ukrainian War began in 2014. Belarus sought to protect its sovereignty; Russia demanded more in terms of friendship and was no longer willing to pay so many of Belarus’ bills.
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8 comments:
Hello Helen
You mentioned that 800,000 Belarus Jews were murdered during the Second World War. But you didn't say what a large percentage of the community that was. Did the Germans kill all the Jews or did the locals participate? What happened to the survivors?
Deb
What a tragedy. In a New York Review of Books, historian Timothy Snyder noted “Belarus was both the epicentre of European mass killing and the base of operations of anti-Nazi partisans who actually contributed to the victory of the Allies.” 20% of all Belarus citizens were killed in the war, but the percentage of Jews was much higher - the European Jewish Congress estimates that 90% of Belarus’s Jewish population was murdered in WW2.
Once in control of Belarus, the Nazis began to concentrate the Jews in ghettos, killing the young and old. But the German attempts to incite the local population to carry out independent pogroms against Belarus' Jews failed. Belarus was almost entirely destroyed by the war, worse than any other European country.
Hello Hels, Thanks you for this capsule history of Belarus, much of which I did not know. How many centers of culture and industry were destroyed in the World Wars! I was especially glad to know that the Belarusians did not willingly participate in the horrible pogroms.
--Jim
Parnassus
there were so many centuries of instability and change that Belarus citizens could never be certain about their own nation's borders, languages, rulers, religion etc etc. Of course there were many disruptions in other nations as well, even in islands that didn't share a border with anyone else.
Here is a true story from my late mother in law. She was a high school student in Czechoslovakia and one Friday afternoon, before they went home for the weekend, the principal called all the students into the assembly room. He told them to say goodbye to the Czech-speaking teachers who were being sacked, to spend the next two days learning Hungarian and to meet their new Hungarian-speaking teachers on Monday morning.
Boa tarde Hels. Obrigado pela excelente de aula de história sobre Belarus.
Luiz
Belarus has a complex national history, doesn't it, and often very troubled. I had enough problems understanding the events while I was writing it myself; I hope that if you translate the material in my blog that the history translates clearly.
Hi Hels - I've been wanting to read this for ages - there's been so much change in that part of the world. Thanks for the interesting summary with your thoughts ... it can't be easy for so many peoples in that part of the world ... thank you - HIlary
Hilary
My closest family lived in Lithuania, Ukraine and Russia, and although there might have been the odd uncle or cousin from Belarus, I had little idea about that nation's changing history.
Even when the USSR ended and the Commonwealth of Independent States was created, I imagine that most people didn't see the Republic of Belarus on nighttime tv ,,, until Alexander Lukashenko became President in 1994.
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