Origins The origin of the Armenian presence in the region can be traced back to the late 10th century. Historically back then their settlement did not occur in Poland but in Ruthenia, where they were invited by the Ruthenian rulers of Kyiv and employed as mercenaries. Emigration to Ruthenia intensified first after the Seljuk penetration into Greater Armenia and the fall of Ani in 1064, and later again in the 12th century. With the rise of the principalities in Western Ruthenia, Prince Davyd Ihorovych invited Armenian settlers to his lands. Others relocated there after the Mongol conquest of Kyiv in 1240. They settled primarily in Galicia and Podolia, including in
Kamianets-Podilskyi and surrounding villages, where they had built a church by 1250. And thus majority of the Ruthenian Armenians became subject of the Polish crown. The rest had lived primarily in Volhynia where the third largest Armenian community had thrived in Lutsk. After 1569 Union of Lublin and subsequent transfer of the Ruthenian voivodeships to the Kingdom of Poland, they ended up under Polish rule as well.
Late medieval and early modern periods After the conquest of Ruthenia,
Casimir III (1333–1370) gave to the Armenians of
Kamieniec Podolski in 1344 and those of
Lwów in 1356 the right of setting up a national council, exclusively Armenian, known as the "Voit." This council, composed of twelve judges, administered Armenian affairs in full independence. All acts and official deliberations were conducted in the
Armenian language and in accordance with the laws of that nation. The Armenians of Lwów had built a wooden church in 1183; in 1363 it was replaced by a stone edifice which became the seat of the Armenian prelates of Poland and
Moldavia. Through successive immigrations, the Armenians of Poland gradually formed a colony, comprising up to 6,000 (excluding
Kaffa). They were welcomed by the Kings of Poland and were granted not only religious liberty, but also political privileges. (now
Lviv) was for centuries the most important Armenian church in Poland In the battles of
Grunwald and
Varna, the forebears of the Alexandrovics, the Augustinovics, the Agopsovics and Apakanovics took part. Also from their ranks came forth later renowned Poles, such as the Malowski, Missasowicz, Piramowicz, Pernatowicz, Jachowicz, Mrozianowski, Grigorowicz, Barowicz, Teodorowicz, among others. As
Kaffa in
Crimea voluntarily recognised Polish sovereignty in 1462, with around 46,000 Armenians (66% of the city's population) in the 1470s, it became the largest concentration of Armenians under Polish sovereignty until the
Ottoman capture of the city. In 1516 King
Sigismund I authorized the installation in the wealthy and aristocratic center of Lwów an Armenian tribunal called the Ermeni tora in
Armeno-Kipchak (Datastan in
Armenian). The peaceful life of the colony was troubled in 1626. An abbot named
Mikołaj Torosowicz was ordained a bishop in 1626 by Melchisedek, a former coadjutor-Katholikos of
Etchmiadzin who supported restoring unity with the
Roman Catholic Church. Despite the ensuing rift between the majority of the Armenian community and the few followers of Torosowicz the Armenian community finally reentered into communion with the
Holy See forming the
Armenian Catholic Church which retained a separate hierarchy and used the Armenian Rite.with image of Armenian (Ormianin)] Armenians enjoyed better living and earning conditions in Poland, local Armenian self-government, religious tolerance and the opportunity to preserve their own customs. Initially, Armenians settled in
royal cities along important trade routes, but later also in
private towns, attracted by Polish magnates. Armenians lived mostly in south-eastern Poland, with the largest Armenian communes in the major royal cities of
Lwów and
Kamieniec Podolski, where they inhabited defined Armenian quarters, and which with several churches served as the main religious centers of Armenians in Poland. Other local Armenian communes were in
Brody,
Brzeżany,
Horodenka,
Jazłowiec,
Józefgród,
Łysiec,
Mohylów Podolski,
Obertyn,
Podhajce,
Raszków,
Stanisławów, Studzienica,
Śniatyn,
Tyśmienica,
Złoczów and
Żwaniec. In addition, there were Armenian churches in
Bełz,
Buczacz,
Jarosław,
Kijów, Kubaczówka,
Kuty,
Lublin,
Łuck,
Waręż,
Włodzimierz,
Zamość,
Żółkiew, and an Armenian chapel in Warsaw. Armenians were also noted in other towns of south-eastern Poland, such as
Przemyśl,
Bar,
Sokal,
Halicz,
Dubno. Since the 16th century, Armenian churches in Poland were erected not in the
Armenian style, but rather in line with the prevailing Polish trends, such as
Renaissance (e.g. in Jazłowiec) and
Baroque (e.g. in Brzeżany and Stanisławów). Some Armenians moved to other parts of the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, e.g.
Kraków,
Warsaw,
Gdańsk,
Płock,
Piotrków and
Vilnius. In 1655–1675, the Armenian community in Poland further grew due to immigration from
Van,
Constantinople and
Isfahan. In 1660, the Armenians of Kijów were expelled by the
Russian occupiers. In 1674, Armenians of Kamieniec Podolski were expelled by the Ottoman occupiers, and after around three years of exile in the
Balkans, they returned to Poland and mostly settled in Lwów, Stanisławów, Brody, Łysiec, Tyśmienica and Złoczów, but some settled in western and central Poland. The Armenian community of
Warsaw gained importance and grew since 1672, when many Armenians fled there from Ottoman-occupied
Podolia. After Poland regained control of Podolia, Armenians once again settled in various towns in the region, including
Józefgród,
Mohylów Podolski,
Obertyn,
Raszków and
Satanów. A group of Polish Armenians took part in the
Syunik rebellion against Ottoman rule in Armenia in the 1720s. The Armenians played an important role in shaping Poland's economic and cultural landscape, leaving a lasting impact through their contributions:"They were mainly occupied with trade and craft. In the 16th and 17th centuries, Armenians introduced Orient onto the Polish market, importing from the East a variety of oriental luxury goods, and producing their own from oriental designs for the nobility and patricians. Although they were an affluent community, some restrictions were imposed on them, since members of the Armenian Apostolic Church were regarded as heretics in the Polish society. However, in 1630 they entered a union with the Roman-Catholic Church and became Catholics of the Armenian Liturgy. This advanced their assimilation processes" The Armenians grew wealthy from trade, specializing in importing a wide variety of goods from eastern markets, i.e.
Moldavia,
Wallachia,
Turkey,
Egypt,
Persia, India and Muscovy to Polish trade centers, such as Kraków, Gdańsk, Lublin,
Poznań, Jarosław,
Toruń and Vilnius. Armenians were also often translators, secretaries and diplomats of Poland to more eastern countries, sometimes even Polish intelligence agents in Turkic and Tatar countries, and counterintelligence agents in Poland. The first known Armenian to serve in Polish diplomacy was an interpreter of the first Polish mission to the Ottoman Empire in 1415. Sefer Muratowicz, Polish diplomat of Armenian descent, contributed to the establishment of
Iran–Poland relations. Armenians also mediated ransoms or ransomed Polish captives from Turkish and Tatar slavery themselves. Some Armenians from Poland even served in the diplomacy of other countries, i.e.
Sweden,
Wallachia and
Austria.
Ties to the Armenian community in the Romanian lands Armenians in
Moldavia were under the jurisdiction of the Armenian Diocese of L'viv since 1365, shortly after the
principality was founded. As merchants, the Armenians mere present in many of the important commercial centers in the various polities which now make up
Romania and
Moldova. The oldest architectural monument built by Armenians on these lands and preserved to this day is the church of St. Mary of Botosani, built in 1350.
Nicolae Șuțu writes in Notion statistiques sur la Moldavie (published in Iași, 1849):
"From the 11th century, the Armenians, leaving their settlements invaded by the Persians, took refuge in Poland and Moldova. Subsequent emigrations took place in 1342 and 1606. The Armenian churches in Moldavia, the oldest of which is in Botoșani and founded in 1350, while the other is in Iași which dates from 1395." The fact that two Armenian Bibles from Caffa dating to 1351 and 1354 were preserved in this church is a testament to the antiquity and importance of the Armenian colony in Botoșani. During the short-lived persecution of the Armenian community under the reign of Moldavian
Hospodar Ștefan VI Rareș, many Armenians fled across the border into Poland. colloquially known as the
Zamca was the base of operations for
James Louis Sobieski's failed bid to become the
Prince of Moldavia. Around 10,000 of the Lwów Armenian community who had settled in
Moldavia moved from there during the
Turko-Polish war in 1671 to
Bucovina and
Transylvania. In Bucovina, they lived in the city of
Suceava and its vicinity. In Transylvania they founded two new cities, Erszebetvaros (
Dumbrăveni) and Szamos-ujvar (
Gherla), which, as a special favor, were declared free cities by
Charles VI, Emperor of Austria (1711–1740). When
James Louis Sobieski attempted to ascend to the Moldavian throne, his base of operations was the 15th century
Armenian monastery of Suceava. Beginning in 1690, the Monastery became the headquarters of the
Polish Army for all of their operations in Moldova related to Poland's participation in the
War of the Holy League against the Ottoman Empire. Staying at the monastery for several years, the Poles built an extensive network of
bastion fortifications which are well preserved to this day. The popular name of the monastery, "Zamca" likely comes from this period and is derived from , the Polish word for castle.
Late modern period in the late 19th or early 20th century The Armenian origins of many Polish families can be traced to before
World War II, the result of intermarriage. The
Armenian cathedral of Lwów, modelled on the Cathedral of Ani, was an important site for religious pilgrimages. The last Armenian Archbishop in Poland,
Józef Teodorowicz, as the head of the community, was a member of the
Austro-Hungarian Senate, together with Roman Catholic and
Greek Catholic colleagues. Following the late-18th-century
Partitions of Poland, most Polish Armenians found themselves in the
Austrian Partition. By the end of the 18th century, the Austrian authorities dissolved Armenian church schools for children and the Armenian Collegium in Lwów, with only one Armenian school active until the 1860s in Kuty. The Armenian community of partitioned Poland have maintained contacts mainly only with Armenians from the neighboring regions of
Bukovina and
Bessarabia, while they very rarely had contact with Armenians of Armenia or with other Armenian diaspora. As most of
Podolia fell to the
Russian Partition and the Armenians there were cut off by the border from the Armenians in the Austrian Partition and the Armenian Cathedral of Lwów, Mohylów Podolski was designated the seat of a local Armenian Catholic bishop (the only one in what was then Russia). By the 1870s, the Armenian communes in the Russian Partition, such as in Mohylów Podolski, were abolished. Malyi Virmeny which translates to
"Little Armenia" in
Ukrainian is a historic old town once near the
Smotrych River which was founded during the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. in the 1930s At the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 6,000 Armenians living mostly in
Eastern Galicia (today
Western Ukraine), with centers in
Lwów (Lviv),
Stanisławów (Ivano-Frankivsk),
Brzeżany (Berezhany),
Kuty,
Łysiec (Lysets),
Horodenka,
Tłumacz (Tlumach) and
Śniatyn (Sniatyn). An Armenian-language faculty was introduced at the
University of Lwów in 1904. During WWI some activists sought to reestablish an independent Armenia or to obtain international protection for Armenians from the Turkish-perpetrated massacres. In 1916, Archbishop Józef Teodorowicz attempted to bring several thousand Armenian survivors of the
Armenian genocide to Lwów, but to no avail due to the hostile attitude of the
Turkish-allied Austrian occupier. The Armenian community and Poles supported efforts to restore an independent Armenia following World War I. The Polish-Armenian Society was founded by a group of Poles and Armenians in Lwów in 1920, which after the
Red Army invasion of Armenia advocated the admission of 40,000 Armenians from the Caucasus and Russia to Poland, which, however, was impossible due to the Soviet occupation.
World War II and post-war period During
World War II, south-eastern Poland was at various times
occupied by the
Soviet Union and
Nazi Germany, and Polish Armenians were like Poles the victims of both occupiers and Ukrainian nationalists. The Soviets conducted deportations to the
USSR and executions of several Armenian Catholic preachers. , the last
diocesan administrator of the
Armenian Catholic Archeparchy of Lwów, issued Armenian Catholic baptismal certificates to Jews,
saving them from the Holocaust, and was arrested by the German occupiers in 1943. Polish Armenians were also the victims of the
massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, perpetrated by the Ukrainian nationalists. After suffering heavy losses along with the rest of Poland's population in the war, the Polish Armenian community suffered a second loss. The regions of Poland where Armenians were concentrated such as
Eastern Galicia were annexed into the
Soviet Union as part of the agreements reached at the
Yalta Conference. As a result, the Polish Armenian community became dispersed all over Poland. Many of them were resettled in cities in northern and western Poland such as
Kraków,
Gliwice,
Opole,
Wrocław,
Poznań,
Gdańsk, and
Warsaw. {{multiple image |align=right |caption_align=center |total_width=340 |perrow=3 To combat this dispersion they began to form Armenian Cultural Associations. Additionally, the
Catholic Church opened two
Armenian Catholic parishes with one in
Gdańsk and the other in
Gliwice, while
Roman Catholic churches in other cities such as St. Giles in
Kraków would from time to time also hold
Armenian Rite services for the local Armenian community. Some Polish Armenians as part of the
Anders Army ended up as emigrants in
Western Europe and later in
Australia, the
United States and
Canada, where they co-founded the Armenian Catholic parish in
Montreal in 1983. A number of cultural and artifacts of Armenian culture can still be found within Poland's present-day borders, particularly in the vicinity of
Zamość and
Rzeszów. == Armenians today ==