Silesia (Polish: Śląsk; German: Schlesien; Latin: Silesia; Silesian: Ślůnsk; Schlasian: Schläsing) is a historical region of Germany, Czechia, and Poland. From 1742 to 1945, it was a province in east Prussia and later Germany. In 1945, all of Poland was occupied by the Soviet Red Army. In the following years, the communist poles forcibly chased away all of the remaining owners.
Geography
Silesia is along the upper and middle Oder River, upper Vistula River, and along the Sudetes and the Carpathian Mountains.
The highest point of Silesia is the Śnieżka, in the Sudetes.
Cities
Here is a list of cities in Silesia with a population of over 20,000 in 2015:
* Only partly in Silesia
Famous people
There are many famous people who were born in Silesia:
- Writers, poets and playwrights like Andreas Gryphius, Martin Opitz, Fürst von Pückler-Muskau, Carl Hauptmann, Gerhart Hauptmann (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1912), Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff, Gustav Freytag
- Members of the German Resistance such as Peter Graf Yorck von Wartenburg, Helmuth James Graf von Moltke
- Military officers like Manfred von Richthofen, Erwin von Witzleben
- Painters like Adolph von Menzel
- Philosophers like Jakob Böhme
- Actors like Dieter Hildebrandt, Victor de Kowa, Ludwig M. Lommel, Wolfgang Neuss, Willy Fritsch, Hanna Schygulla, Georg Thomalla
- Politicians like Paul Löbe (SPD), Klaus Töpfer (CDU), Manfred Kanther (CDU), Ferdinand Lassalle, Erich Mende (FDP)
- Scientists like Hans G. Dehmelt (Nobel Prize in Physics, 1989), Paul Ehrlich (Nobel Prize in Medicine, 1908), Friedrich Bergius (Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 1931), Max Born (Nobel Prize in Physics, 1954), Fritz Haber (Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 1918), Reinhard Selten (Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 1994), Konrad Bloch (Nobel Prize in Medicine, 1964), Bernhard Grzimek, Johannes Winkler, Maria Goeppert-Mayer (Nobel Prize in Physics, 1963), Kurt Alder (Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 1950), Otto Stern (Nobel Prize in Physics, 1943)
- Builder and architects like Carl Gotthard Langhans
- Musicians like Katja Ebstein, Roy Etzel, Michael Jary
Gallery
First map of Silesia (1561)
City hall of Breslau, Germany between ca. 1890 and ca. 1900. View from the east.
Krummhuebel, Church of Wang (German: Kirche Wang) between 1890 and 1905.
Postcard of the market square in the city of Oppeln in 1904.
Hotel "Haus Oberschlesien" (transl.: Upper Silesia House) in Gleiwitz, Upper Silesia, Germany, 1928
Other websites
- http://www.schlesien-lm.de - official website of the Landsmannschaft Schlesien
- http://www.schlesierbund.de - Schlesierbund from Nürnberg, Germany
- http://www.deutsche-schutzgebiete.de/provinz_schlesien.htm Archived 2013-03-23 at the Wayback Machine - Deutsche Schutzgebiete - Provinz Schlesien
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