Osiek Jasielski is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

Jasło County __NOTOC__ Jasło County ( pl, powiat jasielski) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Subcarpathian Voivodeship, south-eastern Poland, on the Slovakia, Slovak border. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a re ...

Subcarpathian Voivodeship Subcarpathian Voivodeship or Subcarpathia Province (in pl, Województwo podkarpackie ) is a voivodeship, or province, in the southeastern corner of Poland. Its administrative capital and largest city is Rzeszów. Along with the Marshall, it is ...

, in south-eastern Poland. It is the seat of the

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' , from German ''Gemeinde'' meaning ''commune'') is the principal unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,477 gminas throughout the country, encompassing over 4 ...

(administrative district) called Gmina Osiek Jasielski. It lies approximately south of

Jasło Jasło is a county town in south-eastern Poland with 36,641 inhabitants, as of 31 December 2012. It is situated in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship (since 1999), and it was previously part of Krosno Voivodeship (1975–1998). It is located in Lesse ...

and south-west of the regional capital

Rzeszów Rzeszów ( , ; la, Resovia; yi, ריישא ''Raisha'')) is the largest city in southeastern Poland. It is located on both sides of the Wisłok River in the heartland of the Sandomierz Basin. Rzeszów has been the capital of the Subcarpathian Vo ...

. The village has a population of 680. Osiek Jasielski is located on a hill, some 270 meters above sea level, along the Wisloka river. The defensive settlement of Osiek probably existed since early

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

, guarding southeastern corner of

Lesser Poland Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name Małopolska ( la, Polonia Minor), is a historical region situated in southern and south-eastern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Kraków. Throughout centuries, Lesser Poland developed a s ...

. In 1365, King

Kazimierz Wielki Casimir III the Great ( pl, Kazimierz III Wielki; 30 April 1310 – 5 November 1370) reigned as the King of Poland from 1333 to 1370. He also later became King of Ruthenia in 1340, and fought to retain the title in the Galicia-Volhynia Wars. He ...

decided to found here a town, together with a castle, with the purpose of defending Poland from possible Hungarian raids. Osiek was the seat of a

starosta The starosta or starost (Cyrillic: ''старост/а'', Latin: ''capitaneus'', german: link=no, Starost, Hauptmann) is a term of Slavic origin denoting a community elder whose role was to administer the assets of a clan or family estates. Th ...

, and the newly established town was famous for its fairs, which took place twice a year, on April 28 and July 13. Royal bill confirming dates of fairs was announced on Jule 2, 1583, at the market square in

Biecz Biecz () (german: Beitsch) is a town and municipality in southeastern Poland, in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Gorlice County. It is in the Carpathian Mountains, in the Doły Jasielsko-Sanockie, by the Ropa River. Due to its rich history, it is oft ...

. Osiek, which until 1772 was part of Biecz County, Krakow Voivodeship, remained a small town. According to some sources, its town charter was voided in 1604, to be returned by King

Zygmunt III Waza Sigismund III Vasa ( pl, Zygmunt III Waza, lt, Žygimantas Vaza; 20 June 1566 – 30 April 1632 N.S.) was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1587 to 1632 and, as Sigismund, King of Sweden and Grand Duke of Finland from 1592 to ...

on March 12, 1618. Most of its residents supported themselves by cultivating land, and the number of artisans was small. Following the first partition of Poland (1772) Osiek became part of Austrian Galicia, in which it remained until November 1918. In 1934 the government of the

Second Polish Republic The Second Polish Republic, at the time officially known as the Republic of Poland, was a country in Central Europe, Central and Eastern Europe that existed between 1918 and 1939. The state was established on 6 November 1918, before the end of ...

stripped it of the town charter. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Osiek was one of stops along the route from

General Government The General Government (german: Generalgouvernement, pl, Generalne Gubernatorstwo, uk, Генеральна губернія), also referred to as the General Governorate for the Occupied Polish Region (german: Generalgouvernement für die be ...

to Hungary. The route was used by the

Home Army The Home Army ( pl, Armia Krajowa, abbreviated AK; ) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) esta ...

, which was very strong in the area. During

Operation Tempest file:Akcja_burza_1944.png, 210px, right Operation Tempest ( pl, akcja „Burza”, sometimes referred to in English as "Operation Storm") was a series of uprisings conducted during World War II against occupying German forces by the Polish Home ...

, two bridges were blown up by the Home Army on August 11, 1944, disturbing movements of the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...

. Before World War II, Osiek had a thriving Jewish community that made up about 25% of the town's population. On July 7, 1942, German military police — assisted by Polish and Ukrainian police — rounded up about 1,250 Jews from Osiek and surrounding villages. They separated out able-bodied adults to become slave laborers. The policemen then led the rest of their captives, including all children and the elderly, into the forest, where they massacred them with machine guns and buried them in pits. The surviving Jews were murdered later that summer in death camps, including

Belzec extermination camp Belzec (English: or , Polish: ) was a Nazi German extermination camp built by the SS for the purpose of implementing the secretive Operation Reinhard, the plan to murder all Polish Jews, a major part of the "Final Solution" which in total ...

. No Jews remain in the village today.

References

{{coord, 49, 38, N, 21, 29, E, region:PL_type:city, display=title Osiek Jasielski Lesser Poland Kraków Voivodeship (14th century – 1795) Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria Kraków Voivodeship (1919–1939)