Podlesie (german: Podlesche) is a district of
Katowice. It has an area of 8.28 km
2 and in 2007 had 5,240 inhabitants.
History
The oldest settlement in the area of what are now the districts
Piotrowice, Podlesie and
Zarzecze was ''Uniczowy'', a village that existed already in the 12th century. In the 15th century Uniczowy began to crumble into three distinct parts. Podlesie was first mentioned in 1468 as ''Uniczowy-Podlesie''.
During the political upheaval caused by
Matthias Corvinus
Matthias Corvinus, also called Matthias I ( hu, Hunyadi Mátyás, ro, Matia/Matei Corvin, hr, Matija/Matijaš Korvin, sk, Matej Korvín, cz, Matyáš Korvín; ), was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1458 to 1490. After conducting several m ...
the land around
Pszczyna
Pszczyna (german: Pleß, cs, Pština) is a town in southern Poland with 25,823 inhabitants (2019), and a seat of a local gmina (commune). It is situated in the Silesian Voivodeship, and was a part of the Katowice Voivodeship from 1975 until ad ...
was overtaken by
Casimir II, Duke of Cieszyn, who sold it in 1517 to the Hungarian
magnates of the
Thurzó family, forming the
Pless state country. In the accompanying sales document issued on 21 February 1517 the village was mentioned as ''Podlesy Vnicziowy''.
The Kingdom of Bohemia in 1526 became part of the
Habsburg monarchy. In the
War of the Austrian Succession
The War of the Austrian Succession () was a European conflict that took place between 1740 and 1748. Fought primarily in Central Europe, the Austrian Netherlands, Italy, the Atlantic and Mediterranean, related conflicts included King George's ...
most of Silesia was conquered by the
Kingdom of Prussia
The Kingdom of Prussia (german: Königreich Preußen, ) was a German kingdom that constituted the state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918. Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. ...
, including the village. Despite of it, most of the inhibants of the village was Poles. In the
Upper Silesia Plebiscite
The Upper Silesia plebiscite was a plebiscite mandated by the Versailles Treaty and carried out on 20 March 1921 to determine ownership of the province of Upper Silesia between Weimar Germany and Poland. The region was ethnically mixed with ...
in 1921, 93,2% of the inhabitants of Podlesie voted for joining Poland (1082 votes for Poland and 79 votes for Germany). In 1922 Podlesie became part of
Second Polish Republic (interwar Poland). In 1939-1945 Podlesie was occupated by Nazi Germany, but was liberated in 1945 and returned to Poland (from 1945 to 1989
People's Republic of Poland, from 1989 current
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...
, known as Third Republic of Poland.
File:Podlesie. Kościół Matki Bożej Częstochowskiej (2006).jpg, Saint Mary of Częstochowa church, built in 1920
References
Districts of Katowice
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