Yasnaya Polyana (; , from 1929 ''Groß Trakehnen''; ; ) is a rural

settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), downward movement of a structure's foundation *Settlement (finance), where securities are delivered against payment of money *Settlement (litigatio ...

(''posyolok'') in the

Nesterovsky District Nesterovsky District () is an administrative district (raion), one of the fifteen in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia.Law #463 As a municipal division, it is incorporated as Nesterovsky Municipal District.Law #258 It is located in the southeast of the ...

Kaliningrad Oblast Kaliningrad Oblast () is the westernmost federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of the Russian Federation. It is a Enclave and exclave, semi-exclave on the Baltic Sea within the Baltic region of Prussia (region), Prussia, surrounded by Pola ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. It is located in the southeast of the oblast, north of the

Romincka Forest Romincka Forest (, ), also known as Krasny Les () or Rominte Heath (), is an extended forest and heath landscape stretching from the southeast of Russian Kaliningrad Oblast to the northeast of Polish Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship. Etymology The ...

. Nearby Diwnoje Nowoje is a railway station on the former

Prussian Eastern Railway The Prussian Eastern Railway () was a railway in the Kingdom of Prussia and later Germany until 1918. Its main route, approximately long, connected the capital, Berlin, with the cities of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) and Königsberg (now Kalini ...

from

Kaliningrad Kaliningrad,. known as Königsberg; ; . until 1946, is the largest city and administrative centre of Kaliningrad Oblast, an Enclave and exclave, exclave of Russia between Lithuania and Poland ( west of the bulk of Russia), located on the Prego ...

Kybartai Kybartai is a town in Marijampolė County, Vilkaviškis District Municipality in south-western Lithuania. It is located west of Vilkaviškis and is on the border of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. History Kybartai was founded during the reign of ...

Lithuania Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...

History

The settlement was originally named after the

Old Prussian Old Prussian is an extinct West Baltic language belonging to the Baltic branch of the Indo-European languages, which was once spoken by the Old Prussians, the Baltic peoples of the Prussian region. The language is called Old Prussian to av ...

word ''trakis'', meaning "great

bog A bog or bogland is a wetland that accumulates peat as a deposit of dead plant materials often mosses, typically sphagnum moss. It is one of the four main types of wetlands. Other names for bogs include mire, mosses, quagmire, and musk ...

". It was known as ''Trakėnai'' in Lithuanian, ''Trakeny'' in Polish, and ''Trakehnen'' in German. In 1454, King

Casimir IV Jagiellon Casimir IV (Casimir Andrew Jagiellon; ; Lithuanian: ; 30 November 1427 – 7 June 1492) was Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1440 and King of Poland from 1447 until his death in 1492. He was one of the most active Polish-Lithuanian rulers; under ...

incorporated the region to the

Kingdom of Poland The Kingdom of Poland (; Latin: ''Regnum Poloniae'') was a monarchy in Central Europe during the Middle Ages, medieval period from 1025 until 1385. Background The West Slavs, West Slavic tribe of Polans (western), Polans who lived in what i ...

upon the request of the anti-Teutonic

Prussian Confederation The Prussian Confederation (, ) was an organization formed on 21 February 1440 at Marienwerder (present-day Kwidzyn) by a group of 53 nobles and clergy and 19 cities in Prussia, to oppose the arbitrariness of the Teutonic Knights. It was based o ...

. After the subsequent

Thirteen Years' War (1454–1466) The Thirteen Years' War (; ), also called the War of the Cities, was a conflict fought in 1454–1466 between the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland and the Teutonic Order. After the Battle of Grunwald, enormous defeat suffered by the German Ord ...

, it became a part of Poland as a

fief A fief (; ) was a central element in medieval contracts based on feudal law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an overlord to a vassal, who held it in fealty or "in fee" in return for a form of feudal alle ...

held by the Teutonic Knights.Górski, pp. 96–97, 214–215 From the 18th century it formed part of the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (, ) was a German state that existed from 1701 to 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1946. It played a signif ...

. In 1731 King

Frederick William I of Prussia Frederick William I (; 14 August 1688 – 31 May 1740), known as the Soldier King (), was King in Prussia and Elector of Brandenburg from 1713 until his death in 1740, as well as Prince of Neuchâtel. Born in Berlin, he was raised by the Hugu ...

had the swampy territory of the

Pissa River The Pissa () is a river in the Kaliningrad Oblast in Russia near Chernyakhovsk. Etymology The Pissa, Inster and Angerapp (Angrapa) are tributaries to the Pregel river. These names, of Old Prussian origin, were used by Germans of East Prussia ...

drained to establish the famous warmblood

Trakehner Trakehner () is a light warmblood breed of horse, originally developed at the East Prussian state stud farm in the town of Trakehnen from which the breed takes its name. The was established in 1731 and operated until 1944, when the figh ...

horse breed stable (''Königliches Stutamt Trakehnen'') northwest of the municipality. The area was colonized by

Protestant Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...

expellees from the

Archbishopric of Salzburg The Prince-Archbishopric of Salzburg (; ) was an ecclesiastical principality and state of the Holy Roman Empire. It comprised the secular territory ruled by the archbishops of Salzburg, as distinguished from the much larger Catholic diocese f ...

Intended for the build-up of an own breeding supplying the Prussian Army cavalry, the stud farm at the time of its opening in 1732 had about 1,100 horses standing on an area of . The "Soldier King" however soon became dissatisfied with the poor efficiency of the stud farm and in 1739 granted it to his son, crown prince

Frederick II of Prussia Frederick II (; 24 January 171217 August 1786) was the monarch of Prussia from 1740 until his death in 1786. He was the last Hohenzollern monarch titled ''King in Prussia'', declaring himself '' King of Prussia'' after annexing Royal Prus ...

. Upon Frederick's death in 1786, it was taken over by the

Prussian state Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, the House of Hohenzoller ...

and renamed ''Königlich Preußisches Hauptgestüt Trakehnen''. In professional hands, the stud and the village of Trakehnen prospered from that time on. The Trakehnen stud farm had to be evacuated after the Prussian defeat at the 1806

Battle of Jena-Auerstedt A battle is an occurrence of combat in warfare between opposing military units of any number or size. A war usually consists of multiple battles. In general, a battle is a military engagement that is well defined in duration, area, and force ...

, when the French

Grande Armée The (; ) was the primary field army of the French Imperial Army (1804–1815), French Imperial Army during the Napoleonic Wars. Commanded by Napoleon, from 1804 to 1808 it won a series of military victories that allowed the First French Empi ...

approached to meet the

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

forces at the Eylau. From 1871, it was part of

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, within which it was administratively located in the

Stallupönen Nesterov (), until 1938 known by its German language, German name (; ) and in 1938-1946 as Ebenrode, is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, town and the administrative center of Nesterovsky District in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, locate ...

district in the Regierungsbezirk Gumbinnen in the province of

East Prussia East Prussia was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1772 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 1871); following World War I it formed part of the Weimar Republic's ...

. From 1911 on it was the site of an annual cross-country race, named in the memory of Colmar von der Goltz in 1931. After the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

had occupied the settlement at the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, it passed to the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

and was renamed to ''Yasnaya Polyana'' ("clear glade"). Although the settlement received a new name, the Russian name has a similar reference to the land, as ''Polje'' means "field" or "glade". The land was off-limits to all people outside of the Soviet Union for fifty years and information about it was almost non-existent. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, a few

ethnic Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The constitution of Germany, implemented in 1949 following the end of World War ...

from Russia and

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...

were resettled to Yasnaya Polyana. It was not maintained as a stable, although the grounds do have a museum for the breed. Russian and German initiatives have brought Trakehner horses to nearby

Pravdinsk Pravdinsk (, prior to 1946 known by its German name, ', , ), is a town and the administrative center of Pravdinsky District in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. It is on the Lava River and is east of Bagrationovsk and southeast of Kaliningrad. P ...

and Mayovka.

Notable people

* Gustav von Below (1791–1852), Prussian general *

Walther Funk Walther Immanuel Funk (18 August 1890 – 31 May 1960) was a German economist and Nazi official who served as ''Reichsminister'' for the Economy from 1938 to 1945 and president of the Reichsbank from 1939 to 1945. Funk oversaw the mobili ...

(1890–1960), Nazi politician * Heinz Ziegler (1894–1972),

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

general

References

External links

Pictures of the Trakehner stablesTrakehners in former East PrussiaHistory of the Trakehner horse breed
{{Authority control Rural localities in Kaliningrad Oblast Nesterovsky District

History

Notable people

See also

References

External links