Polish minority in Moldova

The history of Poles in Moldova may be traced to the 14-16th centuries, when the Principality of Moldova was connected to Poland by a trade route and later it was several times briefly a vassal of the Kingdom of Poland. At these times there was no larger Polish communities in Moldavia. Only since 18th century there were several waves of political and economic emigration of Poles to Bessarabia, the land which constitutes the majority of modern Moldova. These include fugitive serfs, march to Bender of the part of the forces of the dethroned Stanisław Leszczyński, defeated insurgents of the Kościuszko Uprising. Partitions of Poland also contributed to this process.

According to the 1989 Soviet Census, there were 4,739 Poles in the Moldavian SSR. The Moldovan Census of 2004 reported 2,383 Poles. The latter census did not include data collected in Transnistria, and the 2004 Census in Transnistria reported 2% of the population (about 1,100) to be Poles.

Some publications of Polonia activists and Polish diplomats mention numbers of up to 20,000 of Poles in Moldova, — numbers significantly exceeding that of self-identified Poles in the census. Some authors include in their estimates people of Polish descent, while others assume people of Catholic faith (in a predominantly Orthodox country) are most probably of Polish descent; and this may include, e.g. Ukrainians with ties to Poland in their ancestry.

As a consequence of the Russian and Soviet policies towards Polish culture, only a small percentage of Poles in Moldova today speak Polish.

After a brief period of liberal attitude towards Poles in the Soviet Union, the nationality had undergone repressions, dispersal, and assimilation, and its history remained largely a blank spot for a long time. Only since 1990s Polish researchers obtained a possibility to conduct research in this area.

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Wikipedia