1500 BC Slavs move west
The Slavs settle in the regions of eastern Europe and western Russia

963 First Polish contact with Christian Europe
The Poles are first recorded as a tribal group when a German knight comes into contact with them in the region round Gniezno

965 Poles become Catholic
Mieszko, pagan chieftain of the Poles, marries a Christian Czech princess and brings all his people into the Roman Catholic fold

1241 Mongols ravage Cracow
Mongols of the Golden Horde defeat the Poles at Legnica and ravage the city of Cracow

1308 Teutonic knights seize Gdansk
The Teutonic knights seize the coastal area round Gdansk, cutting off Poland's access to the sea

1320 Cracow is capital
Wladyslaw I is crowned king of Poland in Cracow, which he makes his capital city

1333 Casimir is Great
The long reign of Casimir III, known as the Great, is a time of prosperity and achievement in Poland

1386 Poland and Lithuania marry
Jadwiga, 12-year-old queen of Poland, marries Jogaila, her 34-year-old pagan neighbour - uniting the crowns of Poland and Lithuania

1410 Poles crush Teutonic knights
The Poles defeat the Teutonic knights between Tannenberg and Grunwald, bringing the coastal strip around Gdansk into the Polish kingdom

1458 Matthias Corvinus king of Hungary
Matthias Corvinus begins a long reign which brings Moravia, Silesia and much of Austria within the Hungarian kingdom

1466 Prussia annexed by Poland
In the treaty of Torun the Teutonic knights finally cede Prussia to Poland

1493 First Polish parliament
John I Albert summons the first recorded sejm, a parliament representing the whole of Poland

1543 Copernicus goes heliocentric
Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus publishes a book suggesting that the earth moves round the sun

1575 Polish crown for Stephen Báthory
Stefan Báthory, prince of Transylvania, is elected king of Poland

1648 Rebellion of Cossacks
A Cossack rebellion leads to the eventual transfer of their territory from Poland to Russia

1683 Polish king saves Vienna from Turks
The Turks are driven from the walls of Vienna by the Polish king John Sobieski, in what proves a historic turning point

1700 Sweden's neighbours launch war
Poland, Russia and Denmark attack Sweden, beginning the 21-year Northern War

1740 Hasidism develops in Poland
A charismatic leader, Baal Shem Tov, develops Hasidism in Poland as an influential revivalist movement within Judaism

1740 Frederick invades Silesia
Frederick II, the king of Prussia, invades the neighbouring Habsburg province of Silesia, launching the War of the Austrian Succession

1741 Battle of Mollwitz
Frederick's Prussian army defeats the Austrians at Mollwitz, securing his hold on most of Silesia

1772 First slices of Poland
Russia, Prussia and Austria agree a treaty enabling them to divide the spoils in the first partition of Poland

1772 Russia begins to absorb Lithuania
The first partition of Poland begins the process of Lithuania being progressively absorbed into Russia

1793 Second slices of Poland
Russia and Prussia agree on a second partition of Poland

1795 Final slices of Poland
Poland's neighbours – Russia, Prussia and Austria – are all on hand for the final partition of the kingdom

1807 Warsaw becomes grand duchy
Part of Poland is recovered from Prussia to become the grand duchy of Warsaw, a small state dependent upon Napoleon

1815 Polish kingdom linked to Russia
Poland becomes a kingdom of very limited independence, since the Russian tsar Alexander I is to be its king

1839 Preludes in Majorca
Polish composer Frédéric Chopin completes his Preludes under difficult conditions in Majorca

1905 Young Poland group of musicians
Karol Szymanowski and other Polish composers form a group that soon becomes known as Young Poland

1914 August 25-28 Germans destroy large Russian army
A German army encircles and almost annihilates a larger Russian force at Tannenberg

1915  January Chlorine gas used by Germans at Ypres
Germans make an experimental but ineffective use of chlorine gas against the Russians in Poland

1915 December Russians lose Poland
German armies make sufficient advances to drive the Russians out of Poland

1919 Pianist is Polish premier
Composer and pianist Ignacy Jan Paderewski becomes prime minister of the newly independent Poland

1919 Paderewski resigns premiership
The prime minister of Poland, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, resigns his post so as to concentrate on his concert career

1919 June 28 Danzig to be a free city
The Versailles Treaty makes Danzig (or Gdansk) a free city (from 10 January 1920), under the protection of the League of Nations

1919 June 28 Poland recovers access to Baltic
The Versailles Treaty provides a corridor of land to give Poland access to Danzig and the Baltic, thereby dividing two parts of Germany

1926 Szymanowski's King Roger
Karel Szymanowski's opera King Roger has its first performance in Warsaw

1928 Szymanowski's Stabat Mater
Karol Szymanowski's Stabat Mater is performed in Warsaw and brings him international fame

1933 Breakthrough on Enigma code
Polish cryptographers succeed in breaking some of the Enigma code used by the German military

1938 October Hitler demands Danzig
Adolf Hitler makes unacceptable demands upon Poland, including the transfer of the free port of Danzig to Germany

1938 October Hitler wants right of way through Poland
Adolf Hitler demands a strip of territory through the Polish corridor to reunite Germany with East Prussia

1939 Poland the first victim of German blitzkrieg
The new German technique of blitzkrieg ('lightning war') is demonstrated with devastating effect against Poland

1939 September 1 Hitler invades Poland
Adolf Hitler launches a massive attack on Poland, with tanks crossing the border and air raids on Warsaw

1939 September 27 Germany and Russia share Poland
Warsaw falls, after a brave resistance, whereupon Germany and Russia carve up Poland

1939 September Nazi murder squads
Nazi murder squads (Einsatzgruppen) kill Poland's elite

1940  from April 4 Massacre at Katyń
More than 4000 Polish officers are massacred at Katyń on Stalin's orders

1941 December 7 Germans use gas to kill Polish Jews
In three adapted vans at Chelmno, in western Poland, the Germans begin using poison gas to kill Jews

1942  March Concentration camp at Auschwitz
The Nazis build a new style of concentration camp, at Auschwitz in Poland, in which the fit will work and the unfit will be killed

1942  from March Factories move to Auschwitz
German industrial enterprises are moved from the vulnerable Ruhr valley to the slave labour facilities of Auschwitz

1942 July Treblinka is purpose-built death camp
Treblinka is constructed, in Poland, as the Nazis' first large-scale and purpose-built death camp

1943  April 19 Germans destroy Warsaw ghetto
Jews in Warsaw resist a fierce German onslaught for a month before their ghetto is finally destroyed

1944 August 1 Uprising in Warsaw
Members of the Polish resistance rise against the Germans in Warsaw, in a conflict lasting two months and bringing massive casualties

1945  January 27 Primo Levi survives Auschwitz
The Red Army liberates the surviving prisoners at Auschwitz, who include the Italian novelist Primo Levi

1947 Communists take control in Poland
An election campaign in Poland, marked by violence and the use of terror, brings a Communist landslide

1950 The Family Moskat
The Family Moskat, about a Jewish family in Warsaw, is the first of Isaac Bashevis Singer's books to be published in English

1957 Panufnik's Sinfonia elegiaco
Polish-born British composer Andrzej Panufnik wins an international reputation with his Sinfonia elegiaco

1958 Ashes and Diamonds
Polish film director Andrzej Wajda makes Ashes and Diamonds, starring the Polish actor Zbigniew Cybulski

1961 Lutoslawki's Venetian Games
Polish composer Witold Lutoslawski uses 'aleatory counterpoint' in his Venetian Games

1970 Panufnik's Universal Prayer
Polish composer Andrzej Panufnik's Universal Prayer, a cantata setting poetry by Alexander Pope, has its premiere in New York

1970 Lutoslawski composes for Rostropovich
Polish composer Witold Lutoslawksi writes a cello concerto for Mstislav Rostropovich

1976 Górecki's Third Symphony
Polish composer Henryk Górecki completes his Third Symphony

1979 John Paul II returns to Poland
John Paul II makes an emotional and influential return to Poland, the country of his birth

1980 Shipyard strike in Gdansk
Electrician Lech Walesa emerges as the leader of a strike in the Gdansk shipyard in Poland

1980 Solidarity established in Poland
A trade union, Solidarnośc (Solidarity), is formed by strikers in the Gdansk shipyard in Poland

1980 Walesa heads Solidarity
Lech Walesa is elected chairman of the newly formed Polish trade union movement Solidarnośc (Solidarity)

1981 Jaruzelski is Polish premier
The Kremlin appoints a general, Wojciech Jaruzelski, as prime minister of Poland

1981 Martial law in Poland
Polish prime minister Wojciech Jaruzelski imposes martial law and suspends Solidarnośc (Solidarity)

1982 Solidarity banned
The trade union movement Solidarnośc (Solidarity) is declared illegal by the Polish government

1983 Nobel prize for Walesa
Polish union leader and activist Lech Walesa is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

1986 Penderecki's Black Mask
Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki's opera The Black Mask is premiered in Salzburg

1989 Electoral success for Solidarity
Elections in Poland bring Solidarnośc nation-wide success, and the party is soon at the head of a coalition government

1990 Walesa is president
Solidarnośc leader Lech Walesa wins Poland's first free presidential election