966 Christianisation of Poland
972 Battle of Cedynia, the first documented victory of Polish forces, takes place.
1025 Bolesław Chrobry is crowned in Gniezno, becoming the first King of Poland.
1227 Polish Prince Leszek I the White is assassinated at an assembly of Piast dukes at Gąsawa.
1241 Battle of Liegnitz: Mongol forces defeat the Polish and German armies.
1257 Kraków, Poland receives city rights.
1364 Jagiellonian University, the oldest university in Poland, is founded in Kraków, Poland.
1364 Jagiellonian University, the oldest university in Poland, is founded in Kraków, Poland.
1454 In the Battle of Chojnice, the Polish army is defeated by the Teutonic army during the Thirteen Years' War.
1569 Union of Lublin: the Kingdom of Poland and the Great Duchy of Lithuania confirm a real union; the united country is called the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth or the Republic of Both Nations.
1573 Articles of the Warsaw Confederation are signed, sanctioning freedom of religion in Poland.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar, this day is skipped in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar, this day is skipped in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar, this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar, this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar, this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Because of the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1582 Pope Gregory XIII implements the Gregorian calendar. In Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Spain, October 4 of this year is followed directly by October 15.
1651 The Battle of Beresteczko between Poland and Ukraine starts.
1660 Treaty of Oliwa is established between Sweden and Poland.
1674 The nobility elect John Sobieski King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.
1706 During the Battle of Fraustadt Swedish forces defeat a superior Saxon-Polish-Russian force by deploying a double envelopment.
1773 The first recorded Ministry of Education, the Komisja Edukacji Narodowej (Polish for ''Commission of National Education''), is formed in Poland.
1793 Second Partition of Poland: Russia and Prussia partition Poland for the second time.
1795 Partitions of Poland: Stanislaus August Poniatowski, the last king of independent Poland, is forced to abdicate and is exiled to Russia.
1807 Emperor Napoleon I's French Grande Armee defeats the Russian Army at the Battle of Friedland in Poland (modern Russian Kaliningrad Oblast) ending the War of the Fourth Coalition.
1861 Russian troops fire on a crowd in Warsaw protesting against Russian rule over Poland, killing five protesters.
1863 The January Uprising breaks out in Poland, Lithuania and Belarus. The aim of the national movement is to regain Polish-Lithuanian-Ruthenian Commonwealth from occupation by Russia.
1918 Germany, Austria and Russia sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ending Russia's involvement in World War I, and leading to the independence of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.
1918 Poland declares its independence from Russia.
1918 The Second Polish Republic is proclaimed in Poland.
1918 Józef Piłsudski comes to Warsaw and assumes supreme military power in Poland. Poland regains its independence, celebrated each year on this day.
1919 Ignacy Jan Paderewski becomes Prime Minister of the newly independent Poland.
1919 Austria and the Allies sign the Treaty of Saint-Germain recognizing the independence of Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia.
1920 Jozef Haller de Hallenburg performs symbolic wedding of Poland to the sea, celebrating restitution of Polish access to open sea.
1920 Polish-Bolshevik War: a decisive Polish victory in the Battle of Komarów.
1920 The Suwalki Agreement between Poland and Lithuania is signed.
1921 The second Peace of Riga between Poland and Soviet Union.
1922 Gabriel Narutowicz is announced the first president of Poland.
1932 Franciszek Żwirko and Stanisław Wigura, Polish Challenge 1932 winners, are killed when their RWD 6 airplane crashes during a storm.
1939 World War II: Germany and the Soviet Union sign a non-aggression treaty, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret addition to the pact, the Baltic states, Finland, Romania, and Poland are divided between the two nations.
1939 Nazi Germany mounts a staged attack on the Gleiwitz radio station, creating an excuse to attack Poland the following day thus starting World War II in Europe.
1939 World War II: following the start of the invasion of Poland the previous day, the Free City of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) is annexed by Nazi Germany.
1939 World War II: The Soviet Union joins Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland during the Polish Defensive War of 1939.
1939 Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agree on a division of Poland after their invasion during World War II.
1939 General Władysław Sikorski becomes commander-in-chief of the Polish Government in exile.
1939 World War II: Germany annexes Western Poland.
1940 Members of Soviet politburo sign an order for the execution of 25,700 Polish intelligentsia, including 14,700 Polish POWs, known also as the Katyn massacre.
1940 World War II: Norwegian, French, Polish and British forces recapture Narvik in Norway. This is the first allied infantry victory of the War.
1940 A group of 728 Polish political prisoners from Tarnów become the first residents of the Auschwitz concentration camp.
1940 Holocaust: In occupied Poland, the Nazis close off the Warsaw Ghetto from the outside world.
1941 Jedwabne Pogrom: the massacre of Jewish people living in and near the village of Jedwabne in Poland.
1942 Holocaust: The first Jews from the Lviv Ghetto are gassed at the Belzec death camp in what is today eastern Poland.
1942 World War II: In Poland, the first female prisoners arrive at Auschwitz.
1942 World War II: In Poland, the Majdan-Tatarski ghetto is established, situated between the Lublin Ghetto and a Majdanek subcamp.
1943 World War II: The discovery of a mass grave of Polish prisoners of war executed by Soviet forces in the Katyń Forest Massacre is announced, alienating the Western Allies, the Polish government in exile in London, from the Soviet Union.
1943 Prisoners at the Nazi German Sobibor extermination camp in Poland revolted against the Germans, killing eleven SS troops who were guards there, and wounding many more. About 300 of the Sobibor Camp's 600 prisoners escaped from this Nazi extermination camp, and about 50 of these survived past the end of World War II (on May 8, 1945, European time).
1944 World War II: Approximately 38 men, women, and children die in the Koniuchy massacre in Poland.
1944 The Polish Committee of National Liberation publishes its manifesto, starting the period of Communist rule in Poland
1944 Warsaw Uprising against the Nazi occupation breaks out in Warsaw, Poland.
1944 Holocaust: Polish insurgents liberate a German labor camp in Warsaw, freeing 348 Jewish prisoners.
1945 The Soviet Union recognizes the new pro-Soviet government of Poland.
1945 Soviet forces capture the almost completely destroyed Polish city of Warsaw.
1945 World War II: The Red Army liberates the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in Poland.
1945 World War II: Capitulation of German garrison in Poznań. The city is liberated by Soviet and Polish forces.
1951 The Polish cultural attache in Paris, Czesław Miłosz, asks the French government for political asylum.
1979 Pope John Paul II first official visit to his native Poland, becoming the first Pope to visit a Communist country.
1980 In Poland, a plane crashes during final approach near Warsaw, killing 87 people, including a 14-man American boxing team.
1980 Lech Wałęsa leads strikes at the Gdańsk, Poland shipyards.
1980 After weeks of strikes at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk, Poland, the nationwide independent trade union Solidarity is established.
1980 Government of Poland legalizes Solidarity trade union
1981 General Wojciech Jaruzelski declares martial law in Poland to prevent dismantling of the communist system by ''Solidarity''.
1982 Poland bans Solidarity and all trade unions.
1982 Lech Wałęsa, a Solidarity leader, is released from a Polish prison after eleven months.
1982 Lech Wałęsa, the leader of Poland's outlawed Solidarity movement, is released after eleven months of internment near the Soviet border.
1987 A Polish LOT Ilyushin IL-62M "Tadeusz Kościuszko" (SP-LBG) crashes after takeoff in Warsaw, Poland, killing 183 people.
1987 A Polish LOT Ilyushin IL-62M "Tadeusz Kościuszko" (SP-LBG) crashes after takeoff in Warsaw, Poland, killing 183 people.
1989 The Round Table Talks start in Poland, thus marking the beginning of overthrow of communism in Eastern Europe.
1989 Solidarity's victory in the first (somewhat) free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland sparks off a succession of peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe, leads to the creation of the so-called Contract Sejm and begins the Autumn of Nations.
1991 The Visegrád Agreement, establishing cooperation to move toward free-market systems, is signed by the leaders of Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Poland.
1993 Last Russian troops leave Poland.
1996 Polish Premier Jozef Oleksy resigns amid charges that he spied for Moscow.
1997 NATO invites the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland to join the alliance in 1999.
1999 Former Warsaw Pact members the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland join NATO.
2002 Enlargement of the European Union: The European Union announces that Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia will become members from May 1, 2004.
2004 Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia join the European Union, celebrated at the residence of the Irish President in Dublin.