…Volhynia in 1199, forming what is to become one of the more powerful of the independent Russian principalities.

…Koten flees to the court of his son-in-law, Prince Mstislav the Bold of Galich.

He warns Mstislav: "Today the Mongols have taken our land and tomorrow they will take yours".

The Rus princes have ignored the Cumans’ warnings for almost a year, as the Rus have suffered from Cuman raids for decades, but when news reaches Kiev that the Mongols are marching along the Dniester River, the Rus respond.

Mstislav gathers an alliance of the Kievan Rus' princes including Mstislav III of Kiev and Prince Yuri II of Vladimir-Suzdal, who promise support.

The Rus princes then begin mustering their armies and going towards the rendezvous point.

The move by the Rus' army is detected by the Mongols, who are on the east side of the Dnieper River waiting for reinforcements from Jochi, Genghis Khan's eldest son, who is campaigning around the Aral Sea.

Jochi, however, has become ill, which means no reinforcements will be coming.

At the same time, the Rus' attempt to trap the Mongols.

The Princes of Galich and Volhynia transport their armies south down the river, while the Princes of Kiev and Chernigov advance north up the river, and the army of Kursk advances from the front.

At the same time, the Cumans attempt to attack the Mongol army's rear.

When Jebe learns of this, he sends ten envoys to the Prince of Kiev.

The envoys state that the Mongols have no feud with Rus and are only attacking the Cumans; they add that the Mongols are marching east, away from the Rus' cities.

Mstislav of Kiev has the envoys executed, and the Mongols respond by sending another set of ambassadors, who declare war.

When Jebe and Subutai hear of the Rus' movements, they begin moving east, away from Rus', which is the only direction in which they can move.

However, they leave a rearguard of one thousand under the command of an officer, Hamabek, to report of the Rus movements.

Soon, Mstislav the Bold reaches the river opposite the rearguard, and it becomes apparent that no Prince had been appointed commander-in-chief.

Thus, all the Princes can act as they pleased.

Eventually, Mstislav crosses the river under heavy arrow fire.

When the Rus' land, however, their numbers are far superior, and the Mongols are killed to the last man.

The emancipation of the peasantry in Galicia (already emancipated under Prussia some two decades earlier) makes the peasant question a central issue—namely, if the peasants can be absorbed into the Polish national fabric or if their first loyalty will be to the partitioning monarchs.

The issue becomes acute in the Russian partition, which had remained passive in 1848.

The Polish subjects under Austrian jurisdiction (after 1867 the Habsburg Empire is commonly known as Austria-Hungary) confront a generally more lenient regime.

Poles suffer no religious persecution in predominantly Catholic Austria, and Vienna counts on the Polish nobility as an ally in the complex political calculus of its multinational realm.

In return for loyalty, Austrian Poland, or Galicia, receives considerable administrative and cultural autonomy.

Galicia gains a reputation as an oasis of toleration amidst the oppression of German and Russian
Poland.

The Galician provincial Sejm acts as a semiautonomous parliamentary body, and Poles represent the region in the empire government in Vienna.

In the late 1800s, the universities of L'vov (Lwow in Polish) and Krakow become the centers of Polish intellectual activity, and ...