The personal union of Poland and Saxony, or Saxony-Poland, was the personal union that existed from 1697 to 1706 and from 1709 to 1763 between the Electorate of Saxony under the House of Wettin and the aristocratic republic/elective monarchy of Poland-Lithuania. After the death of Augustus III of Poland in 1763, the personal union expired because the guardian of the still underage Saxon Elector Frederick Augustus III (1750–1827) renounced his claims to the throne and the Russian Empress Catherine the Great had her favorite Stanislaus II August Poniatowski elected king. In Poland, the period with Wettin rulers on the Polish throne is also called the Saxon period (czasy saskie). In Polish memory it is known for its particular disorder.
This period was the first since Bolesław I the Brave that Poland and Meissen/Saxony were politically connected.
Dominions
Poland-Lithuania Due to the exhausting Second Northern War, the Commonwealth was a country without state administrative bodies, with an underdeveloped economy, insufficient tax revenues and an army that was neither qualitatively nor numerically ready for the requirements of the time. p. 18 Poland-Lithuania had a wealth of raw materials and was therefore interesting for commercial Saxony. In Poland, Polish officials, the Polish Crown Army and the state treasury were subordinate to the Sejm, whose policies were determined by the powerful magnate families and the Szlachta. Their penchant for forming confederations turned the kingdom into a powder keg. The Polish parliament was unable to act due to these private interests (Liberum Veto); the crown itself had only limited income, which was subordinate to the crown treasurer Jan Jerzy Przebendowski. This meant that Poland had an extreme predominance of the estates over the monarch.
Electorate of Saxony The Electorate of Saxony had highly developed manufacturing and crafts. Due to its coherent territory, it was considered a powerful state structure inside the Holy Roman Empire. Saxony was still superior to Brandenburg-Prussia in terms of internal development at the end of the 17th century, but had to cede the Protestant leadership role in the Holy Roman Empire to Brandenburg in the following decades.
Coronation of Elector Frederick Augustus I as Polish king
One driving force behind the attainment of royal dignity was the desire for political sovereignty, which Elector Frederick Augustus I promised to give further weight in foreign policy. The long-lasting and consolidated dominance of the Habsburg dynasty in the empire encouraged the elector to avoid the threat of a loss of rank and power by increasing his rank in an area that did not belong to the empire. Another important motif were the question of rank and prestige, which at that time indicated the position of power and therefore had immediate political significance. All princes of this time followed the French model of Louis XIV, such as elaborate courtly ceremonies, lavish banquets with opera performances and ballets. The acquisition of the Polish royal crown therefore represented a question of prestige of the first order for Elector Frederick Augustus I. Because only with a royal crown could a German prince be accepted by the European powers as an equal.
The Saxon ambassador in Warsaw, Jacob Heinrich von Flemming, had previously succeeded in completely fragmenting the competition by fielding ever new applicants. The efforts of Pope Innocent XI's nephew, Prince Livio Odescalchi, Duke of Bracciano and Ceri, James Louis Sobieski, the son of the former King John III. Sobieski, Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine, Louis William, Margrave of Baden-Baden, Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria and twelve other candidates were therefore hopeless. François Louis, Prince of Conti who traveled from France for the royal election, was even able to garner a larger number of votes than August, but had to return to his homeland, forced by Saxon troops.
After the usual bribes, Elector Augustus the Strong was able to return on 26/27 July. Contrary to all initial expectations, he was elected on the electoral field in Wola in June. On 15 September 1697 he was crowned as Augustus II in Kraków.
Initial conditions
After the coronation, advantageous opportunities arose for both sides. Both sides felt threatened by Brandenburg-Prussia and its territorial ambitions. By joining forces between the two countries, this danger could be averted for the time being. Both powers needed mutual support in Northern Europe, where the Prussian, Swedish and Russian armies were far superior to the Saxon and Polish armies. Since Poland-Lithuania was the larger of the two partners, the local nobility had reason enough to believe that they would succeed in protecting their interests. As constitutionalists, they were also more likely to succeed in controlling a foreign ruler than a local one.
Despite the advantages, such as additional dynastic inheritance claims and greater weight in peace negotiations, Saxony was not satisfied with winning the Polish royal crown. Instead, Poland's potential should be made financially and militarily available to the court in Dresden. This was contradicted by the limited powers that a Polish elective king possessed. The Electorate of Saxony could only hope to benefit from the connection with Poland if it managed to acquire a land bridge between the two countries. This hope was dashed with the Prussian annexation of Silesia after 1740. As long as communication, goods traffic and troop movements depended on the good will of the Habsburgs or Brandenburg-Prussia, Saxony-Poland could not be considered a great power. p. 20 The idea of a real union between these opposing territories as such was certainly utopian, but the actors still considered a certain unification of the two countries in the areas of administration, military, economics and finance, similar to the core countries in the Habsburg Empire, possible. Points of connection, for example, were Poland's wealth of raw materials and Saxony's manufacturing economy.
History of Saxony-Poland After the occupation of Saxony by the Swedes in the Great Northern War, King Augustus II had to give up the Polish royal title in the Treaty of Altranstädt in 1706 and recognize Stanislaus I Leszczyński, who was supported by Sweden, on the throne. After the Swedish defeat in the Battle of Poltava in 1709, the Saxon Elector was able to regain the throne. After regaining the royal crown, King Augustus II sought to overthrow the Sejm in a coup. His representatives called for the Saxon army to be merged with the Polish Crown Army. Polish fortresses had been occupied and arrests made as early as 1713. Since this would have been a first step towards the establishment of an absolutist hereditary monarchy in Poland, it provoked the uprising of the Tarnogród Confederacy in 1715/16, led by Stanisław Ledóchowski and Jan Klemens Branicki, which put Augustus at risk of his throne. It was mainly a revolt of the small nobility against the king; Important magnates such as Lithuania's hetman Ludwik Pociej (a friend of Peter the Great) tended to try to mediate. Although the Saxon troops remained victorious in all major battles, they were unable to end the uprising, so money began to run out. King Augustus II accepted the Tsar's mediation and achieved only partial success in the Peace of Warsaw in 1716 and the Silent Sejm in 1717. In return, the Saxon army had to leave the country.
After 1716, there were signs of a certain stabilization of Augustus II's government in Poland, which made some reforms possible - but there was no prospect of reforms in the spirit of absolutism. Several Imperial Diets collapsed, and King Augustus II tried unsuccessfully to secure the succession of the Electoral Prince as the next Polish king. At least Poland recovered economically from the effects of the Great Northern War in the 1720s. The feudal nobility could produce intensively, and the exchange of goods between Poland and Saxony, promoted by the Leipzig Trade Fair and facilitated by customs agreements, increased. The raw materials preferably came from Poland and finished products from Saxony. Palaces, parks and numerous new churches showed that Poland still had resources. But the aristocratic republic, which was constantly in internal blockage and power struggles, lacked the will and coherence to make something of it. A central economic and financial policy could not be implemented in Poland, a large part of the taxes (up to 20%) were stuck in the collection system and mercantilist thinking was limited to the self-interest of the magnate families.
Permanent postal routes from Dresden to Poznań, Toruń and Warsaw were established under Augustus II the Strong.
In addition to the lengthy and frustrating reform work in Poland, the permanent securing of Wettin rule in Poland played an important role in the politics of Augustus II. A first step in this direction was taken in 1733 when Elector Frederick Augustus II, the son of Augustus II, with the support of Austria and Russia and the usual bribes against the candidate of Sweden and France, Stanisław Leszczyński, was elected King of Poland. This triggered the War of the Polish Succession. Frederick Augustus II was crowned King of Poland as Augustus III of Poland on 17 January 1734 and claimed the crown in the Peace of Vienna (1738). Given this situation, the king and his prime minister Heinrich von Brühl hoped to control Poland with the “ministerial system” of magnates loyal to Saxony (who were placed in key positions) and tried to politically connect the two countries. During the Seven Years' War they even obtained the consent of their three allies for a renewed Polish crown candidacy for the Saxons, but the successes did not last.
In Saxony, after the fall of Aleksander Józef Sułkowski, Heinrich von Brühl led the government from 1738 to 1756, and in 1746 he formally became prime minister. He was a successful diplomat and consolidated the administration, but was sharply attacked in the state parliament in 1749 because of his financial policies. Despite Brühl's ruthless financial measures, the Electorate of Saxony was heading into crisis. The economy was damaged, the Saxon army, which was already too small, had to be disarmed and a significant portion of the taxes had to be pledged. There was also pressure from outside, as Saxon exports were severely hindered by the Prussian (customs) policy of the time.
But it was the Seven Years' War that brought Saxony's collapse in 1756. The Saxon army, which was too small, surrendered without a fight at Lilienstein under Count Rutowski, King Augustus III. and his court moved to Warsaw, where they remained in relative political powerlessness until the end of the war. The Electorate of Saxony, now provisionally administered by the Kingdom of Prussia and some cabinet ministers, became a theater of war and suffered. When the Seven Years' War ended with the Peace of Hubertusburg in 1763, the Electorate of Saxony, which had previously been quite prosperous, was ruined. Saxony also had no influence whatsoever on the awarding of the Polish crown: Poland-Lithuania had come under Russian hegemony more than ever; as successor to Augustus III. Stanisław August Poniatowski was appointed by Empress Catherine the Great, ending the personal union between Saxony and Poland.
Outcome of the union