Poland lies in the heart of Central Europe. Most of the country is flat farmland and forest on the great European plain, which gave the land its name: the Polans, an early Slavic tribe, were 'people living in open fields'. In the north it meets the Baltic Sea with sandy beaches and dunes, in the north-east lies the Masurian Lake District, with more than two thousand of the country's roughly ten thousand lakes, and in the far south rise the Sudetes and the Carpathian mountains, including the rocky Tatras.
Polish statehood is usually dated to 966, when Duke Mieszko I was baptised. The Kingdom of Poland joined with Lithuania to form the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, one of Europe's great powers, which adopted a modern constitution in 1791. Soon after, its neighbours divided up what was left of it, and Poland vanished from the map for 123 years. It returned in 1918, suffered terribly in the Second World War, lived under communist rule, and in 1989 led the way out of it with the Solidarity movement.
Memories fade faster than photos. Ask these over a meal or a phone call, and write the answers down.
Poland's story runs from a duke's baptism and a golden age of kings and scholars, through the partitions that erased it from the map, to the terrible years of the Second World War and the peaceful Solidarity revolution that helped end communism in Europe.
Duke Mieszko I, the first ruler of the Polish state, was baptised together with much of his court, probably at Poznań or Gniezno. His Czech wife Dobrawa is often credited with influencing him. Many historians see this as the beginning of Poland as a state.
Bolesław I the Brave, son of Mieszko I, was crowned the first king of Poland in 1025, near the end of his life, after years of building up the Polish Church and enlarging his lands.
On 15 July 1410 the armies of Poland and Lithuania, led by King Władysław II Jagiełło and Grand Duke Vytautas, crushed the Teutonic Knights. It was one of the largest battles of medieval Europe, and the Teutonic Order never recovered its former power.
On 1 July 1569 Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania joined into a single state, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, with one elected king and one parliament. It became one of the largest countries in Europe.
In the third partition, Russia, Prussia and Austria divided up what was left of the Commonwealth. After partitions in 1772, 1793 and 1795, there was no independent Polish state for 123 years.
On 1 September 1939 Nazi Germany invaded Poland, starting the Second World War in Europe, and on 17 September the Soviet Union invaded from the east. Around 6 million Polish citizens died in the war, about half of them Polish Jews murdered in the Holocaust.
Strikes at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk in August 1980 led to Solidarity, the first independent trade union in a Warsaw Pact country to be recognised by the state. Led by the electrician Lech Wałęsa, it soon had about 10 million members.
On 1 May 2004 Poland joined the European Union together with nine other countries. It had already joined NATO on 12 March 1999, and in 2007 it joined the Schengen area.
Cook one of the recipes, print the large-print pack about Poland, and finish with the big-screen quiz or the words crossword. Grandchildren can colour the flag.
