Civitas Schinesghe

Civitas Schinesghe
Ziemia Polska (pl) Polonia (la)
9th century–1025
Poland within Europe around 1000CE
Poland during 960-996.
Capital		Gniezno
Languages		Polish (Old Polish)
Religion		Slavic paganism, Roman Catholicism (institutional since 966)
Government		Monarchy
Monarch
•	d. 861	Piast Kołodziej first
•	960–992	Mieszko I
•	992–1025	Bolesław I Chrobry last
History
•	Established	9th century
•	Coronation of Bolesław I the Brave	1025
Preceded by Succeeded by Polish tribes Great Moravia Kingdom of Poland (1025–1385)

Civitas Schinesghe is the first recorded name related to Poland as a political entity (the name is a latinization of hrady knezske or grody książęce "ducal fort") first attested in 991/2. The original deed is missing, but mentioned in an 11th-century papal regesta called Dagome iudex, according to which the Piast duke Mieszko I of Poland had given the guidance of unam civitatem in integro, que vocatur Schinesghe ("a whole state, which is called Schinesghe") over to the Holy See.

Though a state of Poland is not explicitly mentioned, the name Schinesghe most likely refers to Gniezno, one of the main settlements of the West Slavic Polans. Their duke Mieszko had himself baptised upon the marriage with Princess Dobrawa of Bohemia in 965. In 1000 at the Congress of Gniezno the first Polish archdiocese was established and Mieszko's son Duke Bolesław I Chrobry was acknowledged as frater et cooperator of the Holy Roman Empire by Emperor Otto III.

The analysis of the document can help reconstruct the borders of the Polish realm

The last statement suggests that Schinesghe is on the Oder and on the Baltic coast and becomes clear only after reversig "sch" to "chs" giving clearly understandable Chsinesghe which is "książęce" in modern Polish, so "civitate Schinesghe" reads as "the cities of the Duke".