Germanisation of the Province of Posen

The Germanisation of the Province of Posen was a policy of the Kulturkampf measures enacted by German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, whose goal was to Germanize Polish-speaking areas in the Prussian Province of Posen by eradicating and discrimination of Polish language and culture, as well as to reduce the influence of the "ultramontanist" Roman Catholic clergy in those regions.

Since the Third Partition of Poland in 1795 the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth had ceased to exist as a state with its territory annexed by the surrounding great powers Austria, Prussia (which in turn became part of the German Empire in 1871) and Russia. Within the Prussian share were large parts of the historic Greater Poland region around Poznań (Posen), cradle of the first Polish state, which since 1848 were incorporated into the province of Posen.

In the course of the Ostsiedlung in the medieval period, Germans had settled in the region, especially in the western parts. Beginning in the 18th century there were several attempts at German colonisation, the first by the Prussian ruler Frederick the Great, who settled around 300,000 colonists in the Eastern provinces of Prussia, and simultaneously aimed to reduce Polish ownership of land. Poles were portrayed as 'backward Slavs' by Prussian officials who wanted to spread German language and culture. The land of Polish nobility was confiscated and given to German nobles.

In 1806, during the Napoleonic Wars, Polish leaders, with Napoleon's encouragement, successfully started an uprising against Prussian rule, contributing to the French victory over Prussia; in the 1807 Treaty of Tilsit, the Posen region was part of the territory ceded by Prussia and incorporated into the Duchy of Warsaw, a Polish state established by Napoleon and ruled by his ally Frederick August I of Saxony in a personal union.

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