History and establishment of Polonezkoy dates back to Poland’s being invaded by its neighbors Austria, Russia and Prussia in 1772, the Ottoman Empire’s not accepting the disintegration of Poland and Prince Adam Czartoryski’s starting up the independence struggle during his exile in Paris.
During these years, and after the big riot that has been quelled in Poland in 1831, a large number of Polish politicians took refuge in both France and the Ottoman Empire.
Prince Adam Czartoryski were believing that the independence of Poland can only be achieved by the association with the Ottoman Empire and participating the war against Russia.
For this purpose, he sent the famous writer Michal Czajkowski to Istanbul for establishing a Polish Representative Office in 1841. Later on, Michal Czajkowski became a Muslim and toof the name Mehmet Sadik Pasha.
During the Crimean War between 1853 and 1856, with the leadership of Mehmet Sadik Pasha (Michal Czarkowski), the Poles who entered the war alongside the Ottoman Empire were allowed to settle in the lands of today’s Polonezkoy by the Ottoman Sultan Abdulmecit, after the end of the war.
Mehmet Sadik Pasha (Michal Czarkowski) rented the 5,000,000 square meters of land (known as Gypsy Mansion, today’s Polonezkoy) from the Lazarist Priests to forever, for the Polish refugees, immigrants and families of the soldiers, and helped them to settle in this magical gypsy land. And after the Lazarist Priests’ abandoning the village, the Polish immigrants started to live here and they never went back to Poland.
The Poles reconstructed the village within the framework of their own culture, built houses and gardens and start farming by cultivating the unproductive lands. They also gained a tax exemption by the Sultan Abdulmecit.
These lands, which were bought by Prince Adam Czartoryski in 1881, called as Adampol, meaning “the lands of Adam”, after Prince Adam Czartoryski.
Afterwards, the village took the name “Polonez Karyesi”. And the inhabitants of the village took the Turkish citizenship in 1894, and in 1923 the village took the name Polonezkoy (means “the village of the Poles”) and gained an ethnic identity.
In the early 1900s, the village started a concept of a clean family pension service to Istanbul and opened its door to tourism. This type of accommodation has become very famous in the village with its green nature, wooden houses that are like smiling with their landscape of trees full of flowers and fruits.
Today’s Polonezkoy is one of the most preferred places in Istanbul to choose from an exciting weekend breaks, day trips, to nature walking, cycling, picnics, barbecue, dinners in luxurious and quality restaurants, weddings and various parties.
Polonezkoy is also one of the most famous villages in the world. And for more than 150 years, the inhabitants of the village have preserved the Polish language, culture and the traditions of their ancestors.
