Casimir III The Great

• Preferred Name: Casimir III The Great ^{[1] [2]}
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz The Great King of Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " Great" Poland King
  
• Alternate Name: Casimir Piast King of Poland III
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " the Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Casimir of Poland King III
  
• Alternate Name: Casimer III King THE GREAT
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " The Great" Poland King of Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III ( The Great) King Of Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " The Great" King Of Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz Casimir King of Poland III
  
• Alternate Name: Casimir III Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz Of Poland III
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III Prince Of Inowroclaw
  
• Alternate Name: Casimer III King of Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " The_ Great" Poland
  
• Alternate Name: Kazimierz III " the Great" King of Polen
  
• Gender: M
  
• Birth: 30 APR 1309 in Kowal, Powiat włocławski, Kujawsko-Pomorskie, Pologne at LATI: N2.5323 LONG: E9.1516 with note: Extra information
  
• FSID: 935Z-Q42
  
• Burial: 1370 in Wawel, Krakow, Poland at LATI: N0.0497 LONG: E9.9427
  
• Death: 5 NOV 1370 in Kraków, Kraków, Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Pologne at LATI: N0.051 LONG: E9.9317 with note: Extra information
  
• Christening: ABT 1327 in Krakau, Polen at LATI: N0 LONG: E0
  
• http://familysearch.org/v1/TitleOfNobility: King
  
• http://familysearch.org/v1/TitleOfNobility: King of Poland
  
• Notes:

  === Life Sketch ===
  Casimir III, King of Poland was born on 30 April 1310. He was the son of Wladislaw I, King of Poland and Hedwig Piast.1 He married, firstly, Anne of Lithuania, daughter of Gediminas, Grand Duke of Lithuania and Olga of Novgorod, on 19 October 1325. He married, secondly, Adelheid von Hessen, daughter of Heinrich II Landgraf von Hessen, in 1341.1 He married, thirdly, Hedwig of Sagan, daughter of Henry V of Sagan, Duke of Sagan, in 1363.1 He and Adelheid von Hessen were divorced in 1356.1 He died on 5 November 1370 at age 60.
  He was a member of the House of Piast.2 Casimir III, King of Poland also went by the nick-name of Casimir 'the Great'.2 He gained the title of King Casimir III of Poland in 1333.1
  Children of Casimir III, King of Poland and Anne of Lithuania
  Elisabeth of Poland+1 b. bt 1326 - 1334, d. 1361
  Kunigarde of Poland1 b. c 1334, d. 1357
  Child of Casimir III, King of Poland and Hedwig of Sagan
  Anne of Poland+1 b. 1366, d. 1425
  
  === ! Europasche Stammtafeln neue folge vol ===
  ! Europasche Stammtafeln neue folge vol 2 tafel 122;
  
  === ?? Line 243762: (New PAF RIN=16155) 1 NA ===
  ?? Line 243762: (New PAF RIN=16155) 1 NAME Kazimierz III, Prince Of/INOWROCLAW/
  
  === King of Poland (1333-70) and last of the ===
  King of Poland (1333-70) and last of the Piast dynasty he brought comparative peace to Poland. Casimir strengthened the royal power at the expense of the nobles and the clergy. He codified Polish law and alleviated the lot of the peasants and was called 'king of the peasants'. He improved the condition of the Jews, encouraged industry, commerce and agriculture and founded the University of Cracow.
  
  === !EWH, Langer p339; King Poland 1333-1370 ===
  !EWH, Langer p339; King Poland 1333-1370;
  
  === From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 J ===
  From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
  
  === ?? Line 221159: (New PAF RIN=14655) 1 NA ===
  ?? Line 221159: (New PAF RIN=14655) 1 NAME Kazimierz III "The Great", King Of/POLAND/
  
  === ?? Line 7565: (New PAF RIN=51571) 1 NAME ===
  ?? Line 7565: (New PAF RIN=51571) 1 NAME Kazimierz III "The Great", King Of /POLAND/ ?? Line 9326: (New PAF MRIN=13256) 1 MARR 2 DATE 4 OCT 1341 (DIV)
  
  === Casimir III
  
  born April 30, 1310, Kujavi ===
  Casimir III
  
  born April 30, 1310, Kujavia, Pol.
  died Nov. 5, 1370
  
  byname Casimir the Great, Polish Kazimierz Wielki king of Poland from 1333 to 1370, called “the Great” because he was deemed a peaceful ruler, a “peasant king,” and a skillful diplomat. Through astute diplomacy he annexed lands from western Russia and eastern Germany. Within his realm he unified the government, codified its unwritten law, endowed new towns with the self-government of the Magdeburg Law, and founded Poland's first university.
  
  Casimir was the second king of the reunited and resuscitated Poland that for nearly two centuries had been split into numerous small principalities. His father, Wladyslaw I, who had succeeded in reuniting Great Poland and Little Poland, renewed the long-forgotten kingship with his coronation in Kraków in 1320. During his own reign, Casimir would continue the work of his father, adding two large and important regions (Red Russia and Masovia) to the country and making it a solid and respected partner among the other 14th-century powers in central Europe. In addition, he would provide the country with a well-organized government, and thus so strengthened feelings of popular unity that after his death (although he left no legal heir) there were no attempts at restoring the former duchies and principalities. Casimir's mother was Jadwiga, daughter of Boleslaw the Pious (Pobozny) of Great Poland. After the death of his elder brother in 1312, Casimir was regarded as heir and was prepared for the kingship by Jaroslaw, later archbishop of Gniezno and Casimir's counsellor. Upon his father's death Casimir became king of Poland in 1333. Of his three sisters, one, Elizabeth, who in 1320 married King Charles Robert of Hungary, figured prominently in his foreign and dynastic policy.
  
  Dynastic alliances
  
  In 1325 Casimir married Aldona-Ona, the pagan daughter of Gediminas (Giedymin), duke of Lithuania. Baptized before the wedding, Aldona brought with her thousands of Polish prisoners of war (one chronicle tells of 24,000) as a sign of reconciliation between Poland and the then still-pagan Lithuania. The marriage seems to have been unhappy, and the queen died in 1339 leaving no sons. Two years later Casimir married a German princess, Adelhaid of Hesse, but this marriage proved barren, and Adelhaid was sent home in 1356. A third marriage in 1365 with the Silesian princess Hedwig of Glogau-Sagan still brought no legal heir. The question of a successor was, therefore, one of Casimir's main problems. He finally designated as his heir his nephew, Louis of Hungary. Since Louis had no sons either, Casimir named as his second choice Casimir of West Pomerania, a son of his eldest daughter. The act strengthened the position of the nobility, whose consent had to be obtained by the granting of privileges.
  
  The marriages of his daughters and grandchildren further strengthened Casimir's foreign support. His second daughter was married to Louis of Brandenburg (1345); the third was betrothed to Wenzel, son of the Holy Roman emperor Charles IV (1369), who himself married first a grandniece and, later, a granddaughter of Casimir. The king thus had relatives in several important contemporary dynasties: the Wittelsbachs, the Anjous, the Luxemburgs, and the Lithuanians (later known as the Jagiellons). Casimir also had many mistresses, about whom little is known; the most famous of them, the beautiful Esther, may have been invented by the chroniclers to explain the king's notable friendliness toward Jews.
  
  Foreign policy
  
  Casimir's foreign policy reflected his own character: prudent, cool, obstinate, and self-controlled. He preferred diplomacy to war, though he did not entirely refrain from the latter, as shown by a series of forced occupations of foreign territory, notably Red Russia (eastern Galicia), in 1340 and 1349. At the beginning of Casimir's reign Poland was beset by several difficulties: the king of Bohemia claimed the Polish crown; the German knights of the Teutonic Order disputed Eastern Pomerania; and the country lacked powerful allies. By a series of treaties concluded with Hungary, Bohemia, and the Teutonic Order between 1335 and 1348, Casimir obtained a strong ally in Hungary and dropped his claims to Silesia and East Pomerania (claims that would in any case have been difficult to realize). The Bohemian king, in exchange, dropped his claims to Poland; and the Order withdrew from the territories of Kujavia and Dobrzyn, which it had occupied. Having secured his western frontier, Casimir was now able to occupy the former duchies of Halic and Vladimir (Red Russia) and to unite them step-by-step (though never completely) to Poland. As a result of this carefully planned policy, the Masovian princes, long anxious to preserve their independence, declared themselves Casimir's vassals (1351–53); even in the West some German nobles preferred Casimir's to Brandenburg's lordship.
  
  By 1370 Casimir, under different titles, had increased his territory to about 90,000 square miles (233,000 square km) from about 50,000 at his accession. More important than these territorial gains, some of which were lost after Casimir's death, was the growth of the king's prestige throughout Europe. A congress held in Kraków in 1364 was attended by the kings of Hungary, Bohemia, Denmark, and Cyprus, as well as a great number of other princes. Casimir, who 30 years previously had been a humble petitioner at the Congress of Visegrád in Hungary, was now asked to arbitrate a quarrel between the Holy Roman Emperor and Louis of Hungary.
  
  Domestic achievements
  
  Casimir encouraged economic activity and attempted to unite the country under one prince, one law, and one currency. He founded several new towns—two of them named Kazimierz after himself—and gave them, together with already existing towns, the so-called Magdeburg Law, the privilege of self-government. Casimir built more than 50 castles, fostered church building, and embellished the royal castle at Kraków. A special court was established in Kraków to arbitrate in all quarrels and to administer the law codified in the Liber juris Teutonici (“Book of Teutonic Law”). The former privileges of Jews were confirmed and improved. Though Casimir was able to inaugurate his principle of one law in Little Poland and Great Poland, Masovia and Red Russia kept their own nonwritten law. Wishing to educate native lawyers and administrators, he founded the Academy of Kraków (now Jagiellonian University) in 1364.
  
  Since little is known of Casimir's sympathies, personal interests, thoughts, and feelings, he must be judged on his deeds, which characterize him as an especially good, wise, and, to a degree, even modern ruler. He was a sober administrator but not a hero; a man who earned the respect of his contemporaries and posterity but was, perhaps, too cool, too aloof, and too faultless to obtain great sympathy. [Encyclopædia Britannica, online ]

• m. 16 OCT 1325

• m. 25 FEB 1365 in Wschowa, Lubusz, Poland

1. Title: Casimir III The Great, "Find A Grave Index"
   Author: "Find A Grave Index," database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVVN-12HH : 12 May 2022), Casimir III The Great, ; Burial, Kraków, Miasto Kraków, Małopolskie, Poland, Wawel Cathedral; citing record ID 20603830, Find a Grave, http://www.findagrave.com.
   Publication: Name: https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVVN-12HH;
   
2. Title: Casimir III The Great, "Find A Grave Index"
   Author: "Find A Grave Index," database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVVN-12HH : 12 May 2022), Casimir III The Great, ; Burial, Kraków, Miasto Kraków, Małopolskie, Poland, Wawel Cathedral; citing record ID 20603830, Find a Grave, http://www.findagrave.com.
   Publication: Name: https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVVN-12HH;