[134] Given in fief by the Polish kings to the Dukes of Brandenburg and exonerated in 1656 from the oath of vassalage, except the four circles of Braniewo (Braunsberg) (383 sq. mi., 54,613 inhab.), Liebark (Heilsberg) (427 sq. mi., 51,912 inhab.), Olsztyn (Allenstein) (529 sq. mi., 90,996 inhab.) and Reszel (Rössel) (333 sq. mi., 50,472 inhab.), which together under the name of Duchy of Warmie made part of Royal Prussia and were lost at the first partition. [135] Conferred on the king of Prussia under the name of Grand Duchy of Posen at the time of the partition of the Duchy of Warsaw by the Congress of Vienna in 1815. [136] Former appendages of a branch, extinguished in 1675, of the royal Polish house of Piast. [137] Part of the former marquisate of Lusace. [138] Part of the former Polish Silesia, kept by Germany. [139] The territory of Cracow, made into a republic in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, was annexed by Austria in 1846. [140] Consisting of Poles and natives. [141] The circle of Bialystok, occupied by the king of Prussia in 1795, was ceded to Russia by the treaty of Tilsit in 1807. [142] The city of Kijow (Kiev) with its district (773 sq. mi., 560,000 inhab.) was lost in 1686. [143] R. Baumgarten: Deutsche und Polen in Oberschlesien, _Deutsche Erde_, Vol. 13, No. 7, 1914-1915, pp. 175-179. CHAPTER VII BOHEMIAN, MORAVIAN AND SLOVAKIAN The Bohemians, who with the Moravians form the vanguard of the Slavs in Europe, occupy the mountain-girt plateau of Bohemia in the very heart of the continent. Here, a steady easterly spread of Teutons has prevented expansion of these Slavs along the eastern valleys which provide them with communication with the rest of the continent. Bohemians and Moravians thus found themselves shut within the mountainous rim of their land by the Germans of Silesia and Austria proper. The German ring surrounding Bohemia is composed of groups belonging to various types of the Teutonic family. A southwestern element consists of descendants of Bavarian settlers. Farmers and woodsmen were introduced into the Böhmerwald, as an inevitable phase of the exploitation of the mountainous area, by religious communities of the thirteenth century. The end of the Thirty Years’ War was marked by a new influx of Germans needed to repopulate the sorely devastated Bohemian districts. The Bavarians, however, never reached the foot of the eastern slopes. Modern Bohemian resistance to their spread toward the plain persists unflinchingly. Northward, the Erzgebirge uplift is also a German ethnographic conquest. For centuries its mineral wealth has attracted artisans from Franconia, Thuringia and Saxony. The mountain slopes re-echo today to the sound of the dialects of these ancient countries. The Saxon element prevails particularly among the inhabitants of the Elbe valley.