Map - Grodno Region (Grodno Oblast)

Grodno Region (Grodno Oblast)
Grodno Region (Grodzieńszczyzna) or Grodno Oblast or Hrodna Voblasts (Гродзенская вобласць, Hrodzienskaja vobłasć, Гарадзеншчына, Haradzienščyna; Гродненская область, Grodnenskaya oblast; Obwód Grodzieński; Gardino sritis) is one of the regions of Belarus. It is located in the western part of the country.

The capital, Grodno, is the biggest city in the region. It lies on the Neman River. It borders Minsk Region to the east, Brest Region to the south, Poland (Podlaskie Voivodeship) to the west and Vitebsk Region and Lithuania (Alytus and Vilnius counties) to the north. Grodno's existence is attested to from 1127. Two castles dating from the 14th - 18th centuries are located here on the steep right bank of the Nemen. One of the city's surviving masterpieces is the 12th century Orthodox Church of St Boris & St Gleb (Kalozhskaya Church), which is the second oldest in Belarus.

This region was the westernmost "borderlands" of the Early East Slavs (tribal union Dregovichs?) on the lands of the Balts in the 6th-9th centuries. In the 12th-14th centuries it was part of the area sometimes known as Black Ruthenia, that was fully incorporated into the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) by the rulers of Lithuania in the 13th century.

In 1413, the area around Grodno, part of the Duchy of Trakai, was transformed into newly established Trakai Voivodeship. Grodno became the seat of Grodno County. In 1441, Magdeburg Law charter was granted to the capital by Casimir IV Jagiellon Grand Duke of Lithuania and future King of Poland. In 1444, Grodno received its coat of arms from Casimir's hands as well as substantial trade privileges.

The strong economic development of the area continued during the reign of Casimir's son - Duke Alexander Jagiellon who founded the first solid bridge over the Neman River as well as Monastery of Order of Saint Augustine and Monastery of Polish Ordo Fratrum Minorum. Later, Bona Sforza Queen of Poland and Grand Duchess of Lithuania, placed in Grodno her royal residence. According to medieval surveys, Grodno had 35 streets and 700 houses in 1558.

The golden age of Grodno falls on the reign of Stephen Báthory King of Poland, which is between 1576 and 1586. During his reign, Grodno became royal headquarters and began to host sessions of Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth Senate and Parliament. In 1580, on king's order the castle of Grodno was rebuilt in Renaissance style of architecture, by Scoto di Parma.

At the beginning of the 17th century, Grodno was one of the most developed and important cities in Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, traditionally recognized as the third capital of the commonwealth. Deterioration of province status began with Livonian War which put Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in long-lasting and exhausting military conflict with Tsardom of Russia and Swedish Empire. Between 1765 and 1780, the province regained some of its previous status when Antoni Tyzenhaus the Treasurer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Administrator of Polish Royal Estates, was governing the capital and the province. Around 50 new economical endeavours were undertaken by Tyzenhaus in the region, new manufactures, mills and workshops have been built.

As part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth forming the Grand Duchy's Trakai Voivodship, and due to subsequent Partitions of Poland, the whole of the Grodno region was finally annexed by Russian Empire by the end of 1795. The city of Grodno then became a seat for Grodno Governorate.

During World War I the governorate was occupied by Germany. German troops entered Grodno city on 3 September 1915, plundering the Library of Dominicans Order. During the German occupation, Polish citizens of Grodno region were persecuted and had restricted civil rights. At the end of the war, the Belarusian People's Republic declared its independence from Soviet Russia in March 1918 in Minsk. Grodno was the site of the last stand of the BNR's Council (Rada). Soon, the Council was forced to flee as Soviet troops invaded the region and the city in 1919. The same year Polish–Soviet War broke out and lasted until 1921.

Under the terms of Peace Treaty of Riga the region and the city returned to Second Polish Republic which claimed rights to this territory as a successor to Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and as a victorious side of the Polish–Soviet War. By 1939, the Grodno city had 60,000 inhabitants, with Poles and Jews accounting for 60% and 37% of the population, respectively. During Polish rule Grodno was centre of Grodno County in Białystok Voivodeship, but some parts of present Grodno Region was in the voivodeships of Nowogródek and Wilno. 
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Country - Belarus
Flag of Belarus
Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Covering an area of 207600 km2 and with a population of 9.2 million, Belarus is the 13th-largest and the 20th-most populous country in Europe. The country has a hemiboreal climate and is administratively divided into seven regions. Minsk is the capital and largest city.

Until the 20th century, different states at various times controlled the lands of modern-day Belarus, including Kievan Rus', the Principality of Polotsk, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the Russian Empire. In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution in 1917, different states arose competing for legitimacy amid the Civil War, ultimately ending in the rise of the Byelorussian SSR, which became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. After the Polish-Soviet War, Belarus lost almost half of its territory to Poland. Much of the borders of Belarus took their modern shape in 1939, when some lands of the Second Polish Republic were reintegrated into it after the Soviet invasion of Poland, and were finalized after World War II. During World War II, military operations devastated Belarus, which lost about a quarter of its population and half of its economic resources. The republic was redeveloped in the post-war years. In 1945, the Byelorussian SSR became a founding member of the United Nations, along with the Soviet Union.
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BYN Belarusian ruble Br 2
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