PROTESTANT CHURCHES IN THE DABROWA COAL BELT (ZAGLEBIE DABROWSKIE) UNTIL 1914 (Koscioly protestanckie w Zaglebiu Dabrowskim (do 1914 roku))

The ripples of the Reformation reached the territory which later came to known as the Dabrowa Coal Belt in the middle of the 16th century. Whereas the western part of the Duchy of Siewierz, which belonged to the Bishops of Cracow, remained largely unaffected by the various reformist stirrings, they made a perceptible impact on some of the town- and landowners in the eastern part of the Duchy, which was part of the Voivodeship of Cracow. The next wave of Protestantism came to Dabrowa with migrants in the first half of the 19th century: many of the skilled workers attracted to the region by its rapidly developing industry were Protestants from Upper Silesia and Saxony. Their numbers kept rising in the second half of the 19th century in line with the industrial expansion. This article analyzes the key characteristics of the newly-formed Protestant community of the Dabrowa Górnicza region, ie. its spatial distribution, material status, denominational break-down, as well as the initiatives to set up their own places of worship.