Duchy of Masovia

The Duchy of Mazovia emerged as a polity in the course of the 12th century on the territory of today's Mazovia after the division of the inheritance of the Kingdom of Poland in 1138 duchies by the testament of Bolesław III Duke. Wrymouth.

Mazovia was originally a tribal territory, which included the land on the right bank of the Vistula in the vicinity of Płock. The origin of the name is not fully understood, it is a relationship to the name of the butler of King Mieszko II Lambert pulled the Maso, Maslao, Masław († 1047) was called and, in the years after the death of the King, 1034 the territory appropriated. Since the 10th century it belonged to the state of the Piast dynasty and was one of the provinces with the center in Płock. As a result of the testament of Bolesław III. Wrymouth was united under the rule of Duke Bolesław Kraushaar Mazovia with Kuyavian and the country of Sieradz - Łęczyca to a Duchy. In the reign of Duke Konrad (1200-1247) to become independent from the Kraków Voivodeship Presbytery, and it divided after 1313 into three duchies with the centers of Płock, Czersk -Warsaw and Rawa Mazowiecka.

The Dukes of Mazovia from 1351 were vassals of the Polish crown. After the extinction of Mazovia line of the Piast dynasty in the male line by the death of Duke Janusz of Masovia, the Duchy was home to the Kingdom of Poland ceased fief in 1526. The territory was converted into a province on December 27, 1529 and the Kingdom directly administratively incorporated, in which it remained until the partitions.

The memory of the Duchy was both on behalf of the Province received it and in the titulary of the Polish rulers in the following centuries, it stood King Sigismund II Augustus in his titulary entitled to the following areas: Zikmund Augustus Dei gratia rex Poloniae, magnus dux Lithuaniae, nec non terrarum Cracoviae, Sandomiriae, Siradiae, Lanciciae, Cuiaviae, Kijoviae, Russiae, Woliniae, Prussiae, Masoviae, Podlachiae, Culmensis, Elbingensis, Pomeraniae, Samogitiae, Livoniae etc. dominus et haeres.