{"id":24081,"date":"2026-01-12T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/?p=24081"},"modified":"2025-12-28T06:08:03","modified_gmt":"2025-12-28T14:08:03","slug":"the-polish-village-of-smrock-szelkow-parish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/24081","title":{"rendered":"The Polish Village of Smrock (Szelk\u00f3w Parish)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The S\u0142ownik Geograficzny Kr\u00f3lestwa Polskiego i Innych Kraj\u00f3w S\u0142owia\u0144skich (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavonic Countries)<\/em> includes two entries for Polish villages called Smrock, both of them for the same village belonging to the parish of Szelk\u00f3w.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Smrock and Surrounding Area \u2013 1910<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Third Military Mapping Survey of Austria-Hungary (ELTE Faculty of Informatics,
Institute of Cartography and Geoinformatics); digital images, Lazarus ELTE<\/em>
(http:\/\/lazarus.elte.hu\/hun\/digkonyv\/topo\/200e\/39-53.jpg<\/a>: accessed 20 December 2025)<\/p>\n\n\n

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Source: Chlebowski, Bronis\u0142aw and W\u0142adys\u0142aw Walewski, eds., S\u0142ownik Geograficzny Kr\u00f3lestwa Polskiego i Innych Kraj\u00f3w S\u0142owia\u0144skich<\/em> (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavonic Countries<\/em>) – Warsaw 1889, Volume X, page 923<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Click on the link for a PDF copy of the the S\u0142ownik Geograficzny entry for Smrock. Translated from the Polish, the first entry reads:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Smrock<\/strong>, a village, manor, and hamlet on the Orzyc River (left bank), Mak\u00f3w powiat, Smrock gmina, Szelk\u00f3w parish. Two watermills and a sawmill. In 1827, it had 21 houses and 163 inhabitants. As a leased village, it was part of the Mak\u00f3w starosty, then the Ro\u017can estate, and from 1835 the Smrock majorate. In the 1664 inspection of the Mak\u00f3w starosty, we read: “The village of Smroczek has 32 w\u0142\u00f3ki [1 w\u0142\u00f3ka = 30 m\u00f3rgs; Gerald Ortell’s book on Polish Parish Records states that in the Russian partition 1 m\u00f3rg = 1.388 acres], from which 2 belong to the village headmen, 1 to a chosen representative, and 3\u00bd are permanently resident, from which rent, etc. Two mills near the village: one called Zator, the other Przanko, for which mill, according to its third measurement, the honorable Pawe\u0142 Berkowski and Jadwiga n\u00e9e Grzanka received a joint consent from John Casimir on October 18, 1659, with the right to timber from the Perzanowski forest. From both mills, the rent is 40 Polish z\u0142otys. Manor house. Total 212 Polish z\u0142otys 19 groszy, 2 shelags [a shelag is an old Polish coin.]” The village, measured in 1801 by Rockner, comprised 1154 Magdeburg m\u00f3rgs. In 1819, we find the chosen representative, Maciej Sieczkowski, paying 69 z\u0142otys and 8 groszy for 83 m\u00f3rgs for 7 hired farmhands working 1 \u00bd w\u0142\u00f3ka each, 3 hired farmhands working \u00bd w\u0142\u00f3ka each, 4 copyists, a blacksmith, a tavern, and a mill.  On a \u00bd w\u0142\u00f3ka field, 5 bushels of spring grain and 4 bushels of winter grain were sown, and 156 days of teamwork, 156 days of manual labor, and 12 days of threshing were performed for the manor. In addition, 3 capons and 15 eggs were given from each \u00bd w\u0142\u00f3ka.  Furthermore, the village paid a tithe to Pu\u0142tusk. In 1820, the village was reorganized into a rent-paying system; the lands were measured by \u0141aguna and separated; the manor received 1447 m\u00f3rgs, the representative 45 m\u00f3rgs, the village 832 m\u00f3rgs, the mill 48 m\u00f3rgs, the forester’s settlement 28 m\u00f3rgs, and the pine forest 4079 m\u00f3rgs; the services were converted into an annual rent of 768 z\u0142otys and 29 groszy. At that time, the village had 17 men, 18 women, 18 boys and 19 girls under 10 years old, 5 men and 11 women over 10 years old, 10 farmhands, 2 maids, 12 horses, 25 oxen, 26 heifers, 29 cows, 46 pigs, and 24 sheep. The mill was leased in perpetuity in 1812 to Krystyan Witt for 200 z\u0142otys, and after the reorganization, he paid 250 z\u0142otys and 29 groszy in rent; in 1823 the chosen estate was confiscated by the treasury and converted into a leasehold settlement, with a rent of 103 Polish z\u0142otys and 12 groszy. The Smrock estate, consisting of the Smrock manor and village, the village of Makowica, a mill and sawmill in Smrock, a mill and windmill in Bazar, the Bazar manor, the Dani\u0142owo settlement, and the Smrock forest district, totaling 3611 m\u00f3rgs and 269 rods (645 m\u00f3rgs of forest), was granted in 1835 to Colonel Teodor Moeller. The Dani\u0142owo settlement is located nearby and, upon separation, received 78 m\u00f3rgs. The village of Makowica had 17 inhabitants and 983 m\u00f3rgs. The Smrock gmina, with its office in the village of Orzyc, has an area of \u200b\u200b18064 m\u00f3rgs and 4345 inhabitants; the district court and post office are in Mak\u00f3w. The gmina includes: a primary school, 3 mills, 3 windmills, and 2 brickyards. The gmina comprises 6 noble villages: Chyliny, Chrzanowo, G\u0142odki, Pomaski, Szlasy Z\u0142otki, and Zelki-D\u0105browo; 5 villages with mixed population: Ciepielewo, Przeradowo, Strachocin, Szelk\u00f3w, and Zakliczewo, and 10 peasant villages: Jankowo, Laski, Magnuszewo-Ma\u0142e, Magnuszew.-Wielkie, Makowica, Orzyc, S\u0142oniawy, Smrock, and Ulaski.     Lu. Krz.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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Source: Chlebowski, Bronis\u0142aw, ed., S\u0142ownik Geograficzny Kr\u00f3lestwa Polskiego i Innych Kraj\u00f3w S\u0142owia\u0144skich<\/em> (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavonic Countries<\/em>) – Warsaw 1902, Volume XV Part II, Page 600<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Translated from the Polish, the second entry reads:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Smrock<\/strong>, a village in the Mak\u00f3w powiat. In 1465, Zdzis\u0142aw of Chylin sold his Vogtship, comprising 2 lans [1 lan = 30 m\u00f3rgs; Gerald Ortell’s book on Polish Parish Records states that in the Russian partition 1 m\u00f3rg = 1.388 acres] in the ducal village of Smrock near Mak\u00f3w and 10 lans in Brzost\u00f3w in the Wizna region to his brother Micha\u0142 (Kapica, Herbarz, 51).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 by Stephen J. Danko<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The S\u0142ownik Geograficzny Kr\u00f3lestwa Polskiego i Innych Kraj\u00f3w S\u0142owia\u0144skich (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavonic Countries) includes two entries for Polish villages called Smrock, both of them for the same village belonging to the parish of Szelk\u00f3w. Smrock … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-journal"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pyBfX-6gp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24081"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24278,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24081\/revisions\/24278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stephendanko.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}