Minakowski's Great Genealogy presents the family network of elites of Central Europe (former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) since Middle Ages till now.
The elites - that is about 50,000 most prominent people in the history of Poland and adjacent countries - all those about whom books are written, schools are teaching or whose names streets bear.
And also their children, parents, grandchildren, parents-in-law, sisters-in-law: all this family network they belonged to. Together it is over 1.200.000 people.
It appeared that the whole elite of Polish society, in over 1050 years, is one big family, where everybody is connected to anybody else by a chain of no longer than a few dozens people, out of whom every next is a child, parent or a spouse of the latter.
The work on reconstruction of this family network (this graph of connections) are under way. Below there is a current state of affairs, published currently (June 2018).
In our family (our, because I, Marek Jerzy Minakowski, am also here) are:
In the ranking of a hundred most common patrons of streets in Poland only seventeen (or 17%) is outside MGG, while in the top 50 - only four (8%) are outside: Stanisław Staszic, Bartosz Głowacki, Jerzy Popiełuszko i Piotr Skarga.
Among Poles, whose works are (or recently were) school readings, over three quarters (47 out of 61) are in our family. Only 14 authors lacked. Detailed data are here: http://minakowski.pl/trzy-czwarte-autorow-polskich-lektur-jest-w-naszej-rodzinie/.
Until 1990 there were 1134 members of Polish academies of sciences and humanities. Their biographies are published in: Andrzej Śródka, Paweł Szczawiński, Biogramy uczonych polskich: materiały o życiu i działalności członków AU w Krakowie, TNW, PAU, PAN, Wrocław 1983-1990.
Out of those 1134, most (722 or 64%) are in MGG. In detail:
Part | Total | MGG | % |
I. Social sciences | 451 | 306 | 68% |
II. Biological sciences | 103 | 72 | 70% |
III. Strict sciences | 105 | 72 | 69% |
IV. Technical sciences | 99 | 59 | 60% |
V. Agricultural and forestry sciences | 69 | 39 | 57% |
VI. Medical sciences | 168 | 106 | 63% |
VII Sciences on Earth and mining | 62 | 34 | 55% |
VIII. Supplement | 77 | 34 | 44% |
Total | 1134 | 722 | 64% |
Polish Biographical Dictionary has 27.653 biographic entries so far. It is a common work of Polish historians, published initially by Polska Akademia Umiejętności and now by Institute of History of Polska Akademia Nauk (Polish Academy of Sciences and Humanities). The selection of entries is a consensus of all Polish historians - those who are writing entries (51 volumes have been published since 1935) and those who wrote about the people before (the better is the bibliography about the person in question, the more likely he or she will be included into PSB).
So far, we have in MGG 15,762 people who have their entries in PSB, which makes 57%. The full list is here
Three houses of the Great Sejm (king, senators and representatives) had 494 men. This was the elite of the whole area of Rzeczpospolita (even the territories lost during I Partition were represented by exulants and senators still received their nominations). Out of those 494 whe have 471 in MGG, which is 95%. The 5% are still lacking.
Out of the 2.492 men who were members of Senate of Rzeczpospolita between 1569 and 1795, we have 2222 in MGG, which is 89%. We still lack 11%...
Out of 362 upper officers (majors, colonels and generals), we have 259 in MGG (72%). But in there 50% majors here (59 out of 115) and 68% of under-colonels (podpułkownik, 83 out of 122). If we were to count only colonels and generals - we have almost all, that is 94% (117 of 125)
In the army of the Duchy of Warsaw, there were 145 upper officers. We have 92 (63%) in MGG.
Among officers of Polish army during the November Uprising (1830-31) with surnames A till R (described in the R. Bielecki's Dictionary) for total number of 1163 upper officers, we have in MGG 464 (40%)
I have written more about it here: http://minakowski.pl/genealogia-oficerow-kongresowki/ and here: http://minakowski.pl/2346-oficerow-w-naszej-rodzinie/.
Elżbieta Sęczys in Szlachta wylegitymowana w Królestwie Polskim (DiG, Warszawa 2000) listed 48.924 distinct people from families who managed to prove their noble status and the documents are still preserved in Archiwum Główne Akt Dawnych in Warsaw. Among them, 25.308 are in MGG. However it is only 51%, we must remember that very many items are only names of such person, maybe with first name of his father, which is too little to identify such person.
For the total number of 9058 families described there, only in 4474 cases we know a mother of anybody in their family. 79% such families (3533 of 4457) is already in MGG.
The Avenue of Meritorious in Powązkowski Cemetery in Warsaw has 110 graves. Out of them, 68 (62%) are of people in MGG.
In general, in the oldest part of Powązkowski Cemetery (54 fields) over 50% of graves (2.892 of 5.747) are families who are in MGG. More details: http://minakowski.pl/juz-polowa-najstarszych-powazek-to-nasza-rodzina/ . We could have found more but the archive of Cemetery has been destroyed in 1945.
So far, in Powązkowski Cemetery, there are 2921 graves with people who died before January Uprising 1863. 1688 of them (58%) contain somebody from MGG.
There are 4.264 distinct persons who died before 1863 in Powązki Cemetery. Out of the number, 2449 (57%) are in MGG.
Death notices contain anybody who should have been known (not only in Warsaw). This collection contains a whole generation (41 years). For 18.039 people, whose death was noted, already 9.549 (53%) are in MGG.
I have written more about it here: http://minakowski.pl/social-media-170-lat-temu-czytelnicy-kuriera-warszawskiego-jako-siec-kuzynow/.
Central Committee of First Proletaryat party (about 1883) is whole in MGG (7 people)
Polish Revolutionary Committee (government-to-be if Bolsheviks were to win in 1920) had 5 people - all of them in MGG.
Central Committee of Communist Party of Poland had 32 people in total (all members, through the whole history of the party). Out of them, 15 are in MGG.
Full list is here: http://www.sejm-wielki.pl/parlament_od_1919.php