Istebna is a large village and the seat of

Gmina Istebna Gmina Istebna is a rural gmina (administrative district) in Cieszyn County, Silesian Voivodeship, in southern Poland, in the historical region of Cieszyn Silesia. Its seat is the village of Istebna. The gmina covers an area of , and as of 2019 i ...

Cieszyn County __NOTOC__ Cieszyn County ( pl, powiat cieszyński) is a unit of territorial administration and local government ( powiat) in Silesian Voivodeship, southern Poland, on the Czech and Slovak border. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a resul ...

Silesian Voivodeship Silesian Voivodeship, or Silesia Province ( pl, województwo śląskie ) is a voivodeship, or province, in southern Poland, centered on the historic region known as Upper Silesia ('), with Katowice serving as its capital. Despite the Silesian V ...

, southern Poland. The village is situated in the

Silesian Beskids Silesian Beskids ( Polish: , Czech: , german: Schlesische Beskiden) is one of the Beskids mountain ranges in Outer Western Carpathians in southern Silesian Voivodeship, Poland and the eastern Moravian-Silesian Region, Czech Republic. Most of ...

mountain range, near the borders with the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

and

Slovakia Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the ...

, in the historical region of

Cieszyn Silesia Cieszyn Silesia, Těšín Silesia or Teschen Silesia ( pl, Śląsk Cieszyński ; cs, Těšínské Slezsko or ; german: Teschener Schlesien or ) is a historical region in south-eastern Silesia, centered on the towns of Cieszyn and Český T� ...

. The Olza River flows through the village.

Etymology

The name is cultural in origin derived from the word , meaning a room in a (especially rural) house (see also

izba An izba ( rus, изба́, p=ɪzˈba, a=Ru-изба.ogg) is a traditional Slavic countryside dwelling. Often a log house, it forms the living quarters of a conventional Russian farmstead. It is generally built close to the road and inside a ya ...

). It is conjectured that the name was conveyed by settlers from

Istebné Istebné ( hu, Isztebne) is a village and municipality in Dolný Kubín District in the Žilina Region of northern Slovakia. See also * List of municipalities and towns in Slovakia This is an alphabetical list of the 2,891 obcí (singular ...

who supposedly established the village. Historically it was also known as ''Gistebna'' (1621, 1629) or ''Istebne'' (1724; the name in plural form, meaning ''rooms'').

History

The village was first mentioned in the document from 1592 retrospectively mentioning the village ''Jistebne'' as existing in 1583. It belonged then to the Duchy of Teschen, a fee of the

Kingdom of Bohemia The Kingdom of Bohemia ( cs, České království),; la, link=no, Regnum Bohemiae sometimes in English literature referred to as the Czech Kingdom, was a medieval and early modern monarchy in Central Europe, the predecessor of the modern Czec ...

and a part of the

Habsburg monarchy The Habsburg monarchy (german: Habsburgermonarchie, ), also known as the Danubian monarchy (german: Donaumonarchie, ), or Habsburg Empire (german: Habsburgerreich, ), was the collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities ...

. After

Revolutions of 1848 in the Austrian Empire The Revolutions of 1848 in the Austrian Empire were a set of revolutions that took place in the Austrian Empire from March 1848 to November 1849. Much of the revolutionary activity had a nationalist character: the Empire, ruled from Vienna, incl ...

a modern municipal division was introduced in the re-established

Austrian Silesia Austrian Silesia, (historically also ''Oesterreichisch-Schlesien, Oesterreichisch Schlesien, österreichisch Schlesien''); cs, Rakouské Slezsko; pl, Śląsk Austriacki officially the Duchy of Upper and Lower Silesia, (historically ''Herzogth ...

. The village as a municipality was subscribed to the

political district An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other poli ...

Cieszyn Cieszyn ( , ; cs, Těšín ; german: Teschen; la, Tessin; szl, Ćeszyn) is a border town in southern Poland on the east bank of the Olza River, and the administrative seat of Cieszyn County, Silesian Voivodeship. The town has 33,500 inhabitan ...

and the

legal district A judicial district or legal district denotes the territorial area for which a legal court (usually a district court) has jurisdiction. By region Europe Austria In texts concerning Austria, "judicial district" (german: Gerichtsbezirk) refers ...

Jablunkov Jablunkov (; pl, , german: Jablunkau) is a town in Frýdek-Místek District in the Moravian-Silesian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 5,300 inhabitants. Polish minority makes up 16.4% of the population. It is inhabited by a large amo ...

. According to the censuses conducted in 1880, 1890, 1900 and 1910 the population of the municipality grew from 2,112 in 1880 to 2,245 in 1910 with the majority being native Polish-speakers (between 98.2% and 99.5%) accompanied by German-speaking (at most 33 or 1.5% in 1890) and Czech-speaking people (at most 15 or 0.7% in 1880). In terms of religion in 1910 the majority were

Roman Catholics The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

(93.9%), followed by

Protestants Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

(5.9%) and

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

(6 people). The village was also traditionally inhabited by

Silesian Gorals Silesian Gorals ( pl, Górale śląscy, cs, Slezští Goralé, Cieszyn Silesian: ''Gorole''; literally "highlanders") are an ethnographic group (subgroup of Gorals) living in Silesian Beskids and Moravian-Silesian Beskids within historical r ...

, speaking Jablunkov dialect. After

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, fall of

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...

, Polish–Czechoslovak War and the division of

in 1920, it became a part of

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

and was transferred to Cieszyn County. It was then

annexed Annexation (Latin ''ad'', to, and ''nexus'', joining), in international law, is the forcible acquisition of one state's territory by another state, usually following military occupation of the territory. It is generally held to be an illegal act ...

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

at the beginning of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. After the war it was restored to

Landmarks

There is a Catholic Good Shepherd Church in the village, built in 1794 from previous wooden one.

People

* Emanuel Grim, Catholic priest and writer, worked here and is buried at local cemetery * Ludwik Konarzewski-junior, Polish painter, sculptor and also artistic educator of children (son of senior) * Ludwik Konarzewski-senior, Polish painter, sculptor and also educator of fine arts to young people in Istebna *

Janusz Krężelok Janusz Adam Krężelok (born 18 December 1974 in Istebna) is a Polish cross-country skier who has competed since 1994. His best individual finish at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships was a seventh in the individual sprint in 2005 while his bes ...

, cross-country skier *

Jerzy Kukuczka Józef Jerzy Kukuczka (24 March 1948 in Katowice, Poland – 24 October 1989 Lhotse, Nepal) was a Polish alpine and high-altitude climber. Born in Katowice, his family origin is Silesian Goral. On 18 September 1987, he became the secon ...

, high altitude mountaineer, and the second person to climb all of the 8,000 metre peaks (Memorial Chamber dedicated to him is located in its own mountain cottage in Istebna) * Jan Wałach, drawer, engraver (woodcuts), also sculptor and painter

Twin towns

* Iława *

Trzebiatów Trzebiatów (pronounced ; ; formerly german: Treptow an der Rega) is a town in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland, with 10,119 inhabitants (2016). Trzebiatów is located on the Rega River in the north-western part of Poland, roughly 9 kilo ...

Gallery

File:Kościół Dobrego Pasterza w Istebnej 3.JPG, Good Shepherd parish church File:Istebna 07.jpg, Interior of the Good Shepherd church File:WPKiW - Skansen.JPG, Building in Upper Silesian Ethnographic Park File:Henryk Jastrzembski akwarela Górale z Istebnej 1846.png, ''Para góralska z Istebnej'', by Henryk Jastrzembski, (1846) File:Istebna 1091.jpg, Memorial plaque

in Istebna

Footnotes

References

External links

*
Official website of Gmina Istebna
{{Authority control Villages in Cieszyn County Cieszyn Silesia