Solina is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

Lesko County __NOTOC__ Lesko County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Subcarpathian Voivodeship, south-eastern Poland, on the Slovakia, Slovak border. It was created in 2002 out of five gminas which previously made up ...

Subcarpathian Voivodeship Subcarpathian Voivodeship is a Voivodeships of Poland, voivodeship, or province, in the southeastern corner of Poland. Its administrative capital and largest city is Rzeszów. Along with the Marshal, it is governed by the Subcarpathian Regional As ...

, in south-eastern Poland. It is the former seat of the

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' ) is the basic unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,479 gminy throughout the country, encompassing over 43,000 villages. 940 gminy include cities and tow ...

(administrative district) called

Gmina Solina __NOTOC__ Gmina Solina is a rural gmina (administrative district) in Lesko County, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, in south-eastern Poland. It takes its name from its former seat, the village of Solina, which lies approximately south-east of Lesko a ...

(in 1999

Polańczyk Polańczyk is a village in Lesko County, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, in south-eastern Poland. It lies in, and serves as the seat of, the administrative district of Gmina Solina. Polańczyk lies approximately south-west of Solina, south-east of L ...

became the new seat). It lies approximately south-east of

Lesko Lesko (or ''Lisko'' until 1926; ; , alias ''Olesco Lescovium''; ) is a town in south-eastern Poland with a population of 5,755 (02.06.2009). situated in the Bieszczady mountains. It is located in the heartland of the Doły (Pits), and its averag ...

and south-east of the regional capital

Rzeszów Rzeszów ( , ) is the largest city in southeastern Poland. It is located on both sides of the Wisłok River in the heartland of the Sandomierz Basin. Rzeszów is the capital of the Subcarpathian Voivodeship and the county seat, seat of Rzeszów C ...

. In 2002 the village had a population of 190. It is best known for the tallest water

dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, aqua ...

in Poland, the

Solina Dam The Solina Dam () is a concrete gravity dam in south-eastern Poland. It is the largest dam in the country. It is located in Solina, Poland, Solina of Lesko County in the Bieszczady Mountains area of Poland. With the completion of the dam in 1968, ...

, which creates the biggest artificial lake in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

Lake Solina Lake Solina () is an artificial lake in the Bieszczady Mountains region, in Lesko County of the Subcarpathian Voivodship, Poland. Created in 1968, it is Poland's largest artificial lake as well as a major tourist attraction of the region. The So ...

. There is no industry left after the liquidation of the Hydrobudowa site near the dam. Main employer is PGE, owning the hydroelectric plant in Solina. Local people highly depend on tourist income in the summer by renting rooms, running restaurants and bars and selling souvenirs. On the east side of the dam there are a lot of attractions open during summer, such as water sport equipment rental, a port with tourist ships, amusement park, disco and beach. Clean air and natural scenery are all around, bringing many visitors in the summer. The few hotels of various standards and local B&B's often are fully booked.

History

The name of the village comes from the

Solinka Solinka is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Cisna, within Lesko County, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, in south-eastern Poland, close to the border with Slovakia. It lies approximately south-west of Cisna, south of Lesko, and south ...

river that was meeting the San river in the village before the creation of the lake. The original Solina village was located up the San river but due to the Solina lake creation it lies under water now. Today's Solina was created along with the water dam on the grounds of the small village of Zabrodzie. The original Solina village was one of the oldest villages in the Bieszczady mountains. It was first mentioned in 1436 as a village owned by the family of Kmits from Sobien. At the end of the 15th century it was subject to the Wallachian law again. There were three main ethnic groups living in the village until World War II:

Boyko The Boykos or Boikos (; ; ; ), or simply Highlanders (; ), are an ethnolinguistic group located in the Carpathian Mountains of Ukraine, Slovakia, Hungary, and Poland. Along with the neighbouring Lemkos and Hutsuls, the Boykos are a regional subg ...

(Ukrainians),

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

and

Poles Pole or poles may refer to: People *Poles (people), another term for Polish people, from the country of Poland * Pole (surname), including a list of people with the name * Pole (musician) (Stefan Betke, born 1967), German electronic music artist ...

. During the

Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

most Jews were taken away to concentration camps by

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

Germans occupying Poland. Another ethnic group of Boyko were forced by the communist government to move to the Soviet Union or west of Poland during the

Operation Vistula Operation Vistula (; ) was the codename for the 1947 forced resettlement of close to 150,000 Ukrainians in Poland, Ukrainians (including Rusyns, Boykos, and Lemkos) from the southeastern provinces of People's Republic of Poland, postwar Poland to ...

. The Polish people that were left were moved in 1960 to the village of Berezka because of the

creation.

References

Villages in Lesko County Spa towns in Poland Holocaust locations in Poland {{Lesko-geo-stub