East Prussia

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East Prussia (German: Ostpreußen [ˈɔstˌpʁɔɪ̯sn̩] ) was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1772 to 1829 and again from 1878, with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 1871; following World War I, it formed part of the Weimar Republic's Free State of Prussia until 1945. Its capital city was Königsberg (present-day Kaliningrad, Russia). East Prussia was the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast. During the 13th century, the native Prussians were conquered in the Northern Crusades by the Teutonic Knights and then gradually converted to Christianity. In the medieval Ostsiedlung, Germans became the dominant ethnic group, while Poles and Lithuanians formed sizeable minorities. From the 13th century, the region of Prussia was part of the monastic state of the Teutonic Knights. In 1525, the territory became the Duchy of Prussia, a vassal of Poland. It gained full sovereignty in 1657 when Poland renounced its feudal rights. After the annexation...

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