The area of Greater Poland where the Polish nation had originated became the

Province of Posen, an acquired Prussian province, after the Partitions of Poland.

Poles in this Polish-majority province (62 percent Polish, 38 percent German)
resisted German rule.
[Prussia later regained dominance over said province, as well as areas with a
German majority in the Province of West Prussia, as a result of the Treaty of
Versailles in 1919].
In 1226, Prussia was invaded by the Teutonic Knights. The Teutonic Knights were
invited to help in the fight against the Old Prussians, who had been carrying out
raids into Christian territories. With papal support, the Teutonic Order launched a
series of campaigns against the Old Prussians. The crusade was characterized by
brutal battles and forced conversions, with the order establishing a monastic state
in the conquered territories. The Old Prussian culture and religion were
systematically suppressed, and the local population was either converted to
Christianity or replaced by Christian settlers.
[The Teutonic Order is a Catholic religious institution founded in 1189–90 to aid
Christians on their pilgrimages to the Holy Land and nurse the sick in Palestine
during the Third Crusade; it was later militarized in 1198 and given land in
Jerusalem and Germany].
[The Third Crusade (1189–1192) was an attempt led by three European monarchs
of Western Christianity (Philip II of France, Richard I of England and Frederick I,
Holy Roman Emperor) to reconquer the Holy Land following the capture of
Jerusalem by the Ayyubid sultan Saladin in 1187. For this reason, the Third
Crusade is also known as the Kings' Crusade].
The Knights were subordinate only to the pope and the emperor. Their initially
close relationship with the Polish Crown deteriorated completely after they
conquered Polish-claimed regions which were mainly populated by German
settlers. The Knights were eventually defeated in the Battle of Grunwald in 1410
by Poland and Lithuania, allied through the Union of Krewo.
The Thirteen Years' War (1454-1466) began when the Prussian Confederation, a
coalition of Hanseatic cities of western Prussia, rebelled against the Order and
requested help from the Polish king. The Teutonic Knights were forced to
acknowledge the sovereignty of the Polish king in the Peace of Thorn, losing
western Prussia (Royal Prussia) to Poland in the process.
[The Hanseatic League was an alliance of trading guilds that established and
maintained a trade monopoly along the coast of Northern Europe, from the Baltic
to the North Sea, during the Late Middle Ages and Early modern period (13 th C. –
17th C.)].
Upon the death of Albert Frederick in 1618, who died without male heirs, John
Sigismund was granted the right of succession to the Duchy of Prussia, which was
still a Polish fief (‫)إقطاعية‬. From this time the Duchy of Prussia was in personal
union with the Margraviate of Brandenburg. The resulting state, known as
Brandenburg-Prussia, consisted of geographically disconnected territories in
Prussia, Brandenburg among other regions.
[Margraviate: the province or territory of a margrave. Margrave was originally the
medieval title for the military commander assigned to maintain the defence of
one of the border provinces of the Holy Roman Empire or a kingdom.]
During the Thirty Years' War, Frederick William (Sigismund’s successor) managed
to obtain a discharge from his obligations as a vassal (a holder of land by feudal
tenure on conditions of homage and allegiance) to the Polish king by taking
advantage of his friendly relations with Russia during a series of Russo-Polish
wars. He was finally given full sovereignty over Prussia in 1657.
[The Thirty Years War (1618-1648) began as a religious war, fought between
Roman Catholics and Protestants in Germany. It developed into a political struggle
between the Catholic Habsburgs of the Holy Roman Empire (Austria, most of the
German princes, Portugal and Spain). They were opposed by Denmark, Sweden,
England, Catholic France and the Protestant princes of Germany. The war ended
with Catholic victory].
In 1701, Frederick William's son, Elector Frederick III, upgraded Prussia from a
duchy to a kingdom, and crowned himself King Frederick I. He was succeeded by
his son, Frederick William I (1713-1740). In 1740, Frederick William was
succeeded by his son, Frederick II, later nicknamed "Frederick the Great,"( king in
Prussia: 1740-1772 / king of Prussia: 1772-1786) who got into several wars with
the Austrians; from these wars onwards the German dualism dominated German
politics until 1866. He also built up Prussia's military power and participated in the
First Partition of Poland with Austria and Russia (1772)
[German Dualism primarily denotes the rivalry between the Habsburgs and
Hohenzollerns (or simply Austria and Prussia)].
{The Silesian Wars began more than a century of rivalry and conflict between
Prussia and Austria as the two most powerful states operating within the Holy
Roman Empire (although, ironically, both had extensive territory outside the
empire)}.
In April 1849, the Frankfurt Parliament offered the title of Emperor to King
Frederick William IV. Fearing the opposition of the other German princes and the
military intervention of Austria and Russia, the king renounced this popular
mandate, citing his concerns over the legitimacy of the parliament to offer him
the crown without the consent of the various German rulers. Thus, the Frankfurt
Parliament ended in failure for the German liberals.