Page 167 - Ciancia, On Civilization's Edge

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a particular industry, such as forestry or distilling. Even a basic question about the typical shape of a
Volhynian village did not yield a single answer, but instead necessitated an exposition of the variety

of physical arrangements that had developed here over time. Some, like the colonies set up by

civilian settlers from areas beyond Volhynia were long and narrow, stretching out along the banks of

a river or the side of a road and known in Polish as ulicówki (from ulica, the Polish word for street).

Others featured houses that were clustered together, with agricultural fields dispersed throughout the

surrounding areas; others still were made up of far-flung farmsteads and lacked a coherent village

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center at all (Figure 5.1). The shape of the Volhynian village, itself a subject of academic study

during the interwar years, also depended on its geographical location. In the sparsely populated

northern areas, which were included in geographical Polesie, one was more likely to come across an

ulicówka; further south, as the population density increased and the landscape became hillier, more

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compact configurations became the norm.

[INSERT FIGURE 5.1]

Figure 5.1a and b: Different shapes of the Volhynian village. The village on the left represents a
typical ulicówka. Source: Excerpts from Mapa Taktyczna Polski 1:100 000 (Wojskowy Instytut
Geograficzny, 1927). Accessed at: mapywig.org (from the collections at the Jagiellonian University
Digital Library).

There were, however, several characteristics that united rural areas in the eyes of Polish state

officials. As was the case with their urban counterparts, rural spaces were defined by a combination

of their national and religious compositions, economic systems, and physical geography. While those

areas that state officials categorized as urban were home to predominantly Jewish populations

7 Skorowidz miejscowości Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej. Tom IX: Województwo wołyńskie (Warsaw, 1923), vi.
8 On the shape of civilian settlements, see Franciszek Moczulski, “Osadnictwo cywilne i wojskowe od chwili
odzyskania niepodległości w gm. Powursk pow. Kowelskiego” (praca dyplomowa), 32. BUW Manuscript
Collection, Rękopis 1774, Akta 676.
9 Bogdan Zahorski, “Typy wsi wschodniego Polesia,” Ziemia (July 1925): 131-2. See also Jerzy Niebrzycki,
Polesie: opis wojskowo-geograficzny i studjum terenu (Warsaw, 1930), 348.

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