Mazurek Dąbrowskiego , also known by its incipit, Poland Is Not Yet Lost, is the national anthem of Poland.The lyrics were written by Józef Wybicki in Reggio Emilia, Cisalpine Republic in Northern Italy, between 16 and 19 of July 1797, two years after the Third Partition of Poland erased the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from the map. It was originally meant to boost the morale of Polish soldiers serving under General Jan Henryk Dąbrowski's Polish Legions that served with Napoleon's French Revolutionary Army in the Italian campaigns of the French Revolutionary Wars. Dabrowski's Mazurka, expressing the idea that the nation of Poland, despite lacking an independent state of their own, had not disappeared as long as the Polish people were still alive and fighting in its name, soon became one of the most popular patriotic songs in Poland.The music is an unattributed mazurka and considered a folk tune that Polish composer Edward Pałłasz categorizes as functional art which was fashionable among the gentry and rich bourgeoisie. Pałłasz wrote, Wybicki probably made use of melodic motifs he had heard and combined them in one formal structure to suit the text.It is one of the most important songs of the Slavic nations. The text of the hymn was modified to suit new occasions and socio-political contexts throughout the song's history. When Poland re-emerged as an independent state in 1918, Dabrowski's Mazurka became its de facto national anthem. It was officially adopted as the national anthem of the Republic of Poland in 1926. It also inspired similar songs by other peoples struggling for independence during the 19th century, such as the Ukrainian national anthem The Glory and The Freedom of Ukraine Has Not Yet Perished and the Pan-Slavic song Hey, Slavs which was used as the national anthem of Yugoslavia during that state's existence.
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