This article's lead sectionmay be too short to adequately summarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article.(December 2015)
He was the first Polish representative at the League of Nations. His work as a historian was influential in defining the creation and history of the Polish nation.
Biography
Persuaded by his father, Askenazy studied law at the Imperial University of Warsaw in the 1880s. After graduation, he worked as a lawyer; however, all the spare time he devoted to reading books in various languages. In April 1893, he went to Göttingen to study history. He was influenced by the professor of medieval and modern history Max Lehmann under whose supervision he wrote doctoral dissertation Die letzte Polnische Koenigswahl (1894).
After Poland regained independence, Askenazy was chosen to be the first Polish representative at the League of Nations (1920–23). His candidacy for this post was supported by Józef Piłsudski and nomination was signed by the Foreign Minister of Poland, Eustachy Sapieha in May 1920. He cooperated later with other Polish Foreign Ministers: Konstanty Skirmunt, Gabriel Narutowicz and Aleksander Skrzyński. In May 1923, Marian Seyda from, the Popular National Union (a Polish political party of the National Democracy political camp) became the Foreign Minister of Poland after Lanckorona Pact agreement was introduced. Askenazy saw this as a sign to step down.[1] He resigned from the post and in July 1923 came back to Poland. Askenazy never joined any political party.
In his studies, he focused chiefly on Poland's political and economic history in the 18th and 19th centuries. He thus laid the foundations for the Lwów-Warsaw School of History (also known as the "Askenazy school"). He was the first historian to emphasize the Partitions period as crucially important to the creation of the modern Polish nation. [citation needed]
Askenazy's idea of describing a nation's history through its social and economic development, as well as its international and diplomatic backdrop, remains influential in modern Polish historical studies. [citation needed]
William J. Rose, an English translator of Askenazy's book "Danzig & Poland", wrote in the obituary published in The Slavonic and East European Review that with the death of Professor Askenazy "Polish learning lost one of its most distinguished ornaments".[2]
