Carolus I said:
Who were the Poles in Eastern Galicia? Were they the offspring of Polish settlers or were they Polonized Ukrainians/Ruthenians? Or was it a mix of both effects?
It was a mix of both effects, but it seems that to a large extent they were the offspring of Polish settlers. Eastern Galicia was earlier known as Red Ruthenia. That name applied to area of around 97,000 square km which was conquered by Poland in the 14th century, during the reign of King Casimir the Great. Soon after the conquest - at the beginning of the 15th century - the area was inhabited by almost 450,000 people, according to a new book by Leszek Podhorodecki's "Dzieje Ukrainy" ("History of Ukraine"), Warsaw 2014. According to Podhorodecki, in a document from 1353 King Casimir wrote - "I have captured Ruthenia with my people and the gates to this land must stand open for all of my people and merchants." Polish immigration to that region started in the 14th century, soon after the conquest.
Thanks to surviving documents from the 16th century, ethnic structure of 381 villages located in royal lands of Red Ruthenia could be established. In year 1565 ethnic Poles lived in 190 of those villages, and were majority of inhabitants in 21. The total population of those 381 villages were 11000 peasant families, of which about 10% were ethnic Polish families. Among inhabitants of towns and cities as well as among the nobility Poles were more numerous. As Squonk wrote, the nobility were to a large extent Polonised locals, but immigrant nobles - who were granted landed estates in these territories, usually by kings - were also among them.
According to Podhorodecki among immigrants were not only Poles but also Vlachs, Armenians, Germans and Jews. Among those immigrants were also many knights from Upper Silesia, who came when Duke
Władysław II of Opole was the governor of Red Ruthenia (in period 1372 - 1378). But as Squonk mentioned in his post above, in that region Non-Polish ethnic groups were Polonizing themselves quickly - except for those which had different religion than Poles.
In the neighbouring (east of Red Ruthenia) province of Podolia Polish peasants were in year 1565 around 4% of all peasants (between 2% and 15% depending on region), while among inhabitants of towns and cities of Podolia, ethnic Poles were around 10% at that time (so 2,5 times larger percent than among peasants). If we apply the same proportion to Red Ruthenia, then it would mean that Poles were already 25% of inhabitants of towns and cities in 1565.
The scale of Polish colonization can be illustrated by the number (315) of Roman Catholic parishes established in Eastern Galicia between the 14th and the 18th centuries:
Compare the location of historical regions of Red Ruthenia and Podolia:
One century later, in year 1662, in the main city of Podolia - Kamyanets Podilsky - the ethnic structure among burghers taxpayers was as follows: 1072 (44%) burghers taxpayers were Poles, 696 (28,5%) were Armenians, 409 (16,8%) were local Rusyns (Ukrainians) and 261 (10,7%) were Jews. The main city of Red Ruthenia - Lviv - in year 1785 had the following religious structure: 51,2% Roman Catholics, 32,4% Jews, 13,5% Eastern Catholics, 0,7% Armenian Christians and 2,2% other religions. By that time (1785), the percent of Jews among the inhabitants of Lviv had already greatly increased - by comparison in year 1500 Jews were 6,6% of inhabitants, in 1580 they were 11,1% and in 1676 they were up to 30%. Other sources say that in the 16th century Jews were between 3% and 5% of inhabitants of Lviv.
Here is historical data for the city of Lviv (early numbers for Jews are more detailed because there was a special kind of tax collected only from Jews):
And here is the data for languages spoken by inhabitants of the city of Lviv:
Austrian censuses (before WW1) - every-day language:
Year 1880 - 91,870 Polish-speakers / 6,277 Ruthenian-speakers / 460 other Slavic / 9,587 other languages
Year 1890 - 103,999 Polish-speakers / 9,067 Ruthenian-speakers / 424 other Slavic / 12,621 other languages
Year 1900 - 120,634 Polish-speakers / 15,159 Ruthenian-speakers / 711 other Slavic / 21,168 other languages
Year 1910 - 172,560 Polish-speakers / 21,780 Ruthenian-speakers / 800 other Slavic / 6,825 other languages
Polish censuses (after WW1) - mother tongue / first language:
Year 1921 - 136,519 Polish / 19,866 Ukrainian & Rusyn / ??? other Slavic / 63,003 other (incl. 60,431 Hebrew and Yiddish)
Year 1931 - 198,212 Polish / 35,137 Ukrainian & Rusyn / 707 other Slavic / 78,175 other (incl. 7,796 Hebrew & 67,520 Yiddish)
Austrian 19th century censuses counted the following category:
Sprachenstruktur nach dem Kriterium "Umgangssprache" (conversational language / common speech / every-day language).
While Polish censuses after WW1 counted the following thing:
Mother tongue / first language (język ojczysty / la langue maternelle).
The largest percent of Poles (and Polonized locals) was perhaps among the nobility. The nobility was also the most likely group to become Polonized early on. Eastern (Greek) Catholic nobility also acquired Polish identity. Orthodox and Eastern (Greek) Catholic peasants, on the other hand, were not Polonizing themselves that easily. In the 19th century, during Austrian rules in Galicia, there took place even Ruthenization (Ukrainization) of large part of ethnically Polish peasants, especially those which lived in areas with Ruthenian majority, and those which converted to Eastern Catholicism (often that was the only choice when for example the number of Roman Catholics was so small that no Roman Catholic churches existed in a given neighbourhood). Austrian administration supported Ukrainian identity because their goal was to play Poles and Ukrainians against each other and to antagonize them.
On the other hand, the speed of Polonization accelerated among Galician Jews in that period (the 19th century). Especially Jews living in larger cities, including Lviv. By the time of World War 1, Jews of Galicia were more Polonized than Jews in any other region of former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Many declared Polish as their mother tongue.
All in all, the number of people declaring Polish as their mother tongue in Eastern Galicia before WW1 was higher than the number of Roman Catholics. Proportions of Roman Catholics to Greek Catholics and of Polish-speakers to Ruthenian-speakers in the census of 1910 were as follows:
Roman Catholics - 1,763,328
Greek Catholics - 3,284,433
Polish-speakers - 2,575,206
Ruthenian-speakers - 3,207,804
Some of those Ruthenian-speakers - mostly the Ruthenian-speaking nobility - identified as Poles (or with Poland), rather than as Ukrainians.
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