Note on Spelling, Translation, and Language

In this book I use the Polish spelling for the names of cities and villages in Poland except in the case of Warsaw; here I use the Anglicized form. I use Danzig instead of Gdańsk only when quoting from a source that uses Danzig. I also retain Polish spelling for the Polish currency: złoty. I provide the original Polish titles in parentheses after English translations of Polish institutions that are not well known but are important to the story that I am telling. I provide the Polish original in parentheses after the English translation in a few other cases, too, if I think that the precise Polish wording might be useful to researchers. All translations from Polish are my own, unless otherwise noted.

It is important to remember that humans are animals too, but I use the term “nonhuman animals” only occasionally. For the most part I use “animals” to refer not to humans but to the cattle and horses that are the main species featured in this book. I refer to animals as “she” or “he” rather than “it.”