Timeline of the Rakow Community (Minor Reformed Church, or Polish Brethren, or Socinians)

1539   At the age of 80, Catherine, wife of Melchior Vogel or Weygel, was burned at the stake for apostasy. This is the earliest case of persecution of an anti-trinitarian in Poland.
1555   First Synod of the Reformed Church in Krakow.
1556   Second Synod of the Reformed Church in Krakow. Theological challenges made by Peter Gonesius and Gregory Pauli. (Gonesius went on to found antitrinitarian churches in Lithuania that would become associated with the Minor Reformed Church.)
1558   Georgio Biandrata arrives in Krakow, becomes leader of the Reformed Church's critics.
1563   Biandrata removes to Transylvania to serve as court physician there.
1565   Diet of Piotrkow excluded anti-Trinitarians from the synod; they withdraw and form the Minor Reformed Church (AKA Polish Brethren). The old synod becomes known as the Major Reformed Church.
1569   Jan Sieninski establishes the town of Rakow as a refuge for the Minor Reformed Church.
1573   Faustus Socinus visits Krakow. Because of his views, he is not accepted as a full member of the Minor Reformed Church; but he is accepted as part of the Rakow community. (He settles in Basel, Switzerland from 1574-1578.)
1600   In Transylvania, the Unitarian name was first used at the Diet of Lécfalva (October 25 - November 4, 1600).
1602   Jan Sieninski establishes a college and printing press in Rakow.
1604   Faustus Socinus dies.
1605   Racovian Catechism published.
1610   Jesuits lead Catholic reaction to Rakow community.
1638   Two boys damage a crucifix outside Rakow; this is the excuse for Jesuit attacks and suppression of the community.
1648   Cossack Wars destroy Socinian centers in Poland; half of Minor Reformed congregations are lost.
1654   War between Lithuania and Russia destroyed Socinian congregations in Lithuania.
1660   Polish Diet issues decree giving the Minor Reformed Church the choice of conversion to Catholicism or exile. Most convert; refugees go to Holland and join the Remonstrants (who accepted them on the basis of the Apostles' Creed), or to England, or to Prussia, or to Kolozsvar (where a Polish Unitarian church existed until 1793).
1665-1669   Bibliotheca fratrum polonorum (the collected publications of Rakow press) published in Amsterdam; it includes work by Hans Krell, Jonas Schlichting (Szlichtyng), Faustus Socinus and Johann Ludwig Wolzogen. The title page of this collection, bearing the words quos Unitarios vocant, introduced this term to Western Europe.