Is it possible to move to Germany via Polish descent?

[raw valve]

Not sure how to word this, but to describe further;

I want to move to Germany one day. Recently I found out that, from my mom’s side, there’s a huge mix of European heritage— Primarily Polish. By the way my mom described how her grandparents migrated to America, it doesn’t completely sound like they forfeit their EU citizenship…? The chances of me being eligible for one is pretty high (though the details are blurry)

Because of the free movement between EU Union countries, would I be able to move to Germany if I claimed citizenship by descent, even though my heritage is not German but rather some other EU country? If I’m misunderstanding anything please let me know, I didn’t know this was a thing until a week ago

[round coral]

@raw valve hi! you are indeed right, if you get the Polish citizenship, as long as Poland is in the EU, you have the right to live and work in the EU

however, to prove that you're of Polish decent, you need to: (results of quick google search)

[raw valve]

Thank you very much, this helps a lot!! I’d have to ask my mom but I’m fairly sure they left after 1920. I wasn’t sure if I was restricted given I’d be coming from outside of the EU, so this is very reassuring

[round coral]

I'm not a lawyer but I've seen it work out this way for many people with European descent

[sharp barn]

Do you know from which part of Poland they might have originated? Because a lot of now Polish territories were part of the German Empire, mainly the north and the west (the other parts belonged to the Russian empire and the Austro-Hungarian empire). I'm not 100% how heritage claiming works, but it might be possible for you to claim German citizenship from that?

[raw valve]

I don’t have a lot of information now, I’m asking around cautiously (given my mom’s side has a few bad eggs that I don’t want to run into for my mom’s sake). But that’s extremely interesting to know, I’m not too knowledgeable of German and Polish history unfortunately

[sharp barn]

An (extremely) short overview of Polish history before WWII: Poland was a medieval kingdom that for a long time controlled large parts of eastern Europe. Internal instability due to an easy-to-exploit political system led to a loss of power, and the three powers I mentioned (Prussia/Germany, Austria/Austria-Hungary and Russia) divided the Polish territories up among themselves in the late 18th century, thus leading to a sizable Polish minority in all three Empires. After the first world war, all three Empires partly or completely dissolved and a new Polish state was created.

[round coral]

As the screenshot I sent shows, their ancestors must've left Poland after 1920 (to qualify for the citizenship) so after the current border has been established ^^

[sharp barn]

Yes, but those are the rules established by Poland. I thought that maybe Germany having different rules might also enable you to apply for the German citizenship - thus you would have been able to choose - but on further (light) reading on the topic I don't think this would apply here.
And by the way, the Polish borders have moved after the 1920s - during and after WWII the borders were redrawn, so some parts of now Poland were part of the German Empire until 1945, while other parts of 1920s Poland are now part of Belarus and the Ukraine.

[round coral]

Oh, I see what you mean now.
I am not familir with German citizenship rules, I'm only talking from experience of a few of my acquintances who have tried/are trying to become a Polish citizenship.

I also just checked the border history and you're right, I must have misremembered them