https://slavica.indiana.edu/system/tdf/bookContent_pdf/08_SLAVICA%20REISSUE_Gods%20of%20the%20Ancient%20Slavs.pdf?file=1&type=node&id=634&force=
06 October 2017
The Gods of the Ancient Slavs by Myroslava T. Znayenko
https://slavica.indiana.edu/system/tdf/bookContent_pdf/08_SLAVICA%20REISSUE_Gods%20of%20the%20Ancient%20Slavs.pdf?file=1&type=node&id=634&force=
17 September 2017
Perun | Slavic God of Thunder
The lightning god and his cult among the Slavs is attested by the Byzantine historian Procopius in the 6th century. In The Russian Primary Chronicle, compiled c. 1113, Perun is mentioned as having been invoked in the treaties of 945 and 971, and his name is the first in the list of gods of St. Vladimir’s pantheon of 980. He was worshiped in oak groves by western Slavs, who called him Prone, which name appears in Helmold’s Chronica Slavorum (c. 1172). Porenut, Perun’s son, is mentioned by the Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus in the early 13th century.
In the Christian period the worship of Perun was gradually transferred to St. Elijah (Russian Iliya), but in folk beliefs, his fructifying, life-stimulating, and purifying functions are still performed by his vehicles: the ax, the bull, the he-goat, the dove, and the cuckoo. Sacrifices and communal feasts on July 20 in honour of Perun or Iliya continued in Russia until modern times.
©2017 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
16 September 2017
Michał Piotr Boym
Michał Piotr Boym (Chinese: 卜彌格; pinyin: Bǔ Mígé; c. 1612–1659) was a Polish Jesuit missionary to China, scientist and explorer.
He is notable as one of the first westerners to travel within the Chinese mainland, and the author of numerous works on Asian fauna, flora and geography.
Boym authored the first published Chinese dictionaries for European languages, both of which were published posthumously: the first, a Chinese–Latin dictionary, was published in 1667, and the second, a Chinese–French dictionary, was published in 1670.
Michał Boym was born in Lwów, Poland (now Lviv, Ukraine), around 1614, to a well-off family of Hungarian ancestry. His grandfather Jerzy Boim came to Poland from Hungary with the king Stefan Batory, and married Jadwiga Niżniowska.M father, Paweł Jerzy Boim (1581–1641), was a physician to King Sigismund III of Poland. Out of Pawel Jerzy's six sons, the eldest, the ne'er-do-well Jerzy was disinherited; Mikołaj and Jan became merchants; Paweł, a doctor; while Michał and Benedykt Paweł joined the Society of Jesus. The family had their own family chapel in Lviv's central square, which was constructed around the time of Michał's birth.
In 1631, Boym joined the Jesuits in Kraków, and was ordained a priest. In 1643, after almost a decade of intensive studies in the monasteries of Kraków, Kalisz, Jarosław and Sandomierz, Boym embarked on a voyage to Eastern Asia. He first traveled to Rome, where he obtained a blessing for his mission from Pope Urban VIII, and then proceeded to Lisbon. Later that year he embarked with a group of nine other priests and clerics on a voyage to Portuguese Goa, and then Macau. Initially he taught at St. Paul Jesuit College (Macau). He then moved to the island of Hainan, where he opened a small Catholic mission. After the island had been conquered by the Manchus, Boym had to flee to Tonkinin 1647.
Even as Jesuits in northern and central China were successfully switching their loyalties from the fallen Ming Dynasty to the newly established Qing, the Jesuits in the south of the country continued to work with the Ming loyalist regimes still controlling some of the region. Accordingly, in 1649 Boym was sent by the Canton-based Vice-Provincial of the China Mission Alvaro Semedo with a diplomatic mission to the court of the Yongli Emperor, the last Chinese ruler of the Ming Dynasty, still controlling parts of the Southwestern China.
As the Yongli regime was endangered by the encroaching Manchus, the Jesuit Andreas Wolfgang Koffler, who had been at the Yongli court since 1645, had succeeded in converting many of the members of the imperial family to Christianity believing this would attract help from Western monarchs for the Southern Ming's struggle to continue to rule China. Among the Christians at the Yongli's court were Empress dowager Helena Wang (Wang Liena), the wife of the emperor's father; Empress dowager Maria Ma (Ma Maliya), the mother of the emperor; and the heir to the throne, prince Constantine (Dangding), Zhu Cuxuan.[3] The Emperor's eunuch secretary Pang Tianshou (龐天壽), known by his Christian name Achilles, had become a Christian as well, years earlier.
Boym was chosen to present the situation of the Chinese Emperor to the Pope. He received letters from Empress dowager Helena and from Pang Achilles, to give to Pope Innocent X, the General of the Jesuit Order, and Cardinal John de Lugo. Additional letters were dispatched to the Doge of Venice and to the King of Portugal. Together with a young court official named Andrew Zheng (Chinese: 鄭安德勒; pinyin: Zhèng Āndélè),[1 Boym embarked on his return voyage to Europe. They arrived at Goa in May 1651, where they learned that the King of Portugal had already abandoned the cause of the Chinese (Southern Ming) Emperor, and that Boym's mission was seen as a possible threat to future relations with the victorious Manchu. This view was also supported by the new local superior of the Jesuits, who believed the Jesuit Order should not interfere in the internal power struggles of China.
Boym was placed under house arrest. However, he managed to escape and continue his voyage on foot. By way of Hyderabad, Surat, Bander Abbas and Shiraz, he arrived at Isfahan, in Persia. From there he continued his journey to Erzerum, Trabzon and İzmir, where he arrived near the end of August 1652. As the Venetian court was having conflicts with the Jesuits, Boym discarded his habit and dressed up as a Chinese Mandarin, before he arrived in Venice in December of that year. Although he had managed to cross uncharted waters and unknown lands, his mission there would not be easy, as the political intrigues at the European courts proved to be extremely complicated.
Initially the Doge of Venice refused to grant Boym an audience, as Venice wanted to maintain a neutral stance in regards to China. Boym managed to convince the French ambassador to support his cause, and the Doge finally saw Boym and accepted the letter. However, the French involvement caused a negative reaction from the Pope, as Innocent X was actively opposed to France and its ambitions. Also the newly elected General of the Jesuits, Gosvinus Nickel, believed Boym's mission might endanger other Jesuit missions in China and other parts of the world. A new Pope was elected in 1655, and after three years, Alexander VII finally saw Boym on December 18, 1655. However, although Alexander was sympathetic to the Ming dynasty and its dilemma, he could not offer any practical help and his letter to the Chinese emperor contained little but words of empathy and offers of prayers. However, the letter from the new Pope opened many doors for Boym and his mission. In Lisbon, he was granted an audience by King John IV, who promised to help the Chinese struggle with military force.
In March 1656, Boym started his return trip to China. Out of eight priests accompanying him, only four survived the journey. Upon reaching Goa it turned out that Yongli's situation was dire and that the local Portuguese administration, despite direct orders from the monarch, did not want to let Boym travel to Macau. This was in order not to compromise their commercial enterprises with the victorious Manchu. Boym again ignored the Portuguese monopoly by travelling on foot, this time by an uncharted route to Ayutthaya, the capital of Siam. He arrived there in early 1658, and hired a ship from pirates, with which he sailed to what is now northern Vietnam. In Hanoi, Boym tried to procure a guide to lead him and the priests travelling with him to Yunnan. However, he was unsuccessful and he had to continue the journey alone, with the assistance only of Chang, who had travelled with him all the way to Europe and back. They reached the Chinese province of Guangxi, but on June 22, 1659 Boym died, before reaching the emperor's court. The location of where he was buried is not known today.
Before Marco Polo | Benedykt Polak
He accompanied Giovanni da Pian del Carpine in his journey as delegate of Pope Innocent IV to the Great Khan Güyük of the Mongol Empire in 1245-1247. He was the author of the brief chronicle De Itinere Fratrum Minorum ad Tartaros (On the travel of Franciscan friars to the Tatars), published only in the 1839 in France (and a year later in Poland) and a longer work Historia Tartarorum (The history of the Tatars), discovered and published only in 1965 by the academics of Yale University. This journey preceded that of Marco Polo.
The report of Benedict is important because it includes a copy of the letter of the Great Khan to the Pope.
Little is known about the life of Friar Benedykt beyond the story of the journey. He was educated and fluent in Latin. He had become a monk in the Franciscan monastery in Wroclaw about 1236. This was the first major stop of Friar Giovanni after leaving on the mission from Lyon in April 1245. Benedict was chosen to accompany him as an interpreter because he had also acquired a knowledge of the Old East Slavic language and the first part of their journey was to Kiev. Benedict made his accounts of the journey during and after their return in 1247. After returning from the voyage he settled in the Franciscan monastery in Kraków where he spent the rest of his life. Later he was also a witness at the canonization of Saint Stanislaus of Szczepanów in 1252.
15 September 2017
The Russian and the Polish Soul | by N.A. Berdyaev
The old quarrel within the Slavic family, the quarrel of the Russians with the Polish, cannot be explained merely by the external forces of history and the external political reasons. The sources of the age-old historical dispute of Russia and Poland lie deeper. And at present it is especially important for us to be aware of the spiritual causes of this hostility and antagonism, which divides the Slavic world. This is a dispute first of all between two Slavic souls, kindred by blood and by language, with traits of ethnos common to all the Slavs yet so very different, almost opposites, compatible but with difficulty, incapable of understanding each the other. Peoples that are kindred and close tend less so to be capable of understanding each other and are moreso antagonistic towards each other, than those remote and foreign. The kindred tongue sounds odd and seems a corruption of one's own language. In family life also it is possible to observe this antagonism between the close and the impossibility of understanding one another. For outsiders, much is forgiven, but for one's own there is no desire to forgive anything... And no one seems so foreign and unpleasant, as one's own and near.
The Russians and the Polish have fought not only over territory and their different feel towards life. Outwardly -- the Russians historically have come out on top in this age old struggle, they not only warded off the danger of the polonisation of the Russian people, but they also aggressively set upon the Polish people and made attempts at its russification. The polish state was broken apart and divided, but the Polish soul was preserved, and with a still greater intensity the Polish national visage was expressed. The great spiritual upsurge, voiced in Polish messianism, came about already after the destruction of the Polish state. The Polish people, so little capable at building a state, was endowed though with features individualistic and anarchistic, and proved spiritually strong and indestructible. And there is no other people in the world, endowed with so intense a national feeling. The Polish are completely not given to assimilation. And it is with the Polish namely that the idea of a nationalism messianism has reached its highest upsurge and intensity. The Polish have conveyed into the world the idea of a sacrificial messianism. And the Russian messianism always has to seem to the Polish as something non-sacrificial, greedy, with pretensions to seizing territory. After the war, much has to change in the external, the state fortunes of Poland, and it is already impossible to return to the old repression of it. The outward relationships of Russia and Poland will tend to fundamentally change. Russia is aware, that it has to redeem its historical guilt regarding Poland. But the Russian and the Polish souls all still remain the opposite of each other, as terribly foreign, infinitely different, incomprehensible each for the other. The Polish-Russian question is posited by both the Polish and the Russians too externally, on the political plane, and its resolution vacillates depending upon the fluctuations of political intents and military successes. The liberation of Poland would make possible a genuine communion between Poland and Russia, a genuine rapport between the Polish and the Russians, which up til now the repression of Poland has impeded. But what inwardly has to be done for such a communion and rapport? To outward promises the Polish relate suspiciously. At present these historical suspicions are baseless, but psychologically the Polish have quite much basis for them. Spiritually however very little is done for any rapport with the Polish. But I should want to draw special attention to this, that in Polish-Russian relations there is a deeper, a spiritual side. Only a genuine understanding can be liberating, it frees one from any initial negative feelings, and tends to familiarise both us, as Russians, and the Polish, as to why it is always so difficult for the Russian soul to be fond of the Polish soul, and why the Polish soul relates with such suspiciousness towards the Russian soul? Why so foreign and so incomprehensible to each other are these two Slavic souls? Inside the Slavic world has occurred the clash of East and West. The Slavic West has felt itself more civilised, a bearer of unified European culture. And the Slavic East has opposed to the West its own particular spiritual type of culture and life.
I have always thought, that the dispute of Russia and Poland is, first of all, a dispute of the Orthodox soul and the Catholic soul. And within the Slavic world this clash between the Orthodox and Catholic souls has assumed an especial acuteness. Russia historically has been wont to preserve its Orthodox soul and its unique spiritual inheritance against the Western side. In the past, polonisation and latinisation of the Russian people would have been to the ruin of its spiritual self-existence, its national visage. Poland descended upon the Russian East with a sense of its own cultural superiourity. The Russian spiritual type seemed to the Polish not some other spiritual type, but simply a lower and non-cultural condition. The historical struggle of Russia with Poland had a positive significance, and the spiritual uniqueness of the Russian people was affirmed in it forever. The memory of this struggle has left in the souls of both peoples traces so deep, that at present it is difficult to be free of it. Russia grew into a colossus, both as a state, and likewise spiritually, and long since already the fomenting of passions over the Polish danger, just like the Catholic danger, has become shameful and insulting to the dignity of the Russian people. It ill becomes a strong offender to shout about the danger posed by the weaker, the already crushed. At present Russia has facing it tasks creative, and not of oppressive preservation. Russian politics regarding Poland long since already has become historical a relic, connected with the remote past and presenting no opportunity to create for the future. In this mindless politics the guilty one ought not to be forgiving the one, before whom he is guilty. This is something within the realm of external state politics. In the sphere however of the inwardly spiritual there is still hindrance for the Russian soul in approaching the Polish soul by a feeling of foreignness and hostility, evoked by the Latin Catholic engrafting onto the Slavic soul, constituting the Polish national visage. To the self-absorbed Russian soul, having received its own powerful Orthodox engrafting, much is not only foreign and incomprehensible in the Polish, but disagreeable, repelling and arousing of hostility. And even Russian people having fallen away from Orthodoxy remain Orthodox as regards their spiritual type, and it is all the more difficult for them to understand Catholic culture and the spiritual type, nurtured upon its soil. German Protestantism has been less repellant for Russian man, and this has been a genuine misfortune for the fate of Russia.
In the typical Russian soul there is much simplicity, directness and a lack of cunning, foreign to it is every affectation, every overwrought pathos, every aristocratic ambition, all the gesturing. This soul -- readily falls and sins, yet repenting even to the point of morbidity it remains conscious of its own insignificance before the face of God. Within it there is some sort of an especial, altogether non-Western democratism upon religious grounds, a thirst for the salvation of all the people. Everything remains in the depths for the Russian people, and it is not wont to express itself in a plastically facile manner. In Russian man there is so little a sense of discipline, an orderly soul, a tempering of person, he is not extended out upwards, in the stuff of his soul there is nothing of the Gothic. Russian man expects, that God Himself will set order to his soul and arrange his life. In its utmost manifestations the Russian soul -- is a wanderer, seeking for the City not here present and awaiting its descent from Heaven. The Russian people in its lower aspects is immersed in the chaotic, still pagan earthly element. But at its summits it lives in apocalyptic expectations, it thirsts for the absolute and is not ready to settle for anything relative. Altogether different is the Polish soul. The Polish soul -- is aristocratic and individualistic to the point of morbidity, in it so powerful is not only the sense of honour, connected with the knight-chivalrant culture unknown to Russia, but also an obdurate ambition. This is the most refined and elegant soul within Slavdom, drowning in its own suffering fate. Pathetic to the point of affectation. The mannerisms of the Polish soul always strike Russians as artificially elegant and sweet, lacking in simplicity and directness, and repelling in its sense of superiourity and suspiciousness, of which the Polish are not free. The Polish have always seemed lacking in a sense of the equality of human souls before God, of brotherhood in Christ, as connected with the acknowledging of the infinite value of each human soul. The unique spiritual aspect of the Polish nobility has poisoned Polish life and played a fateful role in its state destiny. Russian man is little capable of such scorn, he does not love to give another man the feeling, that he is lower than him. Russian man is proud in his humility. The Polish soul however draws upward. This -- is the Catholic spiritual type. The Russian soul prostrates itself stretched down before God. This -- is the Orthodox spiritual type. With the Polish there is a love for affectation. With the Russians however there is altogether no affectation. In the Polish soul there is an experiencing of the path of Christ, the sufferings of Christ, and the sacrifice on Golgotha. At the summits of the Polish spiritual life the fate of the Polish people is experienced, as the fate of the Lamb, offered in sacrifice for the sins of the world. Suchlike is Polish messianism, first of all sacrificial, not connected with state power, nor with success and dominance in the world... Hence there is born in the Polish soul the pathos of suffering and sacrifice. Everything is different in the Russian soul. The Russian soul is connected moreso with the intercession of the Mother of God, than with the path of Christ's sufferings, with the experience of the Golgotha sacrifice. In the Russian soul there is a genuine humility, but little of the sacrificial victim. The Russian soul devotes itself to a churchly collectivism, always connected for it with the Russian earth. In the Polish soul there is sensed a cramped oppositeness in the person, a capacity for suffering and an incapacity for humility. In the Polish soul there is always the venom of sufferings. The Dionysianism of the Russian soul is altogether different, not so bloody. In the Polish soul there is a terrible jealousy over women, a jealousy, often assuming repulsive a form, spasmodic and convulsive. This power of women, the slavishness of sex is sensed very powerfully in the contemporary Polish writers, Przybyszewski [Stanislaw Feliks, 1868-1927], Zeromski [alt. Zheromski, Stefan, 1864-1925], et al. In the Russian soul there is no such sort a slavery over women. Love plays less a role in Russian life and Russian literature than with the Polish. And Russian sensuality, with genius expressed by Dostoevsky, is altogether different, than with the Polish. The problem of women for the Polish is posited altogether differently than it is with the French -- this is a problem of suffering, and not of delight.
In the soul of each people there are its strong and its weak sides, its qualities and its insufficiencies. But it is mutually necessary to love the qualities in the souls of the peoples and to forgive the deficiencies. Only then is possible a true interaction. Within the great Slavic world there ought to be both the Russian element and the Polish element. The historical quarrel is outmoded and finished, and there is beginning an era of reconciliation and unity. Many a contrary feature can be pointed out in the soul of the Polish people. But there can also show forth features in common to the Slavs, indicators of belonging to the selfsame ethnos. This common affinity is to be sensed at the summits of the spiritual life of the Russian and the Polish people, in the messianic consciousness. Both the Russian and the Polish messianic consciousness are bound up with Christianity, and alike it is filled with apocalyptic presentiments and expectations. The thirst for the kingdom of Christ upon earth, for the revelation of the Holy Spirit, is a Slavic thirst, a Russian and Polish thirst. Mickiewicz [Adam, 1798-1855] and Dostoevsky, Towianski [Andrzej Tomasz, 1799-1878] and Vl. Solov'ev tend to intersect on this. And justice demands the acknowledging, that Polish messianism is moreso pure and sacrificial, than is Russian messianism. There was many a sin in the old polish nobility, but these sins are redeemed by the sacrificial fate of the Polish people, by the Golgotha experienced by them. Polish messianism -- represents the blossoming of Polish spiritual culture -- it overcomes the Polish deficiencies and defects, it consumes them within the sacrificial fire. The old frivolous Poland with the magnate feasts, with the mazurka and the oppressed common people has found its rebirth in the suffering of Poland. But if the Polish messianic consciousness can be posited as higher than the Russian messianic consciousness, I still believe, that within the Russian people itself there is a more intense and pure thirsting for the truth of Christ and the kingdom of Christ upon earth, than there is in the Polish people. The national feeling has been crippled for us, as Russians, by our inward slavery, and for the Polish -- by their outward slavery. The Russian people ought to atone its guilt afront the polish people, to understand for it the strange of soul Poland and not regard as bad the dissimilar to its own spiritual sort. The polish people however ought to get a sense of and understand the soul of Russia, to free itself of the false and ugly contempt, whereby an other spiritual sort seems lower and uncultured. The Russian soul will remain Orthodox in the fundamentals of its type of soul, just as the Polish soul will remain Catholic. This is deeper and broader than Orthodoxy and Catholicism being mere faith-confessions, this -- is an uniqueness of the sense of life and uniqueness of the stuff of soul. But these differing souls of peoples are capable not only of understanding and loving each other, but can also sense their belonging to the same ethnic soul conceiving of its Slavic mission to the world.
1914
© 2009 by translator Fr. S. Janos
(1914 - 178(15,18) - en)
RUSSKAYA I POL'SKAYA DUSHA. First published in the newspaper "Birzhevye vedomosti", 10 Oct. 1914, No. 14610-14424, under title "Rossiya i Pol'sha" ["Russia and Poland"]. Republished thereafter in the 1918 Berdyaev's anthology text of articles, “Sud’ba Rossii” (“The Fate of Russia”), Sect. III, Ch. 2, (p. 361-366 in my 1997 Moscow Svarog reprint).
07 September 2017
Jan Kochanowski | Polish Renaissance Poet
1530 - 1584
Polish Renaissance poet who established poetic patterns that would become integral to the Polish literary language.
He is commonly regarded as the greatest Polish poet before Adam Mickiewicz, and the greatest Slavic poet prior to the 19th century.
Kochanowski was born at Sycyna, near Radom, Poland. He was the elder brother of Andrzej Kochanowski who would also become a poet and translator. Little is known of his early education. At fourteen, fluent in Latin, he was sent to the Kraków Academy. After graduating in 1547 at age seventeen, he attended the University of Königsberg (Królewiec), in Ducal Prussia, and Padua University in Italy. At Padua, Kochanowski came in contact with the great humanist scholar Francesco Robortello. Kochanowski closed his fifteen-year period of studies and travels with a final visit to France, where he met the poet Pierre Ronsard.
In 1559 Kochanowski returned to Poland for good, where he remained active as a humanist and Renaissance poet. He spent the next fifteen years close to the court of King Sigismund II Augustus, serving for a time as royal secretary. In 1574, following the decampment of Poland's recently elected King Henry of Valois (whose candidacy to the Polish throne Kochanowski had supported), Kochanowski settled on a family estate at Czarnolas ("Blackwood") to lead the life of a country squire. In 1575 he married Dorota Podlodowska, with whom he had seven children.
Kochanowski is sometimes referred to in Polish as "Jan z Czarnolasu" ("John of Blackwood"). It was there that he wrote his most memorable works, including The Dismissal of the Greek Envoys and the Laments.
Kochanowski died, probably of a heart attack, in Lublin on 22 August 1584.
Kochanowski never ceased to write in Latin; however, his main achievement was the creation of Polish-language verse forms that made him a classic for his contemporaries and posterity.
His first major masterpiece was Odprawa posłów greckich (The Dismissal of the Greek Envoys, 1578; recently translated into English by Indiana University's Bill Johnston). This was a blank-verse tragedy that recounted an incident leading up to the Trojan War. It was the first tragedy written in Polish, and its theme of the responsibilities of statesmanship continues to resonate to this day. The play was performed at the wedding of Jan Zamoyski and Krystyna Radziwiłł at Ujazdów Castle in Warsaw on 12 January 1578.[5]
Kochanowski's best-known masterpiece is Treny (Threnodies, 1580). It is a series of nineteen elegies upon the death of his beloved two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Urszula (pet name Urszulka). It has been translated into English (as Laments) in 1920 by Dorothea Prall, and in 1995 by Stanisław Barańczak and Seamus Heaney.
Other well-known poems by Kochanowski are Proporzec albo hołd pruski (The Banner, or the Prussian Homage), the satiric poem Zgoda (Accord) published in 1564, and the merry Fraszki (Epigrams, published 1584), reminiscent of the Decameron. His translation of the Psalms is highly regarded. He also wrote in Latin, examples being Lyricorum libellus (Little Book of Lyrics, 1580), Elegiarum libri quatuor (Four Books of Elegies, 1584), and numerous poems composed for special occasions. He greatly enriched Polish poetry by naturalizing foreign poetic forms, which he knew how to imbue with a national spirit.
His writings were published collectively for the first time at Cracow in 1584–90, but the so-called jubilee publication, which appeared in Warsaw in 1884, is better. Many of his poems were translated into German by H. Nitschmann (1875).
05 September 2017
Battle of Grunwald 1410 | by Jan Długosz
The Grand Master sends the king two swords. Wladyslaw Jagiello gives the signal to battle (1410)
Mikolaj, the deputy chancellor of the Polish Kingdom, having received the royal order, went to the supply columns, and the king intended to put on his helmet and march off to battle. Suddenly, two heralds were announced, led under the protection of Polish knights in order to avoid an act of aggression. One of them, from the Roman king [title of the, had a black eagle on a gold field in his coat of arms, and the other, from the Szczecin duke, had a red griffin on a white field. They came out of the enemy's army carrying unsheathed swords in their hands, demanding to be brought into the king's presence. The Prussian Master Ulryk sent them to King Wladyslaw, adding also an arrogant order to rouse the king to commence the battle without delay and to stand in ranks to fight. The Polish King Wladyslaw, having seen them and being convinced, as it indeed turned out, that they were coming with some new unusual deputation, ordered to call back Mikolaj, the deputy chancellor, and he listened to the deputation of the heralds in his presence and the presence of some lords who were ordered to guard the king's safety, namely: Siemowit, a younger Mazovian duke; his royal nephew, Jan Mezyk of Dabrowa; Czech Solawa, secretary Zbigniew Olesnicki; Dobieslaw Kobyla, Wolczek Rokuta, kitchen master Boguchwal and Zbigniew Czajka from Nowy Dwor, who carried the royal spear; Mikolaj Morawiec, who carried a small pennant; and Danilko from Ruthenia, who held the royal arrows - because Aleksander, the grand duke of Lithuania, could not be called on account of the hasty preparations for battle and the difficult duty of drawing up his ranks. And they, having somehow saluted the king, presented the contents of their deputation in German (Jan Mezyk served as interpreter) in the following words:
“Your Majesty! The Grand Master Ulryk sends you and your brother (omitting the name of Aleksander and the title of duke) through us, the deputies standing here, two swords for help so that you, with him and his army, may delay less and may fight more boldly than you have shown, and also that you will not continue hiding and staying in the forest and groves, and will not postpone the battle. And if you believe that you have too little space to form your ranks, the Prussian Master Ulryk, to entice you to battle, will withdraw from the plain which he took for his army, as far as you want, or you may instead choose any field of battle so that you do not postpone the battle any longer”.
So much from the heralds. And it was noticed that during the deputies’ speech the Teutonic army, confirming the statement conveyed by the heralds, withdrew to a much vaster field to give proof by deed of the truthfulness of the secret orders given to the heralds.
It was indeed a foolish statement and did not befit their rule. They did it as if they were convinced that fate and the destiny of each of them on that day depended on their plans and was in their power. And King Wladyslaw, having listened to the boastful and impudent words of the Teutonic deputies, accepted the swords from their hands, and without any anger or resentment, but with tears, responded without hesitation to the heralds, with strange humility, patience and modesty. “Even though”, he said, “I do not need the swords of my enemies, as I have in my army a sufficient amount, however, in the name of God, for securing greater help, protection and defense in my just cause, I accept these two swords brought by you and sent by the enemies who desire my blood and my destruction as well as that of my army. I will turn to Him as to the most just avenger of pride, which is unbearable, to His Mother, the Virgin Mary, and to my patrons and those of my Kingdom: Stanislaw, Adalbert, Waclaw, Florian, and Jadwiga, and I will ask them to turn their anger against the enemies, the proud as well as the wicked, who cannot be appeased and led to peace by any just manner, by any modesty, by any of my requests, if they do not spill blood, do not tear out entrails and do not break necks. Placing my trust in the most sure defense of God and His saints, and in their steadfast help, I am sure that they will shield me and my people with their might and intercession and will not allow me and my people to succumb to the violence of such horrible enemies with whom I strove for peace so many times. I would not be reluctant to conclude it even at this moment, if only it could be done according to just conditions. I would withdraw the hand extended to battle even now, although I see that heaven most clearly foretells my victory in battle by the swords you have brought me. I do not at all claim the choice of a battlefield, but, as becomes a Christian and a Christian king, I leave it to God, wishing to have whatever place of battle and whatever outcome of the war that God's mercy and fate will determine for me today, hopeful that the heavens will put an end to the Teutonic relentlessness so that as a result, their wicked and unbearable pride will be defeated once and for all. For I am sure that heaven will support a more valid cause. On the field we tread, on which the battle will be waged, Mars, the mutual and just judge of war, will erase and humiliate the impudence of my enemies, which reaches to the skies”. The two aforemen–tioned swords, sent out of pride by the Teutonic Knights to the Polish king, are kept to this day in the royal treasury in Cracow to remind us of and bear witness to the pride and defeat of the one side and the humility and triumph of the other.
The first encounter
When the reveilles began to sound, the whole Polish army sang with loud voices the native song ‘Mother of God’ and then, lifting spears, they threw themselves into battle. The first, however, who went to battle were the Lithuanian army, commanded by Duke Aleksander, who did not tolerate any delay. Mikolaj, the deputy chancellor of the Polish Kingdom, who intended to go with chaplains and scribes to the royal camps, had already disappeared out of the king's eyesight in a torrent of tears, when one of the scribes prompted him to stop for a moment and wait for the clash of these powerful armies, because it was indeed a rare sight that would never be seen again. He, agreeing, turned his eyes and face to the fighting ranks. And it was just at that moment that the two units clashed in the middle of the valley that separated the armies, and both sides raised a cry, as soldiers usually do before a battle. The Teutonic Knights tried in vain to hit and confuse the Polish units with a double shot from the cannons, even though the Prussian army ran to battle with a louder cry, greater speed and from a higher elevation. In the place where the encounter occurred, there were six high oak trees on whose trunks and branches many people climbed and sat - it was not dear if they were from the royal or Teutonic army - to watch from above the first encounter of the units and the fate of both armies. Because during the attack of the armies, breaking spears and armor hitting against each other produced such a great clatter and bang, and the clang of swords resounded so loudly, as if some huge rock had collapsed, that even those who were several miles away could hear it. Then knight attacked knight, armor crushed under the pressure of armor, and swords hit faces. And when the ranks dosed, it was impossible to tell the coward from the brave, the bold from the slow, because all of them were pressed together, as if in some tangle. They changed places or advanced only when the victor took the place of the defeated by throwing down or killing the enemy. When at last they broke the spears, all the units and armor clung together so tightly that, pushed by the horses and crowded, they fought only with swords and axes slightly, extended on their handles, and they made a noise in that fighting that only the blows of hammers can raise in a forge. And among the knights fighting hand to hand only with swords, one could observe examples of great courage.
Wladyslaw Jagiello in danger
After the Lithuanian army was driven away, a light, mild rain sent up a powerful swirl of dust that covered the battlefield and fighters, and a fierce battle broke out again between the Polish and Prussian armies in many areas. As the Teutonic Knights were striving hard for victory, the big standard of the Polish King Wladyslaw with the white eagle in the coat of arms, carried by the Cracow standard-bearer, the knight Marcin of Wrocimowice of the Polkozic clan, fell to the ground under the enemy's pressure. But the knights fighting under it, the most battle-seasoned knights and veterans, raised it immediately and put it in its place, not allowing its destruction. It would not have been possible to raise if it had not been for the outstanding unit of the bravest knights, who defended it with their own bodies and arms. And the Polish knights, trying to erase the infamous insult, attacked the enemy in the most furious way, and routed them completely, cutting down all these forces that dashed with them.
Meanwhile, the Teutonic army, which made chase after the fleeing Lithuanians and Ruthenians, considering themselves victorious, was heading to the Prussian camp, leading a crowd of captives. Seeing, however, that a very fierce and bloody battle was taking place, they abandoned the captives and spoils, and threw themselves into the vortex of the battle to help their own, who at that moment were fighting with less intensity. Thanks to the help of the new fighting men, the battle between the two armies grew more fierce. And when on both sides a lot of men fell down and the Teutonic army suffered heavy losses, when confusion began in its units, when its leaders perished, it was expected that the Teutonic army would be inclined to run away. But thanks to the persistence of the Teutonic Knights and the Order as well of the Czech and German knights, the battle which was weakening in many places was renewed.
During the fierce battle between the two armies, the Polish King Wladyslaw stood nearby observing the courage of the fighters, and having put his trust in God's mercy, he confidently expected the retreat and final rout of the enemies, whom he saw shattered and defeated in many places. Meanwhile, sixteen new, untouched, not yet battle-scarred regiments of the enemy entered into battle under their standards. When their ranks turned toward the Polish king, standing only with his bodyguard, it seemed that they aimed at him with their outstretched spears. And the king, convinced that the enemy's army threatened his life, especially because of a small number of knights surrounding him, and fearing mortal danger, sent his secretary, Zbigniew of Olesnica, to the regiment of his courtiers fighting nearby, with the order to come quickly to his rescue, to protect their king from the mortal danger he would face if help did not come at once. This regiment was dose enough to engage the hostile forces. But a king's knight, Mikolaj Kielbasa of the Nalecz clan, one of those fighting in the first rank, aimed his sword at secretary Zbigniew, the king's messenger, scolding him loudly and ordering him to leave: “Poor wretch”, he said, “don't you see that the enemies are attacking us? And you compel us to abandon the battle, just about to begin, and go to defend the king? Wouldn't it be like escaping from the ranks, turning tail to the enemy, and endangering both ourselves and the king if our forces broke down?” Zbigniew of Olesnica, chased away by these harsh words, with–drew from the court regiment which surrounded him, and the king's men at once engaged their enemies, and fighting very fiercely they crushed and smashed the enemies. After returning to the king, Zbigniew of Olesnica reported that all the knights were engaged in battle and added that the knights, fighting or waiting for the battle, would not be persuaded to do anything, nor would they follow any order. Zbigniew reported to the king that he could not convince any units involved in the battle, since they would not listen to arguments or orders on account of the noise and confusion.
A small royal standard carried behind the king, with the white eagle on the red field as the coat of aims, was farsightedly removed so as not to betray that the king was there. It was hidden on the order of the king's bodyguard, and the surrounding knights shielded the king with their horses and bodies so that nobody would guess that he stood there. The king was eager to fight and, setting spurs to his horse, he attempted to cut into the tightest ranks of the enemies. The bodyguard restrained him with great effort, barring his way. The king lightly struck one of his bodyguards, Czech Solawa, with the tip of his spear, when Solawa firmly grabbed his horse's bridle, so that the king could not advance, and he had to ask him to let go so that he could fight. He finally withdrew, prevented by the firm and decisive command of the bodyguard, who declared that they would rather expose themselves to the worst danger than permit him to fight.
Meanwhile, a knight of German origin, Dypold Kokeritz of Ecber in Lusatia, ran out of the Prussian army on a red horse, dressed in a white coat, called in Polish a jakka, with a gold belt, and in full armor. He ran from the ranks of a bigger Prussian regiment, one among the sixteen regiments, to the place where the king stood, and waving his spear in full view of the Prussian army standing under sixteen standards, he intended, it seemed, to attack the king. When the Polish King Wladyslaw attempted to fight with him, waving his own spear, Zbigniew of Olesnica, the king's secretary, clashed with him, shielding the king from the blow, with a spear broken in half. He struck the German on the side and knocked him from his horse to the ground. With his spear, King Wladyslaw struck the knight, who lay on his back on the ground in convulsions, hitting him in the forehead, which was bare as his visor had opened, but left him intact. But the knights keeping guard over the king killed him immediately, and the foot soldiers pulled off his armor and clothes.
Did anyone manage to achieve anything more successful in this battle? Indeed there was nothing more brave and bold than the deed of Zbigniew. This man, without armor or arms, dared to fare an excellently armed knight in battle; a youth, virtually a boy, entered into battle with a mature man and veteran. With a spear broken in half he knocked away a very long spear of the enemy and, hurling an implacable enemy down from his horse, he eliminated the imminent danger hanging not only over the king but also over the whole army, if the king had fallen down and died. And when the Polish King Wladyslaw, listening to his bodyguard's words of praise in which they profusely extolled his courage, wanted to give him the knight's belt as a sign of favor and to reward his exceptionally praiseworthy deed, the noble youth did not agree to this laudable favor from the king, but when the king tried persistently to confer on him the rank of knight, he responded that he should be enlisted not in the secular army, but in the spiritual one and that he would prefer to fight always for Christ rather than for an earthly and mortal king. Then King Wladyslaw said: “Since you choose a better fate, if I win, to reward your deed, I will not fail to elevate you to the rank of bishop”. From that time on, the king began to bestow on the aforementioned Zbigniew greater affection. Favored in everybody's presence with special consideration, he was in time to become the bishop of Cracow, thanks to the king's support. Pope Martin V granted him dispensation from the stigma he drew upon himself with this extraordinary deed.
The Teutonic army suffers defeat
It was from one of sixteen regiments of the Teutonic army that Kokeritz, a knight from Meissen, attempted to attack the king and died because of this thoughtless rather than brave deed. Seeing that the aforementioned knight Kokeritz was slain, the army began to withdraw at once, having been given a signal by a Teutonic Knight, a regiment commander, who was sitting on a white horse, giving to the knights in the first rank a signal to retreat with his spear and shouting in German: ‘Herum, herum’. After turning back, the army moved towards the right side, where the bigger royal regiment was standing, which returned with some other royal regiments after finishing the slaughter of the enemy. The majority of the king's knights, having noticed the army positioned under sixteen standards, took them for the enemy's army, as was the case. The rest, succumbing to human weakness, prone to expect something better, maintained that it was the Lithuanian army because of the big number of light spears, called sulice; and did not attack them immediately, held back by uncertainty and disputes that arose among them. To put a stop to these disputes, Knight Dobieslaw of Olesnica,. from the clan called Debno, with a cross in their coat of arms, set spurs to his horse and charged alone, with a raised spear, toward the enemy. A Teutonic knight, a commander of the regiment and units, ran out from the Prussian cavalry toward him and cutting off the attacking Dobieslaw, with skillful motions of his lance pushed Dobieslaw's outstretched spear over his head and in the first moment avoided his blow. And Dobieslaw, seeing clearly that his blow had missed, and recognizing that it was risky and unwise to fight against the whole unit, returned quickly to his people. The Teutonic knight, who began to chase him, setting his spurs to his horse and aiming threateningly at Dobieslaw with his spear, struck only Dobieslaw's horse across the covering called a caparison, and wounded its loins, but not mortally, and quickly returned to his ranks, to avoid being captured by Polish knights.
And the Polish units, abandoning a hesitation which delayed them, threw themselves with many regiments at the enemy, who were positioned in sixteen regiments, in which found refuge also those who had suffered defeat under other banners, and the Poles waged a mortal battle against them. And although the enemies put up a resistance for some time, ultimately, surrounded by great numbers of the king's army, they were put to the sword and virtually all units fighting in the sixteen regiments either perished of were taken prisoner. After defeating and crushing the enemy's army, during which - as it is known - Grand Master Ulryk, marechals, commanders and all the more prominent knights and lords of the Prussian army perished, the remaining crowd of enemies beat a retreat and once they turned tail they began to run away with determination.
And the Polish king won a delayed and difficult victory, but one that was nonetheless full and decisive over the Grand Master and the Teutonic Order. It was then that the knight Jerzy Gersdorff, who carried the banner of Saint George in the Teutonic army and who preferred to be taken prisoner than to shamefully run away, stood in the way of Przedpelk Kropidlowski, a Polish knight of the Dryja clan, together with forty comrades in arms. He fell to his knees and was taken prisoner, like a knight, as was his wish, after also surrendering his banner. Two princes, who were helping the Teutonic knights with their own armies and under their own banners, were taken prisoner: Kazimierz of Szczecin was taken by Skarbek of Gora; Konrad Bialy of Olesnica by Czech Jost of Salc. In addition, many knights from different armies and of various nationalities were taken prisoner. A considerable number of knights who escaped from the Prussian units found refuge behind the Prussian supply columns and in the camp. Attacked fiercely by the king's army as it fought its way into the supply columns and to the camp, they perished or were taken prisoner. Also the enemy's camp, filled with all kinds of riches and wagons, as well as all the possessions of the Prussian master and of his army, were plundered by the Polish knights. They found in the Teutonic camp several heavy wagons loaded with fetters and chains which the Teutonic knights had brought to shackle the Polish prisoners, since they had promised themselves a sure victory, without considering God's intervention and without thinking about the battle, but only about a triumph. They also found other wagons full of pine fire-brands soaked with tallow and tar, also arrows greased with tallow and tar, with which they were going to chase the defeated and escaping soldiers. In their delusion caused by pride, they were too eager to anticipate an outcome which rested in God's hands, not leaving any room for God's power. But according to God's just verdict, obliterating their pride, the Poles were putting them in those fetters and chains. It was an event worth watching, and also surprising, when it comes to pondering matters concerning human fate, that the lords were put in their own fetters and chains, which they themselves had prepared, and the enemies' wagons, amounting to several thousands, were plundered within a quarter of an hour by the king's army, to such a degree that not a trace was left of them.
In addition, there were many barrels of wine in the camp and on the Prussian wagons, which the king's army, exhausted by toils of battle and summer heat, descended upon after defeating the enemy, in order to quench their thirst. Some knights quenched their thirst by scooping up the wine with their helmets, others used gloves, and still others boots. And the Polish King Wladyslaw ordered the wine barrels destroyed and smashed, fearing that his army, if they got drunk with wine, could become inefficient and be easily defeated by a cowardly enemy, if somebody had enough courage to begin a battle, and also that the army could become prone to sickness and weakness. When, following the king's order, the barrels were quickly smashed, the wine flowed over the corpses of the dead, a big pile of them in the place where the enemy's camp was. It was seen flowing mixed with the blood of the dead people and the horses in a red stream up toward the meadows of the Stebark village and because of the swift current, it formed a streambed. They say that it gave rise to tall stories among the people, to stories that described how in that battle so much blood was spilled that it flowed like a stream.
Later they found not far from the enemy's camp in a little forest covered with trees that we call birches, seven Teutonic banners left by the fleeing army, carefully stuck in the ground, which were immediately carried to the king. The commander of Tuchola, Henryk, who had ordered two swords to be carried in front of him and would not be swayed from this proudful order by his good advisors, when he arrived in Wielchniowa in his shameful escape from the battlefield, was caught by his pursuers and died in a pitiful way, by decapitation, and suffered a terrible but just punishment for his lack of reason and his pride. Some pious and humble men, who were allowed to see it by God's mercy, saw in the air during the battle an illustrious man clothed in a bishop's robes, constantly blessing the Polish army, as long as the battle went on and the victory was on the side of the Poles. It was believed that it was Saint Stanislaw, bishop of Cracow, patron of the Poles and the first martyr, thanks to whose intercession and help the Poles, as is known, won this famous victory.
Pursuit of the fleeing Teutonic Knights
After smashing the enemy's supply column, the king's army came to a hill, on which stood the enemy's permanent camp, and they saw many enemy units and detachments scattering in escape, and the light reflecting off their armor, which nearly all of them wore. The Polish army continued chasing them, entered wet meadows, threw themselves at the enemies and defeated the handful that had dared to offer resistance. Following the king's order to the knights to end the slaughter, they chased the remaining unit, not allowing any bloody outrages. It was then that the Polish king gave a sign to order the knights to chase the fleeing enemies, having admonished them to refrain absolutely from slaughter. The pursuit stretched for many miles. The handful that had taken flight earlier escaped. Many knights were captured and brought to the camp and the victors treated them with leniency. The next day they were handed over to the king. Because of the crowding and pushing, many drowned in a pond, two miles from the battle scene. The approaching night interrupted the pursuit. Fifty thousand enemies perished in that battle, and forty thousand were taken prisoner. It was reported that 51 banners were taken. The victors became rich with the enemy's booty. Although I am convinced that it is a difficult thing to count exactly how many of the enemies perished, however the road was covered with corpses for many miles, the soil was soaked with the blood of the dead, and the air was filled with the cries of the dying and of the moaning.
This text is from Polish Literature from the Middle Ages to the End of the Eighteenth Century: A Bilingual Anthology, selected and translated by Michael J. Mikos (Waszawa: Constans, 1999).
Sendivogius | the Great Polish Alchemist
Michael Sendivogius, a Pole
Though this name in the past Has been kept in oblivion, Its praise now penetrates the darkness, As it Michael Sendivogius (Polish: Michał Sędziwój; 1566–1636), was a Polish alchemist, philosopher, and medical doctor. A pioneer of chemistry, he developed ways of purification and creation of various acids, metals and other chemical compounds. He discovered that air is not a single substance and contains a life-giving substance-later called oxygen 170 years before similar discoveries by Scheele and Priestley. He correctly identified this 'food of life' with the gas (also oxygen) given off by heating nitre (saltpetre).[1] This substance, the 'central nitre', had a central position in Sendivogius' schema of the universe.[2]
Little is known of his early life: he was born in a noble family that was part of the Clan of Ostoja.[3] His father sent him to study in university of Kraków but Sendivogius visited also most of the European countries and universities; he studied in Vienna, Altdorf, Leipzig and at Cambridge. His acquaintances included John Dee and Edward Kelley. It was thanks to him that King Stefan Batory agreed to finance their experiments.[4] In the 1590s he was active in Prague, at the famously open-minded court of Rudolf II.
In Poland he appeared at the court of King Sigismund III Vasa around 1600, and quickly achieved great fame, as the Polish king was himself an alchemy enthusiast and even conducted experiments with Sendivogius. In Kraków's Wawel castle, the chamber where his experiments were performed is still intact. The more conservative Polish nobles soon came to dislike him for encouraging the king to expend vast sums of money on chemical experimentation. The more practical aspects of his work in Poland involved the design of mines and metal foundries. His widespread international contacts led to his employment as a diplomat from about 1600.
In his later years, Michael Sendivogius spent more time in Bohemia and Moravia (now in the Czech Republic), where he had been granted lands by the Habsburg emperor. Near the end of his life, he settled in Prague, in the court of Rudolf II, where he gained even more fame as a designer of metal mines and foundries. However the Thirty Years' War of 1618-48 had effectively ended the golden age of alchemy: the rich patrons now spent their money on financing war rather than chemical speculation, and died in relative obscurity.
Polonia or About the Geography, Population, Customs, Offices, and Public Matters of the Polish Kingdom in Two Volumes by Martinus Cromerus
Polonia or About the Geography, Population, Customs,
Offices, and Public Matters of the Polish Kingdom
in Two Volumes
Book I
(selections)
People here are usually of light complexion, fair-haired or even verging on white; they are of average height or somewhat taller, of robust body build, and only women, especially from the most distinguished noble or burgher homes take great care so that by appropriate endeavors they make themselves look like slim reeds, as the famous poet says.1 Besides this, they do not pay much attention to good looks, for making up one's face and dying one's hair is generally considered a shameful thing. But on the other hand, both for men and for women, a genuine color is their natural adornment.
The Poles have an open and sincere disposition, they are more likely deceived than they would deceive someone else; they are not so much inclined towards quarreling as towards harmony; one cannot see in them impudence and arrogance, on the contrary--they are even submissive, so long as they are treated politely and gently. They are most impressed by personal example and in general they listen to their rulers and officers. They are inclined to bestow upon others acts of kindness, courtesy, friendliness, and hospitality to such a degree that they not only willingly receive and entertain strangers and visitors from other lands, but they even invite them and offer all their help; they easily form social acquaintances and friendships with everyone; what is more, they eagerly imitate the customs of those they deal with, especially the foreign ones.
The upbringing of youth is somewhat too free and perhaps too little attention is given to it, but the good inborn features of character compensate for these failings. All people, both poor and rich, both nobility and common folk, especially burghers, endeavor to send young boys to schools and for practical instruction, to accustom them to Latin from the earliest childhood. Many keep tutors. Therefore even in the very center of Italy it is difficult to find so many people of all kinds with whom one could communicate in Latin as here. Also the girls learn either at home or in convents to read and write in Polish, and even in Latin; when they become more mature, they begin to get accustomed to household duties, especially pertaining to the kitchen and tending flock, and to spinning flax or wool as well as to weaving and embroidery. The young men learn to work in the fields or in some craft or trade and to hold office and prepare themselves to assume ecclesiastical or lay positions which fall to more affluent people. Many live at home with their parents and help them in estate matters, and after their parents' death fulfill their duties as the heads of family.
There are many people who, disregarding the expenses, deprivations, and all the troubles that accompany travelers abroad, go readily to far-off countries, bearing well the lack of conveniences as they find more attractions in those things which are abroad than in those in their own country. That is why they diligently and easily learn the languages of those nations which they visit, and also try to bring back from abroad something new pertaining to food, clothing, and customs, perceiving in it some reason for distinction on account of refinement. This plague has crept even into religion.
The Poles have quick minds capable of overcoming any difficulties, but they are more likely inclined to accurately master foreign ideas instead of managing to independently invent something new and gain a decisive superiority in some field. Maybe it happens because they are not very eager to devote themselves to one art or skill, but want to learn many disciplines or maybe because of carelessness, tardiness, and unwillingness to make an effort, characteristic of them in many a field, especially since the people, who on account of their functions occupy themselves with both liberal arts and mechanics, satisfied with average results, do not look too hard for accomplished craftsmen and the highest quality of work. Finally, maybe it is so because more affluent people succumb to careless inactivity and pleasant amusements, leaving to the poorer people the intellectual work and improvement of inventiveness. Those in turn, according to the words of the philosopher2 who says that it is difficult to expect good work from a pauper, must look around everywhere for earnings that would secure their upkeep and fathom the studies and occupations which are at times foreign to their interests and not in the range of their abilities; additionally, when they achieve enough to be satisfied and when they conform to the way of life of the more affluent, they immediately begin to be distracted by matters connected with securing their possession by suits and legal tricks or by supporting the policy of the rich. And they do all this either because they cannot be left alone by their own ambition or because they want to find for themselves and their kin some absolute defense against the harm and insults from others that threaten them. Because I do not know how it happens that especially now, in the epoch we are living in, the goodness of mind and heart as well as the decrees and civil law do not effectively guarantee the acquisition of values that serve life and its adornment, let alone their essential defense.
Translated by Michael J. Mikoś
Notes:
1 Terence.
2 Aristotle.
Text: Kromer Marcin, Polska, czyli o położeniu, ludności, obyczajach, urzędach i sprawach publicznych Królestwa Polskiego księgi dwie. Translated into Polish by Stefan Kazikowski, Olsztyn: Pojezierze, 1984, 68-72
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Gniazdo
Gniazdo (AKA: The Cradle) is a 1974 film about Mieszko I of Poland, Duke of the Polans from AD 962 until his death in 992.
Directed by Jan Rybkowski and written by Aleksander Scibor-Rylski. Starring Wojciech Pszoniak as Mieszko.
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