Bonos Sforzos vietinės administracijos pareigūnai Lietuvos Didžiojoje Kunigaikštystėje: personalinis aspektas

Abstract

The article discusses the personal aspect in the administration of land complexes owned by Bona Sforza in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL). The officers of local administration personally assigned by Bona Sforza are the main object of the article. Therefore, their origin, career, significant social relations are analyzed in the article. The research explains what people Bona used assign to manage her lands in the GDL, highlights the typical tendencies and reveals the characteristics of the management of specific land complexes. Keywords: Bona Sforza, Grand Duchy of Lithuania, officers, starost, persons, personal aspect. Summary By analyzing historiography as well as published and unpublished historical sources, the personal aspect of Bona Sforza’s land management in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (GDL) is analyzed in the article. Information about the people who managed Bona Sforza’s land in the GDL is still spread in historiography. Since the article focuses on the people who managed Bona’s land in the GDL, the questions of their origin, career and social relations as well as the complexity and administrative system of Bona’s lands were examined. Land holdings were managed as complexes by different people. For those who served as officers in the complex of bridewealth lands, being a local officer for Bona was the final rather than first step of an officer’s career. These officers were not previously related to Bona either by their origin or career. In the lands and manors of Bielsk, the local officers were mainly of local origin or originated from neighboring lands; they were representatives of the middle nobility, experienced officers with strong knowledge of the law system of the GDL. Viceregents in the castle of Grodno were people whose personal lands and career were related to the powiats of Vilnius and Trakai and who served for the ruler and voivode of Vilnius Albertas Gostautas. The manors in the powiat of Grodno were managed by the people who were familiar with the region of Grodno, originated from this area and/or served here as officials before Bona. The starosts of Kremenets were related to the lands of Volhynia through their origin or career; Bona’s manors in Samogitia and around Alytus were managed by the representatives of the old nobility of the GDL who were often related by blood. The absolute majority of people who served as officers of local administration in Bona Sforza’s lands originated from the GDL (or their ancestors had previously put down their roots, had land and career there). Bona also resorted to the people of Polish origin, who managed small manors and large complexes of land. A few people of Polish origin (Chwalczowski, Dybowski) were especially important in the system of Bona’s land administration. They managed important complexes of land and completed special tasks.