Wiktor Czermak i lwowska edycja Śpiewów historycznych Juliana Ursyna Niemcewicza

Abstract

Written in 1808–1813 and published in 1816, the Historical Songs by Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz played a significant role in the post-partitioned era, anticipating later calls for writing history to keep up the nation’s spirits. In the neoromantic era Niemcewicz’s Songs, which recount glorious events of Polish history, were used as a means of educating the peasants to help them become politically conscious members of the national community. In the mid-1890s the Polish Society in Lwow, founded in 1883 by Jozef Ignacy Kraszewski, published a poetic part of Niemcewicz’s work. The poems were published along with commentaries from Wiktor Czermak (1863–1913). Affiliated to the University in Krakow, Czermak was a graduate of the Lwow University. The publication also contains a biography of Niemcewicz – the poet, the historian, the politician and the publicist.