Zusammenfassung Im Herbst 2020 entdeckte eine Gruppe von Detektorgängern auf einer bewaldeten Düne in der Nähe des Dorfes Cierpice in Nordzentralpolen 150 Bronzefunde. Der Fund umfasst Backenstücke, Phalerae, Rassel- und Terretringe sowie Zügelmanschetten mit Drahtgliedern, die einst Teil eines Pferdezaumzeugs aus der Endbronzezeit waren. Die Zaumzeugteile wurden zusammen mit einem Tüllenbeil in Pflanzenfasern eingewickelt und dann sorgfältig in einen organischen Beutel gelegt, der verrottet war. In diesem Artikel werden die Ergebnisse der archäologischen, metallographischen und paläobotanischen Untersuchungen des Hortes vorgestellt und diskutiert, unterstützt durch andere archäologisch dokumentierte Daten. Diese werden mit den Mustern der Bewegung und des Verbrauchs von Metallwaren im heutigen Polen während der Lausitzer Periode und dem weiteren Kontext der nordeuropäischen Bronzezeit in Beziehung gesetzt.

This essay focusses on issues connected with research into the history of exported porcelain from the Far East. To this end, it discusses the literary context of the expressions “the family of roses” and “the family of greens,” and also the genesis, main features, and current terminology relating to the two most widespread techniques of glaze-painting decoration (Kangxi wucai 康熙五彩 and falangcai 珐琅彩). The article discusses the most important techniques of decoration that preceded the development of the Kangxi wucai palette and the relations between technological development and the taste of the period. It also indicates the important items in Polish collections, especially in the National Museum in Gdańsk. From the holdings of this museum, the author selects a plate decorated with wild geese on Lake Taihu. An analysis of the plate – with regard to the technology of its production, aesthetics, and iconography – is the main element in the article. Polish items are presented in the context of important European collections: the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Musée Guimet, the National Museum in Oslo, and the Museo Correr in Venice. The author formulates a new term in art theory: the aesthetics of double foreignness. It makes it possible to give a name to a phenomenon that develops in the process of reception and analysis of objects produced in one developed and isolated civilization, intended for and commissioned by a second civilization.

The infamous Treblinka camp was one of numerous extermination camps throughout Poland, where Germans carried out mass killings of Jews. There were two camps in Treblinka, AL Treblinka I, a forced labor camp, and KL Treblinka II, the site of the extermination camp. Treblinka I held captives of various origins and ethnic backgrounds who were serving their sentences by working in a pre-existing gravel pit. Many of those prisoners perished in the camp, and it was believed that the principal causes of their death were attributed to the horrific sanitary conditions in the camp as well as the strenuous hard work of daily life. In 2019, archaeologists uncovered a clandestine mass burial pit that contained commingled human skeleton remains at the Execution Site of the former Treblinka I camp. It was estimated that there were a minimum of forty-nine people in the pit. Within months, an anthropologist performed biological profile assessments and detailed trauma analysis on the recovered skeletal parts. The main goal was to study perimortem trauma patterns to infer the cause and manner of death of the victims. We hypothesized that the victims did not die solely because of the camps’ conditions but were brutally slaughtered by the camp guards. Our results were later compared with the survivors’ written testimonies. As a result of our research, we were able to show that the Treblinka I captives’ death was extremely brutal and that the killing methods were varied. This led us to conclude that multiple assailants were involved in the killing spree. All of our results were consistent with the written witness testimonies, which concurs with our skeletal material analysis that proves the atrocities committed by the Nazis on their civilian prisoners during the war took place.

W tekście przedstawiono wyniki badań wielokulturowej osady badanej w 2011 roku w Inowrocławiu. Na podstawie zarejestrowanych materiałów źródłowych ustalono, że badany teren był zagospodarowany z przerwami, od neolitu do nowożytności. Pozyskane materiały i odsłonięte obiekty powiązano z osadnictwem kultury amfor kulistych, łużyckiej, jastorfskiej oraz przeworskiej. W północno-wschodniej części wyniesienia starsze struktury osadnicze zostały zniszczone przez nowożytne wybierzyska gliny.

The article describes the landscape history of the Westerplatte Peninsula in Gdańsk (Poland) from the 17th to the 20th century presented as a complex process of the landscape’s environmental, urban and military transformations. Westerplatte is known as the symbolic place where the Second World War in Europe broke out, and for this reason the current discourse is mainly concentrated on that period. Nonetheless, the history of Westerplatte includes many other important events involving Polish, German, Russian and even French politics over the last three centuries. Thanks to its location at the entrance of one of the main harbours on the Baltic Sea, it is cartographically the best-documented part of the Vistula river estuary. A comprehensive archival survey conducted in the Polish and German archives and cartographical analysis of over 200 selected historical maps allowed the authors to reconstruct its spatial history over three centuries. This case study of Westerplatte can be regarded as an example of the research modus operandi of a historical landscape which has been transformed multiple times. It might form the basis for establishing a new policy for its preservation, allowing a balance to be kept between fluctuations of the current historical politics and more universal requirements for the protection of tangible and intangible heritage. The article also stresses the importance of a holistic and interdisciplinary approach in the analysis of a historical landscape and the necessity of proper selection and critical verification of sources.

The article presents the results of research on the settlement of the Pyrzyce Lowland, NW Poland, in the Pre Roman and Roman Iron Ages. The central part of this area was covered in the past by a large water body, pre-Miedwie lake, which due to natural processes and subsequent human intervention was partially drained. In order to carry out the research, 85 Pre-Roman and 305 Roman Iron Age sites were catalogued. The main method of researching the spatial organization was triangulation and subsequent polygon networking. The results of the spatial analysis were confronted with data from lake Racze’s palynological profile. Thanks to this procedure information was obtained on settlement structures, population, environment and economy, as well as their changes in time. The similarities and differences between the Pre-Roman and Roman Iron Ages were then discussed. During the research a strong suggestion of settlements having been relocated according to changes of the palaeo-shoreline of pre-Miedwie lake was concluded. Also, the change from inhabiting large and stable settlements in PRIA to single, often relocating farms in RIA was registered. There were no significant changesin terms of economy, which stayed diversified during the entire PRIA and RIA periods. The changes in anthropopression were most likely linked with changes in population size, reflecting 8 distinct phases of settlement in the area.

AbstractThe article presents a trend in rural and small-town architecture, in central Poland, consisting in the reuse of material from river-going vessels. As part of the research, twenty objects (existing and non-extant) were identified that had been constructed using material from wooden vessels that had navigated the Vistula River in the past (nineteenth and twentieth centuries). There was also a reinterpretation of the origin of construction material from a farm building that had been moved in the 1980s from near the Vistula to one of Polish open-air museums. The results indicate that these are probably the last material traces of a boat mill that operated on the Vistula in the late nineteenth century. Also, many preserved millstones embedded in buildings located near the Vistula seem to confirm this conclusion.

Od pierwszych dni września do połowy października 1981 roku w Gdańsku odbywał się I Krajowy Zjazd Delegatów NSZZ „Solidarność”. Zgromadzenie budziło duże zainteresowanie społeczeństwa. Rzetelne źródło wiedzy na temat wydarzenia stanowiło wydawane z okazji zjazdu oficjalne pismo „Głos Wolny”. Jak do tej pory treść gazety nie stała się przedmiotem badań historyków, choć pismo zawiera wiele ciekawych informacji wartych szczegółowych studiów. W niniejszej pracy przedstawiono studium rubryki Nasza sonda, będącej jedną z form badania opinii publicznej, zamieszczonej na łamach wydawnictwa. Analiza dotyczy przedmiotu przeprowadzonej sondy oraz jej wyników. Dodatkowo dokonano także próby określenia znaczenia oraz funkcji rubryki. Do przeprowadzenia studiów wykorzystano metodę sondażu diagnostycznego, analizę zawartości treści, a także analizę ilościową oraz jakościową, przy pomocy których badaniu poddano wszystkie (24) numery pisma. Public opinion polls Presented in “Głos Wolny” – the official newspaper of the 1st National Congress of Delegates of NSZZ “Solidarność” From the first days of September to mid-October 1981, the 1st National Congress of Delegates of NSZZ “Solidarność” took place in Gdańsk. The assembly attracted significant public attention. A reliable source of information about the event was the official magazine “Głos Wolny”, published on the occasion of the Congress. So far, the newspaper has not been studied by historians yet, although the magazine contains information worth detailed studies. This work presents the analysis of the Nasza sonda column, one of the forms of a public opinion poll published in the newspaper. This analysis regards the subject of the survey along with its results. Additional attempts to determine the importance and the role of the column are made. The diagnostic survey, content analysis, quantitative and qualitative analyses are the methods used to study all 24 issues of the journal.