Polish King Research Articles

Russian Endeavors for the Polish Crown in the Seventeenth Century

Polish-Russian relations have from their very beginning been characterized by intense political rivalry and military confrontation. This is no surprise, since after the Polish-Lithuanian union (1386, 1569), Poland was drawn into the conflict between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the great Muscovite principality over hegemony in Eastern Europe. Struggles between Lithuania and Muscovy were thus transformed into wars between the Russian state and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. During the reigns of Polish kings Stefan Batory (1576–86), Zygmunt III (1587–1632), and Wladyslaw IV (1632–48), the commonwealth gained a military advantage over its eastern neighbor. This was especially evident during the Time of Troubles (smutnoe vremia), when the Polish army occupied Moscow (1610–12) and when Wladyslaw IV defeated the Russians in the War of Smolensk (1632–34).

King John III of Poland and the Turkish Aspects of his Foreign Policy

King John III Sobieski is one of the best known and greastest Polish rulers. The great battle of Vienna in 1683, when united Polish and Austro - German armies under the command-in-chief of Sobieski crushed the Turkish army, brougth Poland and especially her king immortal fame. In historical consciousness of the Poles Sobieski is a national hero and at the same time conqueror of the Turks. But a question arises-was he always a foe of Turkey? Let us try to answer this question. He was like all Polish kings in 16-18th centuries especially after 1572, the year of the extinction of Jagiellonian dynasty, an elective monarch not a hereditary one. "This prince was descended of a noble and ancient family, the none of the most considerable nor richest in the kingdom" - wrote about his election the aulic physycian to him, Irishman Bernard O'Connor, the author of a very valuable and interesting book entitled "The History of Poland" published in London in 1698.

Armenians and Jews in medieval Lvov : Their role in oriental trade, 1400-1600

Eleonora Nadel-Golobič, Armenians and Jews in medieval Lvov. Their role in oriental trade, 1400-1600. The oriental trade of Lvov in the discussed period was connected with Moldavia and Crimea until the end of the fifteenth century and with the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century. In the fifteenth century and earlier Lvov's oriental trade was of a transit character, however beginning with the sixteenth century a part of the Far Eastern or Persian goods and a considerable part of local Balkan products were sold on the local market. Lvov's oriental trade was dominated by two ethnic minorities: Armenians and Jews, while the role of other traders was less significant. Both Armenian and Jewish minorities were readily accepted by the Polish kings (Lvov was a Crown city) since they had at their disposal not only the necessary capital and international contacts, but also trading experience. In the earlier stage of this period the Jews of Red Russia and Lvov's Jews as well were engaged in local trade (which included also the articles from Orient), while the Armenians operated on an international scale. Jewish participation in international trade is attested only in the second half of the sixteenth century.

The Ure-ox, extinct in Europe since the seventeenth century: an early attempt at conservation that failed

The last cow of the Ure-ox, Bos primigenius Bojanus, that survived in Europe and, accordingly, in the whole world, died a natural death in the year 1627 in the Jaktorowska Primeval Forest situated some 60 km south-west of Warsaw. this magnificent species had long been under the special protection of the Polish kings, and hunting it was a part of the strictly respected ‘jus regale’. The King's commissioners had to submit reports about the status of the Ure-oxen, thus providing a detailed history of the Ure-ox in its last refuge in the years from 1510 until its extinction in 1627. In the circles interested in nature protection, a project is being developed to erect a life-size monument of Bos primigenius near the place where the last representative of this animal lived and died out.

Doctors afield; Nicolaus Coppernic, 1473-1543.

THE only definitive biography of Copernicus— that by Leopold Prowe1—is not approved by Polish patriots, because it honors him as a great Prussian rather than as a Pole. He was born in Thorn, an East Prussian city founded by the Knights of the Teutonic order, of Silesian parentage, and (fortunately) wrote only in German and Latin, but he certainly acknowledged the sovereignty of a Polish king. Copernicus is celebrated, however, not for being a Silesian, Prussian or Pole, but as the elabora tor (with the probable aid of no instrument other than a home-made wooden triquetrum) of a new . . .

The Royal Serfs (Servi Regales) of the `Ruthenian Law' and Their Origin

THE term 'Ruthenian Law' (Jus Ruthenicum or Jus Ruthenicale)l relates to the system of laws and customs prevailing among the 'Ruthenian' (Rus')2 population of Galicia at the time of her seizure by the Polish king Casimir the Great in 1349. In 1387 Galicia was formally incorporated into the Kingdom of Poland, but the 'Ruthenian' people were allowed, for some time, to keep their old customs intact. It was only in 1430 that the Ruthenian Law was abrogated in principle. In 1435 the Polish system of administration and courts was introduced in the country, court proceedings being now recorded in Latin instead of in Old Russian. Even after that, however, and until at least the early sixteenth century, the legal status of certain groups of the population remained the same as it had been in the time of the Ruthenian Law (tempore juris Ruthenicalis). It must be said in this connection that, owing to the devastation of Galicia by the Mongols in the thirteenth century and to a series of raids by Lithuanians, Poles, and Hungarians, plus local riots and uprisings, in the late thirteenth and the first half of the fourteenth century, most of the local archives perished and no documents of the 'Ruthenian' courts of the pre-Polish period have been preserved. As a result it is only for the period after 1435 that the documentary evidence for the study of social history of mediaeval Galicia becomes available. Paradoxically enough, then, most of what we know of some of the institutions of the Ruthenian Law, we know through the sources of a later period when the Ruthenian Law was officially abrogated. Generally speaking, the Polish kings of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries considered Galicia a valuable asset not only because of the natural resources of the country (fertile land, salt mines, crossing of several trade routes), but even more so because of the stronger position of the king in regard to the nobility in this newly acquired land, so much more that its acquisition was the result of the personal initiative of a king (Casimir the Great). It was but natural that the king tried to put as many social groups in the country as possible under his direct control. This explains the fact that the king lost no time in confirming his authority over the social groups which had been already in a subordinated position in regard to the former rulers of the country-the Mongols and the local Rus' princesprior to 1349. The status of these groups was not changed after 1435. Three such groups are mentioned in the records of the Galician courts of the fifteenth century: (1) The 'Hundred Men' (Homines Sbtny, that is, men belonging to the 'Hundred'); (2) The 'Horde Men' (Ordyntsy); and (3) The Homines Ka-

Poland and Germany

IT is not generally realised that Berlin was originally a Slav settlement. In vol. 18 of Nauka Polska (Warszawa: Imienia Mianowskiego) Dr. K. Piotro-wicz, director of the Library of the Polish Academy of Sciences, gives a well-documented account of the manuscripts, documents, prints and other Polish works produced in early times on present German territory. It is clear that in the Middle Ages Polish culture played an important role in those lands now comprising eastern Germany, for many of the Polish kings and noblemen were patrons of learning. Also many scientific and other works by Polish authors were printed in towns as far west as Strasbourg. In the same volume there is an introductory note on the scientific and cultural relations between Germany and Poland by Prof. Aleksander Bruckner, of the University of Berlin.