Papier trwalszy niż kamień – o nagrobku Stanisława Żółkiewskiego napisanym przez Jakuba Sobieskiego
Paper Stronger than Stone: On Stanisław Żółkiewski’s Epitaph and Its Authorship Attributed to Jakub Sobieski

Summary/Abstract: The author of this article brings forth the history of an anonymous epitaph inscribed on the tombstone in Żółkiew to commemorate Stanisław Żółkiewski, an inscription which has paradoxically been preserved as a text in "Monumenta Sarmatarum", an anthology by Szymon Starowolski. The manuscript, stored in Ossoliński National Institute (3567 II), includes the copy of the epitaph whose authorship has been attributed to Jakub Sobieski, father to king John III Sobieski and a renowned orator as well. The author has taken a closer look at the arguments speaking in favour of Jakub Sobieski’s authorship and, having taken into account the unique character of the manuscript, funeral customs, and the comparison with the funeral speech, assumed the authorship of Jakub Sobieski to be highly probable. The final part of the article focuses on the legend from Jan III Sobieski’s childhood associated with Horace’s dictum that, allegedly, Jan III Sobieski read from his great-grandfather’s tombstone. The author formulates a hypothesis that the dictum might have come from a book that included the epitaph inscribed on the memorial erected in Cecora, Stanisław Żółkiewski’s field of death, as well as the inscription on the tombstone in Żółkiew.

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