Uczeń i Mistrzowie. Więzi profesora Tadeusza Silnickiego z lwowskimi uczonymi
The disciple and the masters: Professor Tadeusz Silnski's ties to Lviv scholars

Summary/Abstract: The article investigates the scholarly and professional relationship between Professor Tadeusz Silnicki, a distinguished historian of law, and his masters: Professor Oswald Balzer and Professor Władysław Abraham. It aims to illuminate the bonds forged between the young aspiring scholar and two eminent legal historians active at the turn of the twentieth century. These connections began with Silnicki's presence at their lectures and seminars at the University of Lviv (UL, then known as the Jan Kazimierz University in Lviv) as a student. He was initially drawn to the history of law, later broadening his interests to the history of canon law. He formalised his passion for historical and legal studies by working in the UL Department of Canon Law, which was headed by Abraham. By tracing the successive stages of Silnicki's academic trajectory, the article introduces the reader to the origins and further development of these relationships, from his undergraduate years through his tenure at UL. This picture is further augmented by Silnicki's own reminiscences and testimonies preserved in his memoirs and diaries, in which he expresses not only his profound esteem for his mentors but also recounts their seminar methods, the research problems they addressed, and the scholarly ethos and normative framework that prevailed within the academic milieu. The article offers insight not merely into their mutual connections, but also into what Silnicki, the future Poznań historian of law and ecclesiastical law, ultimately inherited from his illustrious predecessors, and into the extent to which Balzer and Abraham became a source of lasting inspiration for his subsequent scholarly activity. Employing the historical-legal method, the study draws upon relevant literature and archival materials, such as the papers of Silnicki, Balzer, and Abraham, held in the State Archives of the Lviv Region (Ukraine), the Archives of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, and the Library of the Ossoliński National Institute in Wrocław (Poland).

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