Dwa spojrzenia na historię Polski. Polemika demokratów lwowskich Henryka Schmitta i Ludwika Wolskiego z przedstawicielem krakowskiej „nowej szkoły historycznej” Józefem Szujskim w latach 70. XIX wieku

Author(s): Anna Wardzińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

The purpose of the article is to present the polemic between Henryk Schmitt and Ludwik Wolski, the advocates of what is known as a democratic view of Polish history, on the one hand, and one of the main representatives of the Kraków school of history, Józef Szujski, on the other. In recounting the polemic, I seek to answer the question of whether it was simply a matter of historiographical controversy, or whether Galicia’s political circumstances and the situation of the subjects of this article affected the views they expressed.

Историческая полонистика В. О. Ключевского в оценке польской историографии

Author(s): Tadeusz Kruczkowski / Language(s): Russian Issue: 9/2017

This article discusses the key elements of Vasily Klyuchevsky’s interpretation of Polish history as well as the reception of it in Polish historiography, mainly in works by Marian Henryk Serejski and Katarzyna Błachowska. Vasily Klyuchevsky was one of the leading representatives of the Russian liberal historiography at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries

Między ideą jagiellońską a Międzymorzem. Ewolucja kwestii ukraińskiej w poglądach politycznych Oskara Haleckiego (1891–1973)

Author(s): Oleksandr Avramchuk / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

The purpose of the article is to present the evolution of Oskar Halecki’s interpretation of the Ukrainian problem, including the way in which this distinguished Polish historian viewed the issue of Poland’s eastern border, the attitude he adopted towards the idea of Ukraine’s independence and the role he gave Ukraine to play in the community of nations that he defined as ‘Central and Eastern Europe’. The article’s main concern is how Halecki’s historical views affected the interpretation of the Ukrainian question in Polish political thought.

W stronę origines de la Pologne contemporaine – poszukiwania metodologiczne Stefana Kieniewicza w latach 1946–1948

Author(s): Marcin Wolniewicz / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

This article deals with Stefan Kieniewicz’s theoretical reflection on history in the years 1946–1948. A distinguished student of the history of the lands of partitioned Poland, Kieniewicz played his part in the elaboration of the Marxist interpretation of this period of Polish history. In the period under consideration, scholars still enjoyed a significant amount of freedom in the pursuit of their studies, including in terms of the search for methodological inspirations. The author’s attention is specifically drawn to Kieniewicz’s discussions of the strengths and weaknesses of the traditional model of historical research (the one based on the doctrine of individualistic historicism) on one hand and what was then regarded as new approaches to historical studies, inspired by Marxism and sociology, on the other. The author also attempts to show the extent to which these new inspirations informed Kieniewicz’s concept of ‘integral history’ and his program of the social history of partitioned Poland.

Miejsce hipotezy podboju w milenijnym kanonie powstania państwa polskiego

Author(s): Andrzej Wierzbicki / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

In the years 1960–1966, communist Poland witnessed celebrations held to mark the thousandth anniversary of the rise of the Polish state. In organizing these events, the communist authorities hoped to neutralize the celebrations of the thousandth anniversary of the baptism of Poland, to be held in 1966, as announced by Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński in 1957. For obvious reasons, the question of the role of Christianity and the church organization in the formation of the Polish state was fundamental to the ideological struggle which the communist state waged against the Church. The traditional and well-established interpretation of the creation of the Polish state was based on the opposition between the idea of the state’s ‘self-generated’ and gradual birth on one hand and that of its violent emergence as a result of a foreign invasion and conquest on the other.In approaching the issue from the perspective of the latter variant, the author characterizes the key elements of the millennial interpretation of the creation of the Polish state. Although his focus is essentially on the historiography of the Polish People’s Republic, some attention is also devoted to the Polish historiography in exile.

Polska międzywojenna w pracach Franciszka Ryszki z lat 1950–1996

Author(s): Wojciech Kapica / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

The purpose of this article is to examine Franciszek Ryszka’s view of the interwar Poland, including the way in which the view evolved throughout his academic career. The author begins his analysis with texts which, written in the period of the Stalinization of Polish historiography, contributed to the ‘black legend’ of the Second Republic. As the research into the Second Republic progressed and the circumstances in which the historical profession operated changed, Ryszka’s picture of the inter-war Poland grew more objective. The most original parts of his works are those that draw on his own experience – the account of the country life from the perspective of a landed gentry family, the description of the lifestyle and cultural patterns to which this social group adhered, and the analysis of the group’s slow decline and of the rural poverty.

Dzieje zatrzymane. Wstęp do analizy wizji historii Polski po 1944 roku w podręcznikach ekonomii politycznej socjalizmu od lat 50. do 80. XX wieku na przykładzie problematyki bodźców

Author(s): Tomasz Ochinowski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

The author of this article starts from the assumption that the vision of reality to be found in textbooks of the political economy of socialism should be treated as part of the official discourse of the Polish People’s Republic. In the analysis of a number of selected textbooks, he focuses mainly of the “stimuli” issues. After deconstructing the relevant texts, he proceeds to search for all kinds of regularities, politically correct statements and ways of masking purely ideological beliefs. His focus is also on the criticisms repeated in different works by different authors.The article offers the analysis of the history of ways of speaking about historiography’s social function. This approach is inspired by Foucault’s view of how historical interpretations are shaped. The author also touches on the issue of the knowledge/power relation, following ‘French Theory’ in his understanding of it. The way in which politics and education coexisted in Communist Poland offers a clear-cut example of the interrelation between power and knowledge. The educational materials intended for Polish students and Polish intelligentsia distorted the picture of both the past and present.The author shows that ‘Foucauldian practices’ adhered to in the political economy of socialism involved the use of a set of incentives designed not only to motivate employees of different level to work better but also to shape their political and moral and historical views.

„Historyk i władza” – z Mychajło Hruszewskim o korelacjach między polityką i historią

Author(s): Julita Zielińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

Cierpienia młodego marksisty na Uniwersytecie Jagiellońskim (1950). Tadeusza Mariana Nowaka listy do władz Polski Ludowej

Author(s): Paweł Rutkowski / Language(s): Polish Issue: 9/2017

From the Editors

Author(s): Roman Michałowski,Richard Butterwick-Pawlikowski / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The Historical Region of East-Central Europe in Research into the History of Religion in the Early Modern Era

Author(s): Wojciech Kriegseisen / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The study contains the reflection on the usefulness of the notion East-Central Europe as a historical region in the research on confessional relations in the early modern era. It begins with the description of the discussion on regionalization of European history, with particular emphasis on the frequently ideologized division into East and West. Next, the author recalls the genesis of the notion of East-Central Europe as a historical region, which was introduced after the Second World War by Oskar Halecki, and the popularization of this notion in the second half of the twentieth century. In the author’s opinion, the most important criterion in the evaluation of usefulness of this construct should be its research functionality checked not in syntheses or reviews, but in detailed research into specific problems, including comparative research.

A Marriage of Convenience: the Roman Catholic Church and Modernity in Nineteenth-Century Europe

Author(s): Maciej Janowski / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The paper examines the problem of Dechristianization and secularization in nineteenth-century Europe, with a special emphasis on the Roman Catholic Church’s ways of reacting to modernity. The first part deals with changes in religious attitudes, on individual and collective levels, in the midst of rapid social and intellectual changes that took place in the nineteenth century. The building of the modern secular state structures was among the most important factors weakening the position of the established churches.The second part of the paper deals with the Roman Catholic Church. The argument of the author is that the Church managed to come to terms with modernity and to escape secularization at the price of supporting modern radical nationalism in the early twentieth century. The Church, especially since the times of Pope Leo XIII, chose to embrace modernity in its conservative form as an alternative to the dominant rationalist-liberal type. It was, nevertheless, a modernity, and the transformations of the Catholic Church throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries should be understood in terms of modernization (although unenthusiastic) rather than resistance to modernity. The problem of Catholic liberalism and the reasons for its rather moderate influence are also discussed.On the whole, Peter Berger was right in saying that ‘modernity is not necessarily secularizing; it is necessarily pluralizing’, that is it creates various possibilities of behaviour that can, but do not have to, lead to secularization.

The People’s Republic of Poland — a Sketch for Reflections on the Laicization of the State

Author(s): Jerzy Eisler / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The paper examines the problem of Dechristianization and secularization in nineteenth-century Europe, with a special emphasis on the Roman Catholic Church’s ways of reacting to modernity. The first part deals with changes in religious attitudes, on individual and collective levels, in the midst of rapid social and intellectual changes that took place in the nineteenth century. The building of the modern secular state structures was among the most important factors weakening the position of the established churches.The second part of the paper deals with the Roman Catholic Church. The argument of the author is that the Church managed to come to terms with modernity and to escape secularization at the price of supporting modern radical nationalism in the early twentieth century. The Church, especially since the times of Pope Leo XIII, chose to embrace modernity in its conservative form as an alternative to the dominant rationalist-liberal type. It was, nevertheless, a modernity, and the transformations of the Catholic Church throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries should be understood in terms of modernization (although unenthusiastic) rather than resistance to modernity. The problem of Catholic liberalism and the reasons for its rather moderate influence are also discussed.On the whole, Peter Berger was right in saying that ‘modernity is not necessarily secularizing; it is necessarily pluralizing’, that is it creates various possibilities of behaviour that can, but do not have to, lead to secularization.

Let’s Write a Better Book about Mieszko I!

Author(s): Grzegorz Pac / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The paper is a critical review of Przemysław Urbańczyk’s monograph on Mieszko I, but rather than being a systematic discussion of the whole work, it focuses on those issues discussed in the book, which concern the relations between archaeology and history. Fragments basing exclusively on archaeological research are considered the most valuable by the author, whereas he is more critical about those parts which are based on the on interpretation of written sources. He postulates that such works, relating to both archaeology and history, should be created in close cooperation between representatives of both disciplines.

The First Treachery of the West. On the Book by Andrzej Nowak

Author(s): Marek Kornat / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

The Polish-Soviet War (1919–20) is one of the key events in the process of implementation of the Versailles order in Eastern Europe. Having saved the Versailles deal, the war gave the nations of Central and Eastern Europe an extremely valuable opportunity, for twenty years, to decide about themselves and build their own nation states on the remnants of three empires, which disintegrated in the aftermath of the geopolitical revolution brought by the Great War (1914–18). From the very beginning, the West did not understand the geopolitical significance of the Polish-Soviet War, seen as a local conflict of two countries, triggered by ‘Polish imperialism’.

Better Not at All Than Not Well. A Review of a Biography of Władysław Gomułka

Author(s): Jerzy Eisler / Language(s): English Issue: 02 (en)/2017

Władysław Gomułka was the Polish communist leader who, most probably, played the most important role in the history of Poland. In the years 1943–48 he was the Secretary of the Polish Workers’ Party, and next, from 1956 to 1970, the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party. According to the rule ‘the more power the more responsibility’, which had particular significance in non-democratic systems, Gomułka was responsible or co-responsible for everything good but also for everything bad that happened in Poland during his rule. At the same time he is this Polish communist leader, on whose life and activity over twenty books were published. One of the recent ones was published by Anita Prażmowska. Unfortunately, this is not a successful attempt.

Doctrine and Politics in the Latin Biblical Poetry of Philip Melanchthon’s Silesian Disciples

Author(s): Angelika Modlińska-Piekarz / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2017

This article deals with selected works by Philip Melanchthon’s Silesian disciples who studied in Wittenberg in the years 1545–1560: Jacob Kuchler from Jelenia Góra (about 1526 – about 1572), Joannes Seckerwitz from Wrocław (about 1529 – about 1583), Thomas Mawer from Trzebiel (1536–1575), Caspar Pridmann from Głogów (1537–1598) and Laurentius Fabricius from Ruda (1539–1577). The article’s focus is on the doctrinal and political meaning of the works used as a tool in fighting the Catholic Church and in spreading Protestantism in the stormy era of the religious struggle waged in Silesia and in the entire territory of Central and Northern Europe. The texts analysed here also aimed to promote and spread Protestant doctrines and principles (sola gratia, solus Christus, sola fide, sola Scriptura, predestination, the repudiation of priesthood and celibacy) across the Empire, Poland, Prussia and Livonia.

Louvain Edition of the Vulgate and the New Testament in the Translation by Jakub Wujek from 1593 Study of Matthew 16:13–20

Author(s): Paulina Nicko-Stępień / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2017

The article is devoted to the influence of the Louvain edition of the Vulgate on the workshop of Jakub Wujek, one of the most famous sixteenth-century translators of the Bible. This relationship is shown based on the example of the pericope concerning the promise of the primacy of St. Peter from Matthew 16:13‒20. Until now, studies of the method of the Jesuit from Wągrowiec have availed themselves at random of various editions of the Vulgate (different from those used by the translator, including even modern translations), leading to erroneous conclusions about his workshop. The article comprises the exact editions on which Wujek based his work. This method enabled the discovery that the marginal notes added to the text by the translator were not compiled by him, but transcribed from the Louvain edition of the Vulgate.

Sources for the Textual Commentary of the 1593 Jakub Wujek’s New Testament Translation. Study of Acts 2:14–36

Author(s): Paulina Nicko-Stępień / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2017

The purpose of the article is to indicate sources for the textual commentary of the 1593 Jakub Wujek’s New Testament translation. This issue will be shown by the example of Acts 2:14–36. In his translation work, the Jesuit used the 1582 Rheims New Testament in English and a Latin commentary by Robert Bellarmine entitled Disputationes Christianae Fidei. The problem of sources for the Wujek’s New Testament translation was until now almost completely unresearched or researched erroneously. However, the collation of Wujek’s commentary with the commentaries from Bellamine’s work and the Rheims New Testament led to surprising results: Jakub Wujek, one of the most distinguished sixteenth-century biblical translators, most probably knew English and his textual commentary on the 1593 New Testament is a compilation of texts of the two above-mentioned works. This means that as a commentator Wujek was largely reproductive and dependent on sources and he did not use the works of the Church Fathers directly, but quoted passages from the already existing compendia.

A Dangerous Domain: Bartholomew Keckermann on History and Historiography

Author(s): Wojciech Ryczek / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2017

The main purpose of the paper is to present and discuss some Keckermann’s thoughts on history and the art of historiography, expressed in the treatise De natura et proprietatibus historiae commentarius (Hanovie 1610), published posthumously by his student, David Schumann. According to the humanist from Gdańsk, history is not art, science, or discipline, because it does not have own commonplaces (loci communes), regarded as the basis for method. Nevertheless, history plays an important role in teaching of the practical arts such as politics or economy, because it is an inexhaustible source of examples, taken from narratives about the past events to illustrate general rules related to human life and actions. An excellent historian would be only someone who is able to combine searching for the truth with frankness in its telling. Therefore, he is obliged to use a simple style without almost any rhetorical devices. In relation to single events history serves as a tool of description and explication. Thus it provides the necessary illustrative material in the form of examples for the practical disciplines.