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This book makes a contribution to ongoing European research into the political discourse of the early modern era, analyzing the political discourse of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569–1795). The sources comprise the broadly understood political literature from the end of the sixteenth century until the end of the eighteenth century. The author has selected and analysed concepts and ideas that are particularly important for the noble political discourse, with the aim of understanding what these concepts meant for the participants in public debate, who used them, how they explained and described the world, how they allowed for the formulation of political postulates and ideals, whether their meaning changed over time, and if so, then to what extent and under what influences. The author’s research focuses not only on the understanding of the concepts that functioned in the period under study but also on their use as instruments in the political struggle. The book is addressed to readers from the academic milieu – students and researchers – but is likewise accessible to less prepared readers interested in the history of political language and concepts as well as the history of political thought.
The history of eastern European is dominated by the story of the rise of the Russian empire, yet Russia only emerged as a major power after 1700. For 300 years the greatest power in Eastern Europe was the union between the kingdom of Poland and the grand duchy of Lithuania, one of the longest-lasting political unions in European history. Yet because it ended in the late-eighteenth century in what are misleadingly termed the Partitions of Poland, it barely features in standard accounts of European history. The Making of the Polish-Lithuanian Union 1385-1569 tells the story of the formation of a consensual, decentralised, multinational, and religiously plural state built from below as much as above, that was founded by peaceful negotiation, not war and conquest. From its inception in 1385-6, a vision of political union was developed that proved attractive to Poles, Lithuanians, Ruthenians, and Germans, a union which was extended to include Prussia in the 1450s and Livonia in the 1560s. Despite the often bitter disagreements over the nature of the union, these were nevertheless overcome by a republican vision of a union of peoples in one political community of citizens under an elected monarch. Robert Frost challenges interpretations of the union informed by the idea that the emergence of the sovereign nation state represents the essence of political modernity, and presents the Polish-Lithuanian union as a case study of a composite state. The modern history of Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Belarus cannot be understood without an understanding of the legacy of the Polish-Lithuanian union. This volume is the first detailed study of the making of that union ever published in English.
A major new assessment of the "vanished kingdom" of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth--one which recognizes its achievements before its destruction Richard Butterwick tells the compelling story of the last decades of one of Europe's largest and least understood polities: the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Drawing on the latest research, Butterwick vividly portrays the turbulence the Commonwealth experienced. Far from seeing it as a failed state, he shows the ways in which it overcame the stranglehold of Russia and briefly regained its sovereignty, the crowning success of which took place on 3 May 1791--the passing of the first Constitution of modern Europe.
A landmark study of republican discourse in sixteenth-century Poland-Lithuania and its original contribution to early modern republicanism.
This book traces the history of an idea of freedom in political thought in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from its emergence following the Union of Lublin in 1569 to its collapse in 1795.
This work is an attempt to change thinking not only on the political practice and the role of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in a European context (both East and West), but to also connect the early modern past with present notions of citizenship and participatory political systems.
Robert Frost examines the reasons for the collapse of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth after the Swedish invasion of 1655.
For four centuries, the Polish�Lithuanian state encompassed a major geographic region comparable to present-day Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Latvia, Estonia, and Romania. Governed by a constitutional monarchy that offered the numerous nobility extensive civil and political rights, it enjoyed unusual domestic tranquility, for its military strength kept most enemies at bay until the mid-seventeenth century and the country generally avoided civil wars. Selling grain and timber to western Europe helped make it exceptionally wealthy for much of the period. The Polish�Lithuanian State, 1386�1795 is the first account in English devoted specifically to this important era. It takes a regional rather than a national approach, considering the internal development of the Ukrainian, Jewish, Lithuanian, and Prussian German nations that coexisted with the Poles in this multinational state. Presenting Jewish history also clarifies urban history, because Jews lived in the unincorporated "private cities" and suburbs, which historians have overlooked in favor of incorporated "royal cities." In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the private cities and suburbs often thrived while the inner cities decayed. The book also traces the institutional development of the Roman Catholic Church in Poland�Lithuania, one of the few European states to escape bloody religious conflict during the Reformation and Counter Reformation. Both seasoned historians and general readers will appreciate the many excellent brief biographies that advance the narrative and illuminate the subject matter of this comprehensive and absorbing volume.
Ancient Models in the Early Modern Republican Imagination, edited by Wyger Velema and Arthur Weststeijn, approaches the early modern republican political imagination from a fresh perspective. While most scholars agree on the importance of the classical world to early modern republican theorists, its role is all too often described in rather abstract and general terms such as “classical republicanism” or the “neo-roman theory of free states”. The contributions to this volume propose a different approach and all focus on the specific ways in which ancient republics such as Rome, Athens, Sparta, and the Hebrew Republic served as models for early modern republican thought. The result is a novel interpretation of the impact of antiquity on early modern republicanism.
Unintended Affinities examines the ways in which German and Polish historians of the nineteenth-century regarded the Holy Roman Empire and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The book parallels how historians approached the old Reich and the Commonwealth within the framework of their national history. Kożuchowski analyzes how German and Polish nationalistic historians, who played central roles in propagandizing a glorious past that justified a centralized modern state, struggled with how to portray the very decentralized and multi-ethnic empires that preceded their time.