W niewoli. Doświadczenie jenieckie i jego konteksty na przestrzeni dziejów, red. M. Jarząbek, M. Stachura, P. Szlanta, Kraków, 2019
Tatar incursions into the south-eastern territory of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in early mode... more Tatar incursions into the south-eastern territory of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in early modern period had an extremely degrading effect on the functioning of the economy and demographic development of the areas affected by those slave hunting operations. However, as the military operations pursued by Tatar hordes were asymmetric, their impact was much broader, extending to multi-aspect socio-cultural processes which still await in-depth recognition by historical sciences. Some of these processes can be termed anomic, a social condition characterized by instability, desintegration and sense of anxiety. In the historical perspective, Tatar slave raids were the most traumatic experience, of existential significance, to the populations inhabiting the south-eastern provinces of the Kingdom of Poland, one of their consequences having been the post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This disease entity must have affected a considerable portion of the several hundred thousand captives abducted from the Poland-Lithuania’s territory by Tatar warriors in the seventeenth century. Among the main stressors that triggered traumatic experiences in the attacked communities was the practice of inciting large-scale fires of the built-up areas and economic infrastructures of villages and smaller urban centres. The particularly devastating practice of taking captives was frequently combined with demonstrative killing of the dwellers of the settlements under attack. Based on seventeenth-century source material of varied origin, the author traces the manifestations of traumatic experiences, highlighting the testimonies of psychic disorders among the people who were subjected to traumatising and limit experiences. The latter typically included brutally violent attacks of Tatar troops and the immediately consequent captivity — and, in most of the cases, exhaustive transfer of the captives towards the Black Sea steppes and conclusive separation from their closest relatives.
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of the Polish-Lithuanian state from the late 15th to the end of the 17th century. Since military operations conducted by Tatar hordes were asymmetric warfare profile, focusing on civilian communities, mostly in rural areas, they constituted an existential threat to the civilians living there. This stemmed from the impact of such unconventional
military operations, which included catastrophic damages to buildings and economic infrastructure of attacked villages, as well as significant demographic losses, suffered by local populations. Thus, Tatar slave raids have left a permanent mark in the collective memory of victimized communities. The author utilizes a broad base of source materials dating back to 17th and 18th century, including narrative sources, visitation files of Latin Przemyśl diocese, treasury and tax sources, to focus on the transformation process of communicative (generational) memory into cultural memory. The latter began to memories into cultural memory were the representatives of local intellectual elites, most
often Catholic priests. Their activities, referring to the sacrum-profanum dichotomy and the providentialism idea, popular in the 17th–18th century Commonwealth, indicate a socially conditioned process of forming a cultural memory within the framework
of symbolically objectified and highly structured narrative, relating directly to Christian religion, which on one hand transcended individual experience of the members of local community, and on the other, responded to current social and cultural needs.
form around mid-18th century, when the last generation that directly witnessed Tatar pillage raids started dying out. Cultural memory is understood here — after German cultural studies scholar and Egyptologist Jan Assmann — as exteriorized and objectifi ed
memory of the given community about its own traumatic past. It is transmitted through textual sources and oral tradition, often supported by various “places of memory” existing in the local landscape, both material and intangible with great symbolic potential, such as legends, folk tales and songs. It seems that figures of key importance in transforming local communicative memories into cultural memory were the representatives of local intellectual elites, most often Catholic priests. Their activities, referring to the sacrum-profanum dichotomy and the providentialism idea, popular in the 17th–18th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, indicate a socially conditioned process of forming a cultural memory within the framework of symbolically objectifi ed and highly structured narrative, relating directly to Christian religion, which on one hand transcended individual experience of the members of local community, and on the other, responded to current social and cultural needs.
The article presents basic defence strategies, both collective and individual ones, used by civilians during Tatar raids into the south-eastern lands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth throughout the seventeenth century. The phenomenon of Tatar invasions into aforementioned parts of Poland-Lithuania in the early modern period was for the population of those territories an existential threat. The main reason was the strategy of asymmetric warfare used by Tatar troops. It meant that Tatar commanders avoided military clashes with enemy units while at the same time were giving high priority to attacks against civilian communities, regarded as the human cargo, and to destruction of buildings and economic infrastructure, mainly in rural areas. In response to this lengthy state of threat the people of the south-eastern lands of the Commonwealth developed different defence strategies, both on an individual and collective level, which were to protect their lives, freedom and properties. An analysis based on various sources has demonstrated that people attacked by Tatars used a suprisingly broad array of defence strategies. Interestingly, they included not only the hard military solution against the aggressors (fight), as it was presented until recently in the literature on this subject. Apart from the dominant defence reaction in the form of escape, there were also used more sophisticated "soft" methods to neutralise this type of military threat, such as, for example, negotiations with Tatars, persuasion and various forms of cooperation, mainly tactical one with the enemies. All this show a pragmatic approach of the threatened populations to the problems with their safety and security.
AND TRADING URBAN CENTRES IN LESSER POLAND AGAINST
THE BACKDROP OF THE LOCATION PROCESSES AND SPATIAL
DEVELOPMENT IN THE LATE MIDDLE AGES
The article addresses the complex issues regarding in the growth and
development of small Lesser Polish centres engaged in craftsmanship
and commercial exchange in late medieval times. I present the “case
study” of Strzyżów and Czudec, two old rural settlements in the border
zone between the Kingdom of Poland and Halych Rus’ (the Principality
of Galicia–Volhynia) which by the 14th – 15th centuries had developed
into towns. I examine the factors which determined their transformation
into small centres for craftsmanship and commercial exchange
in this part of Lesser Poland. I have tried not to overlook the political
and socio-economic processes in the late 14th- and early 15th-century
Kingdom of Poland, as it expanded politically and its demographic and
economic power rose at a rapid rate. On the other hand, I have also made an effort not to lose sight of the local conditions and pay due attention to the role of the Strzeżowski family, hereditary lords of the Strzyżów-Czudec manor estates in the area, in the creation and furtherance of good prospects of socio-economic development for both of these towns. It was displayed by the active support of the location processes, which has resulted in a rapid spatial development of Strzyżów and Czudec in the late medieval period.
Voivodeship) belonged to these parts of the Kingdom of
Poland, and from 1569 the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth,
which for several centuries, from late Middle Ages to the end of
the 17th century, were affected by extremely destructive Tatar
invasions. For several centuries Tatar military expeditions to
the Polish and Lithuanian territories that aimed at robbing and
terrorising local population were an excellent tool used by the
Crimean Khanate, and also periodically by the rulers of the Ottoman
Empire who employed subordinate Nogai tribes, for forcing
the kings of Poland to pass special fees and levies, which
was guaranteed in Polish-Ottoman and Polish-Tatar peace treaties.
These fees, referred to as “gifts”, were a relic of the Mongol
and Tatar supremacy over Ruthenian territories in the times of
the Golden Horde.
A long-term threat of rapacious invasions of the Tatars from
Crimea and Budjak and their catastrophic economic and demographic
effects were not the only consequences of the military
activity of Tatar hordes on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian
Commonwealth. This multi-dimensional and periodically very
intensive impact of Tatar cavalry raids must have caused the
formation of a specific cultural discourse and collective memory
reproduction processes in communities that were threatened
existentially, exploited economically and drained demographically.
The strength and remarkable durability of the collective
memory of Tatar attacks is primarily a result of such factors as
distance and strangeness of aggressors in terms of civilization,
culture and religion, but the specific character of the activities
carried out by the Tatars was an even more important factor
that generated collective memory of the attacked community.
A characteristic feature of Tatar operations was the application
of asymmetric warfare consisting in concentration of operational
efforts in the civil sphere, which was reflected mostly in
conducting expropriating operations and taking the defenceless
people, mainly from rural areas, into captivity. Collective
memory related to the historical phenomenon of Tatar invasions
has been preserved in legends, songs, sayings, folk proverbs
and beliefs transmitted from generation to generation in
local communities (oral history) and in specific elements of religious
ceremonies. A characteristic feature of these traditional
records, despite their quite considerable diversity in form and
content, was the presence of the idea of providentialism, a belief
in particular care of God over the Commonwealth and the communities
of the faithful that were threatened by the attacks of
hostile forces.
The above-mentioned historiosophical vision was not only
popular among the nobility and bourgeoisie, but also among the
broad group of the peasant population, and slightly later penetrated
into their awareness by means of the parishes of the Catholic
as well as the Orthodox, and later the United Church. The
narrative structures of the legends frequently contain motives
of wonderful divine interventions, often associated with the devotion
to the Virgin Mary and supernatural meteorological phenomena
that saved lives and freedom of people and brought salvation
for cities and villages threatened with destruction. There
are also many legends with moral and educational content,
which refer to the figures of renegades who, during Tatar attacks,
betrayed and shared their knowledge with hostile troops
for various reasons. From the social point of view, an important
role of legends and folk stories related to Tatars was their therapeutic
and compensating role as well as an inscription of Tatar
threats into the existing system of terms and values.
It should be emphasized that collective memory of the Tatar
attacks was strengthened, consolidated and reproduced also due
to the symbolism present in iconography of sacral buildings and
in the local cultural landscape in the form of roadside shrines,
crosses and mounds. The product of synergistic connection of
influences of intangible and tangible memory carriers, which
interconnect by using a dialectically complicated intergenerational
communication network, was a creation of collective
memory, consolidated by means of official historical and religious
discourses that constitute its social frame. Durability as
well as catastrophic economic and demographic effects of Tatar
invasions caused the situation where the contacts between the
peasant population of the Commonwealth and the warriors
from Crimea and Budjak became a border experience and foundational
trauma that affected the formation of identity of local
communities as a confrontation of different values and lifestyles
originating from different civilization and cultural circles. For
this reason the centuries of nomad invasions, which were in fact
a dramatic, intercultural conflict and “the clash of civilizations”,
may be defined – following the concept of Pierre Nora – as one
of the central and symbolic “places of memory” (lieu de mémoire),
having a multi-dimensional impact on the Polish culture.
Books by Andrzej Gliwa
of the Polish-Lithuanian state from the late 15th to the end of the 17th century. Since military operations conducted by Tatar hordes were asymmetric warfare profile, focusing on civilian communities, mostly in rural areas, they constituted an existential threat to the civilians living there. This stemmed from the impact of such unconventional
military operations, which included catastrophic damages to buildings and economic infrastructure of attacked villages, as well as significant demographic losses, suffered by local populations. Thus, Tatar slave raids have left a permanent mark in the collective memory of victimized communities. The author utilizes a broad base of source materials dating back to 17th and 18th century, including narrative sources, visitation files of Latin Przemyśl diocese, treasury and tax sources, to focus on the transformation process of communicative (generational) memory into cultural memory. The latter began to memories into cultural memory were the representatives of local intellectual elites, most
often Catholic priests. Their activities, referring to the sacrum-profanum dichotomy and the providentialism idea, popular in the 17th–18th century Commonwealth, indicate a socially conditioned process of forming a cultural memory within the framework
of symbolically objectified and highly structured narrative, relating directly to Christian religion, which on one hand transcended individual experience of the members of local community, and on the other, responded to current social and cultural needs.
form around mid-18th century, when the last generation that directly witnessed Tatar pillage raids started dying out. Cultural memory is understood here — after German cultural studies scholar and Egyptologist Jan Assmann — as exteriorized and objectifi ed
memory of the given community about its own traumatic past. It is transmitted through textual sources and oral tradition, often supported by various “places of memory” existing in the local landscape, both material and intangible with great symbolic potential, such as legends, folk tales and songs. It seems that figures of key importance in transforming local communicative memories into cultural memory were the representatives of local intellectual elites, most often Catholic priests. Their activities, referring to the sacrum-profanum dichotomy and the providentialism idea, popular in the 17th–18th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, indicate a socially conditioned process of forming a cultural memory within the framework of symbolically objectifi ed and highly structured narrative, relating directly to Christian religion, which on one hand transcended individual experience of the members of local community, and on the other, responded to current social and cultural needs.
The article presents basic defence strategies, both collective and individual ones, used by civilians during Tatar raids into the south-eastern lands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth throughout the seventeenth century. The phenomenon of Tatar invasions into aforementioned parts of Poland-Lithuania in the early modern period was for the population of those territories an existential threat. The main reason was the strategy of asymmetric warfare used by Tatar troops. It meant that Tatar commanders avoided military clashes with enemy units while at the same time were giving high priority to attacks against civilian communities, regarded as the human cargo, and to destruction of buildings and economic infrastructure, mainly in rural areas. In response to this lengthy state of threat the people of the south-eastern lands of the Commonwealth developed different defence strategies, both on an individual and collective level, which were to protect their lives, freedom and properties. An analysis based on various sources has demonstrated that people attacked by Tatars used a suprisingly broad array of defence strategies. Interestingly, they included not only the hard military solution against the aggressors (fight), as it was presented until recently in the literature on this subject. Apart from the dominant defence reaction in the form of escape, there were also used more sophisticated "soft" methods to neutralise this type of military threat, such as, for example, negotiations with Tatars, persuasion and various forms of cooperation, mainly tactical one with the enemies. All this show a pragmatic approach of the threatened populations to the problems with their safety and security.
AND TRADING URBAN CENTRES IN LESSER POLAND AGAINST
THE BACKDROP OF THE LOCATION PROCESSES AND SPATIAL
DEVELOPMENT IN THE LATE MIDDLE AGES
The article addresses the complex issues regarding in the growth and
development of small Lesser Polish centres engaged in craftsmanship
and commercial exchange in late medieval times. I present the “case
study” of Strzyżów and Czudec, two old rural settlements in the border
zone between the Kingdom of Poland and Halych Rus’ (the Principality
of Galicia–Volhynia) which by the 14th – 15th centuries had developed
into towns. I examine the factors which determined their transformation
into small centres for craftsmanship and commercial exchange
in this part of Lesser Poland. I have tried not to overlook the political
and socio-economic processes in the late 14th- and early 15th-century
Kingdom of Poland, as it expanded politically and its demographic and
economic power rose at a rapid rate. On the other hand, I have also made an effort not to lose sight of the local conditions and pay due attention to the role of the Strzeżowski family, hereditary lords of the Strzyżów-Czudec manor estates in the area, in the creation and furtherance of good prospects of socio-economic development for both of these towns. It was displayed by the active support of the location processes, which has resulted in a rapid spatial development of Strzyżów and Czudec in the late medieval period.
Voivodeship) belonged to these parts of the Kingdom of
Poland, and from 1569 the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth,
which for several centuries, from late Middle Ages to the end of
the 17th century, were affected by extremely destructive Tatar
invasions. For several centuries Tatar military expeditions to
the Polish and Lithuanian territories that aimed at robbing and
terrorising local population were an excellent tool used by the
Crimean Khanate, and also periodically by the rulers of the Ottoman
Empire who employed subordinate Nogai tribes, for forcing
the kings of Poland to pass special fees and levies, which
was guaranteed in Polish-Ottoman and Polish-Tatar peace treaties.
These fees, referred to as “gifts”, were a relic of the Mongol
and Tatar supremacy over Ruthenian territories in the times of
the Golden Horde.
A long-term threat of rapacious invasions of the Tatars from
Crimea and Budjak and their catastrophic economic and demographic
effects were not the only consequences of the military
activity of Tatar hordes on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian
Commonwealth. This multi-dimensional and periodically very
intensive impact of Tatar cavalry raids must have caused the
formation of a specific cultural discourse and collective memory
reproduction processes in communities that were threatened
existentially, exploited economically and drained demographically.
The strength and remarkable durability of the collective
memory of Tatar attacks is primarily a result of such factors as
distance and strangeness of aggressors in terms of civilization,
culture and religion, but the specific character of the activities
carried out by the Tatars was an even more important factor
that generated collective memory of the attacked community.
A characteristic feature of Tatar operations was the application
of asymmetric warfare consisting in concentration of operational
efforts in the civil sphere, which was reflected mostly in
conducting expropriating operations and taking the defenceless
people, mainly from rural areas, into captivity. Collective
memory related to the historical phenomenon of Tatar invasions
has been preserved in legends, songs, sayings, folk proverbs
and beliefs transmitted from generation to generation in
local communities (oral history) and in specific elements of religious
ceremonies. A characteristic feature of these traditional
records, despite their quite considerable diversity in form and
content, was the presence of the idea of providentialism, a belief
in particular care of God over the Commonwealth and the communities
of the faithful that were threatened by the attacks of
hostile forces.
The above-mentioned historiosophical vision was not only
popular among the nobility and bourgeoisie, but also among the
broad group of the peasant population, and slightly later penetrated
into their awareness by means of the parishes of the Catholic
as well as the Orthodox, and later the United Church. The
narrative structures of the legends frequently contain motives
of wonderful divine interventions, often associated with the devotion
to the Virgin Mary and supernatural meteorological phenomena
that saved lives and freedom of people and brought salvation
for cities and villages threatened with destruction. There
are also many legends with moral and educational content,
which refer to the figures of renegades who, during Tatar attacks,
betrayed and shared their knowledge with hostile troops
for various reasons. From the social point of view, an important
role of legends and folk stories related to Tatars was their therapeutic
and compensating role as well as an inscription of Tatar
threats into the existing system of terms and values.
It should be emphasized that collective memory of the Tatar
attacks was strengthened, consolidated and reproduced also due
to the symbolism present in iconography of sacral buildings and
in the local cultural landscape in the form of roadside shrines,
crosses and mounds. The product of synergistic connection of
influences of intangible and tangible memory carriers, which
interconnect by using a dialectically complicated intergenerational
communication network, was a creation of collective
memory, consolidated by means of official historical and religious
discourses that constitute its social frame. Durability as
well as catastrophic economic and demographic effects of Tatar
invasions caused the situation where the contacts between the
peasant population of the Commonwealth and the warriors
from Crimea and Budjak became a border experience and foundational
trauma that affected the formation of identity of local
communities as a confrontation of different values and lifestyles
originating from different civilization and cultural circles. For
this reason the centuries of nomad invasions, which were in fact
a dramatic, intercultural conflict and “the clash of civilizations”,
may be defined – following the concept of Pierre Nora – as one
of the central and symbolic “places of memory” (lieu de mémoire),
having a multi-dimensional impact on the Polish culture.