The Medieval Teaching Aid. The Analysis of One Page from
the Manuscript by Jakub of Piotrków

The purpose of this paper is to characterize page 190v of the manuscript preserved in the Jagiellonian Library (cat. number 1297). The page in question contains prayers and commentaries. Hitherto, researchers have neglected this page, so it has not been thoroughly described and some elements of the layout have not been identified or have indeed been misidentified (cf. A. Brückner, W.R. Rzepka and W. Wydra, C.K. Święcki et al.). The foregoing research has considered the page as a separate item disregarding the surrounding pages. In this paper, the author discusses the page as a whole. This allowed her to ask new questions concerning: the writer’s intention, the function of the page, and the possible status of this old-Polish text.
In the main part of the paper, the author makes an attempt to reconstruct the sequence of writing the elements of the layout (page composition), paying special attention to the relations between the elements. According to the author, it is possible to reconstruct the probable sequence of the writer’s actions, and therefore to retrace the creative process of the scribe (known as Jakub of Piotrków, the Canon of Płock). The author assumes there were three stages of the writer’s work. In the first stage, he wrote Polish and Latin texts of Pater noster and Credo on the page. Then the page could have been used to lecture on the prayers or to teach how to memorize them.
Comparing the page at this stage with other known collections of basic prayers, we can eliminate the function of this record as a compendium or collection of common prayers. At later stages, the writer added the next elements: a commentary on the translation of the prayers into Polish, a-few-word explanations (e.g. “The Holy Trinity: The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit”, the division of water into snow, rain and ice), an abridged version of Credo, a Polish version of Ave Maria and a paraphrase of Our Father by Ludolf the Carthusian. In the analysis, the author points out the motivation behind the writing of consequent elements and their function (preaching and mnemonic). The last hypothetical stage of the creation of the page is writing down the text of Benedictiones mensae, not related to the elements mentioned before.
The applied research procedure, that is reconstructing the sequence of writing the texts on the page, allows the proposal of a hypothesis of how the creative process might have looked. The analysis proves that the writer’s intention could have changed as subsequent elements were being written on the page. At the first stage of writing, the page could have served as a theological lecture or mnemonic teaching aid facilitating the memorizing of the texts (both in Latin and Polish). The receivers could have been the congregation (taught the basic prayers in Polish) or clerical students and priests preparing for ministration (as the texts of prayers in Polish and Latin indicate). At the second stage, the function of the page becomes clear: it serves as the teaching aid during the lecturing of the articles of faith and explaining theological and linguistic matters (metatextual and metalinguistic commentary on the translations of prayers into Polish). This is why we should consider the presumptive receivers consisted not only of simple folks (as some of the elements on the page could not be applied, should the public have such a profile) but of clergymen or clerical students as well.
Certain elements of the page were selected for use depending on the audience of the lecture and its purpose. According to the latest research on the distinguishing features and character of old-Polish texts, we can assert that linguistic relics like this one, closely bound up with orality of the medieval language, are not (were not) complete works in their final shapes, but rather texts in statu nascendi. The discussed text is an example of a genuine teaching aid, that served the writer, Jakub of Płock, and after that – probably the next clergymen, in ministering.

Aemulatores Erasmi? „The Council of Women” in Polish Literature of XVI Century

The aim of this article is to present how the Polish renaissance authors creatively transformed and adapted to the native context one of Erasmus’ dialogues, Senatulus sive Gynaikosynedrion. The humanist exploited here a popular motif of a meeting of women who debate on different issues. The work is based on one of Aristophanes’ comedies as well as an episode from a biography of a Roman emperor, Heliogabal. Senatulus was very popular and was translated into a number of vernacular languages all over Europe. Erasmus, with his characteristic sense of humour and criticism, pointed to some vices of women, but did not stop there. He used a seemingly paradoxical formula of women’s council to draw attention to social and political problems of the time.
Early modern Polish texts developing the theme in question can be understood in the context of Polish parliamentarism. But their literary inspiration has to be taken into consideration as well. The first part of this article focuses on problematic aspects of Senatulus, its somewhat provocative and ambiguous character, which probably attracted authors to this particular text. Then two Polish dialogues that are linked to Erasmus’s work are examined. These are: anonymous Senatulus to jest sjem niewieści (Senatulus, or the council of women) from 1543 and Sjem niewieści (The council of women) written by Marcin Bielski in 1566/1567. Even a preliminary comparison of these two works with Erasmus’ colloquium indicates that the vernacular texts are a kind of sequel to the original and further develop its basic idea. References to the Latin version are present here on different levels. Similarity lays not only in the title and topics discussed by the characters, but also in the linguistic structure. In both cases, the concept of the female parliament was used by the writers as a pretext to draw attention to the political, social and economic problems Poland faced at that time and to suggest their own solutions.

La Judit by Guillaume Du Bartas (1574) and a paraphrase by Rafał Leszczyński (1620): genre form and ideological contexts

The objective of the article is a comparative analysis of the biblical epic La Judit (1574) by Calvinistic poet Guillaume Salluste Du Bartas and the Polish paraphrase written by Rafał Leszczyński (1620), who was the leader of Polish Protestants in Greater Poland. The current state of research on both poems is very modest: the works were discussed exclusively in introductions to the critical editions cited above. In the present article, the two versions have been compared on three aspects: epic poetics, confessional tinge and references to regicide, which was a contemporary issue in both countries in those times. The French poem is composed of six books and comprises 2,837 lines of 12 syllables each, rhyming AABB. The biblical narration was enriched with numerous allusions to contemporary events as well as digressions on both moral and political issues. It is written in a high style enriched with Homeric comparisons, characters’ speeches, descriptions and erudite catalogues. Leszczyński’s adaptation is shorter than the French original: it is composed of five books comprising 1,640 lines of 13 syllables each, rhyming AABB. This reduction owes to the removal of the digressions and contemporary allusions, without touching the qualities of the epic style.
The present analysis highlights the great independence of Leszczyński as a translator, in comparison to the original text, as well as du Bartas’ ideological intentions. The French oeuvre is an epic poem of high literary ambition as well as an expression of the author’s irenic views with regard to France’s destructive religious wars and his distance in relation to regicide concepts. Leszczyński moves away from the epic convention to the benefit of the genre form called biblical poetic tale. He coloured his version Polish, and due to the more condensed narration, he emphasizes the theological message of the poem and its Calvinistic character. The question of regicide is effaced in his paraphrase and replaced with a patriotic message. Due to its liberal attitude towards the French text, Leszczyński’s version may be classified as imitation rather than a translation of the French original.

Rejowe dykteryjki i kulturowe odsłanianie reformacyjnego dyskursu

(Paweł Stępień, Śmiech w czasach ostatecznych. Tematyka religijna w figlikach Mikołaja Reja, Warszawa 2013, ss. 179)