In 1916, it was the third year of the Great War, and there was no end in sight to the military struggle. All sides of the conflict were looking for new allies, although it was not so much about gaining more political supporters as it was about, above all, gaining more soldiers. For soldiers were…
Many film roles, dozens of opera roles, Jan Kiepura, the “second Caruso”, conquered the world with his golden voice and charisma. How did this Polish boxer become an internationally famous singer? by Magdalena Mikrut-Majeranek From sports to concert halls The road from sports to art was a bumpy one. Jan Kiepura was a man…
The intellectual history of the 16th century was the most prolific in Poland. At the end of the 15th century, the rich Polish nobility began to send their offspring on “Italian trips”, cultural and educational expeditions to universities on the Apennine Peninsula. In Padua, Rome, Venice and Florence, young Poles encountered Renaissance ideas which “fell…
The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the heart of the continent was one of the largest and most diverse European countries of the early modern age (16th-18th centuries), including the territories belonging nowadays to Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus and Ukraine, as well as scraps of Russia and Estonia. The Commonwealth was created as a result of the…
The passing of the Government Act was possible because an understanding had been reached between members of the enlightened opposition and the King, Stanisław August Poniatowski. by Piotr Ugniewski The turning point had been a long discussion between the leader of that opposition, Ignacy Potocki, and the monarch, at the Royal Castle, on 4 December…
We all know the poem by Władysław Bełza, “The Catechism of a Polish Child,” written in 1900, and we will all reply without a second thought: the white eagle. Still, it would not come amiss to wonder: why the eagle? by Beata Wolszczak The legendary Lech had resolved to settle in the flatlands, where…
