Józef Andrzej Gierowski

Józef Andrzej Gierowski (1981)

Józef Andrzej Gierowski , literary also Josef Gierowski (born March 19, 1922 in Czestochowa , † February 17, 2006 in Krakow ), was a Polish historian, rector of the University of Krakow and a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Polish Academy of Scholarship .

Live and act

Gierowski was a member of the Polish Home Army ( Armia Krajowa ) during the Second World War . He studied at the Kraków Underground University under Władysław Konopczyński and received his doctorate from the University of Wrocław in 1947 . In 1953 he took over the management of the Cracow-based Institute for the History of the Polish Academy of Sciences , at which since 1957 under the editing of Tadeusz Manteuffel the "History of Poland" ( Historia Polski ) and since 1960 under the editing of Karol Maleczyński the "History of Silesia “( Historia Śląska ) has been published in numerous volumes. For both series, Gierowski edited the depiction of the early modern period. Gierowski was also the editor of the 1956 edition series “Schlesische Urbare” ( Urbarze śląske ) and co-author of the 1958 “History of Wroclaw until 1807” ( Dzieje Wrocławia do roku 1807 ; together with Wacław Długoborski and Karol Maleczyński).

In 1965 Gierowski switched to the chair of Polish history from the 16th to 18th centuries. Century at the University of Cracow , where he was director of the Historical Institute from 1967 to 1972. From 1977 to 1981 Gierowski headed the Institute for Silesian History of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Wroclaw. For the newly published Historia Polski in Warsaw in 1978 , Gierowski edited the second part, which covered the period from 1505 to 1864; the work had twelve editions by 1988. In 1981 Gierowski was elected rector of the Cracow University and held this office until 1987. Under his rectorate, Pope John Paul II was awarded an honorary doctorate from the university in 1983 and the Research Center for Jewish Studies was opened in 1986, which Gierowski took over.

In 1989, the year of the revolution, Gierowski was appointed to the newly revived, traditional Polish Academy of Learning ( Polska Akademia Umiejętności ) and in 1990 he was appointed dean of the Academy's Faculty of Philosophy and History. In 1996 Gierowski's treatise on the Polish-Lithuanian aristocratic republic in the 18th century was published there. Gierowski was a founding member in 1991 and chairman of the foundation board of the Judaica Foundation in Krakow until 2001 . In 1993 he was appointed to the “Main Commission for the Study of Crimes against the Polish People” ( Główna Komisja Badania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu ) at the Institute for National Remembrance ( Instytut Pamięci Narodowej ). In 2001 Gierowski published the fifth part in the “Great History of Poland” ( Wielka historia Polski ), which deals with the history of the Polish Kingdom from 1648 to 1763.

Gierowski was honored with numerous awards, in Poland a. a. with the Order of the Rebirth of Poland II Class (1989), an honorary doctorate from the University of Wroclaw (1992) and the Cross of the Polish Home Army (1994).

Contribution to historiography

Gierowski was an excellent connoisseur of the later Polish-Lithuanian aristocratic republic (1569-1795). The studies he initiated about the reign of Augustus the Strong led to a revision of the views about the time of the Polish-Saxon personal union (1697–1763), of which German and Polish historiography since the second half of the 19th century has mainly had a negative image had been drawn. The turning point in scholarly considerations was marked by the anthology “Around the Polish Crown”, published by Gierowski in 1962 together with the Rostock Eastern European historian Johannes Kalisch (1928–2002), which triggered numerous new studies on the history of Saxon-Polish relations, especially in Poland.

German and Polish historians see Gierowski's merit not only in having deconstructed the “black legend of the Saxon times” (Michael Komaszynski) in the history of Poland. Even more important was that the studies of Gierowski and his students sharpened that "eye for the differences in the relations of individual German states with Poland" (Jacek Staszewski) that had existed in the age of nationalism and due to the aggressive Prussian-German policy towards Poland the Bismarck era had been lost.

Gierowski has also made great contributions to the promotion and understanding of Jewish history and culture in Poland; It was a particular concern of his, as he himself emphasized in 1986 at the inauguration of the Research Center for Jewish Studies at the Cracow University, to help to break down existing reservations and prejudices against Jewish fellow citizens.

Publications (selection)

• Sejmik generalny Księstwa Mazowieckiego na tle ustroju sejmikowego Mazowsza [= The general assembly of the Principality of Mazovia in the system of the Mazovian provinces], Breslau 1948.
• Między saskim absolutyzmem, a złotą wolnością. Z dziejów wewnętrznych Rzeczypospolitej w latach 1712–1715 [= Between Saxon absolutism and golden freedom. From the history of internal conditions in Poland 1712–1715], Breslau 1953.
• Prussia and the project of a coup d'état in Poland in 1715 (On the Genesis of the Tarnogród Confederation), in: Yearbook for the History of the USSR and the People's Democratic Countries of Europe, Vol. 3 (1959), pp. 296-317.
• Personal or Real Union? On the history of the Polish-Saxon relations after Poltava, in: Johannes Kalisch, Józef Gierowski (eds.): To the Polish crown. Saxony and Poland during the Northern War 1700–1721, Berlin (East) 1962 (series of publications by the Commission of Historians of the GDR and People's Poland; Vol. 1), pp. 254–291.
• Historia Polski 1492–1864, Warsaw 1967.
• Historia Polski, T. 2: 1505–1864, 2 vols., Warsaw 1978, 12th ed. 1988.
• The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. From Anarchy to Well-Organized State (Academia Scientiarum et Litterarum Polona; Dissertationes Facultatis Historico-Philosophicae, Vol. 82), Krakau 1996.
• Wielka historia Polski, Vol. 5: Rzeczpospolita w dobie złotej wolności (1648–1763) [= Great History of Poland, Vol. 5: The Republic at the Time of Golden Freedom (1648–1763)], Krakow 2001.
• One ruler - two states: The Saxon-Polish personal union as a problem for the monarch from a Polish perspective, in: Rex Rexheuser (ed.): The personal unions of Saxony-Poland 1697–1763 and Hanover-England 1714–1837. A comparison, Wiesbaden 2005 (German Historical Institute Warsaw; Sources and Studies, Vol. 18), pp. 121–152.

literature

• Karl Czok: On the reassessment of the Saxon-Polish Union (1697–1763), in: Poland and Saxony - Between proximity and distance, Dresden 1997 (Dresdner Hefte; No. 50), pp. 9–16.
• Michael Komaszynski: August the Strong and his rule on the Vistula in the mirror of Polish historiography, in: Saxony and the Wettiners - Chances and Realities. International scientific conference, Dresden, 27. – 29. June 1989, Dresden 1990, pp. 132-138.
• Andrzej Link-Lenczowski, Mariusz Markiewicz (eds.): Rzeczpospolita wielu narodów i jej tradycje. Materialy z konferencji “Trzysta lat od początku unii polsko-saskiej: Rzeczpospolita wielu narodów i jej tradycje”, Kraków 15–17 IX 1997 r. [= The republic of both nations and their tradition. Materials for the conference "Three Hundred Years Since the Beginning of the Polish-Saxon Union: The Republic of Both Nations and Their Tradition", Krakow, 15. – 17.IX.1997], Krakau 1999 [p. 227–257 List of Gierowski's writings] .
• Jacek Staszewski: Poland and Saxony in the 18th century, in: Yearbook for History, Vol. 23 (1981), pp. 167–188; Ders .: The Polish Aristocratic Republic in the 18th Century in the Light of Recent Research, in: Journal for East Central Europe Research, Vol. 52 (2003), pp. 572-583; Ders .: Saxony, in: Andreas Lawaty, Hubert Orłowski (eds.): Germans and Poles. History, culture, politics, Munich 2003, pp. 166–172.

Footnotes

1. ↑ See the information on the homepage of the Chair of Jewish Studies at the University of Krakow ( memento of the original dated November 7, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  

Web links

• Literature by and about Józef Andrzej Gierowski in the catalog of the German National Library
• Publications by and about Józef Andrzej Gierowski at Litdok East Central Europe / Herder Institute (Marburg)