Jan Malecki

Johannes Maletius (name variants: Johann Maletius, Johannes Maletzki, Jan z Sącza, Ioannes Sandecensis, Jan Malecki-Sandecki, Hans von Sandaz; * around 1482 in Nowy Sącz in the Kingdom of Poland ; † summer or autumn 1567 in Lyck , Duchy of Prussia ) was a Printer, Lutheran clergyman and translator of the Reformation period.

Life

From 1522 to 1528 Maletius was a printer in Cracow . He then set up a printing house in Pułtusk at the instigation of the Bishop of Płock . In September 1536 he moved first to Royal Prussia , then to the Duchy of Prussia (he first stayed in Marienburg ), where he converted to the Protestant faith, supported by Bishop Paul Speratus .

Bishop Speratus then suggested to Duke Albrecht of Prussia to make him Polish Protestant Archpriest of Lyck in the Duchy of Prussia near the border with the Polish Kingdom. The duke was initially reluctant, since he was a printer, not a priest (letter of March 21, 1537). At that time he was already active as "the prince's book printer" (mostly producing his Polish, Protestant writings in Königsberg ). However, in May 1537 he was picked up from Marienwerder in the Duchy of Prussia, where he was now staying, and appointed pastor and archpriest of Lyck by the Duke, for which he was to receive 60 marks a year - but he has “complete security in the new doctrines not acquired ". Soon after starting his work, he was warned that in future he should refrain from using "unusual words" at a baptism; He had declared "that church baptism does little to help you to be saved" and also said something wrong about predestination (letter from the Duke to Bishop Speratus, December 24, 1537).

Maletius received an estate near Lyck from Duke Albrecht (named after him "Maleczewo", later Malleszewen, 6 km southwest of Lyck), on which he was able to set up an office (printing workshop ). Not a single one of his Lycker prints is known to date; “Perhaps some of the same can be found somewhere in Polish libraries” (document book 1890). On October 16, 1544 he received land on Lake Rygiel (5 Hufen , 20 Mzg. [Old Russian unit of measurement], later called Adl. Gut Regelitzen, seven kilometers southeast of Lyck).

Around 1550 Johann Maletius was given a three-year vacation to work for the Duke in Olita and Nieśwież near Vilnius in the Polish Lithuania, Mr. Nicolaus Radziwill , “for the production of etzliche printing”. He kept the pastoral position in Lyck, but provided a deputy. In 1552 Maletius began printing his Polish translation of the New Testament in his printing house in Regelitzen near Lyck .

Not long before his death, on May 28, 1567, he signed the Repetitio corporis doctrinae prutensiae .

Act

Maletius was initially active as a printer in Cracow and Pułtusk in Poland, later in Lyck and Königsberg in the Duchy of Prussia and near Vilnius in Lithuania . In Prussia, Poles were very much in demand for their position, since many of the Prussian church leaders spoke no Polish, although a large part of the population had immigrated from Mazovia ; the bishop Paul Speratus of Pomesania was z. B. responsible for the southern part of Prussia (since the 18th century also unofficially referred to as Masuria ); without Maletius he could not have administered this office at all. Maletius became an important promoter of the Reformation of the Polish-speaking population from the surrounding area in Prussia. Maletius spoke German, Polish, Latin, Czech and Ruthenian.

In 1546 he printed Luther's little catechism in Polish. 1546, he wrote to the Königsberg University rector Georg Sabinus his famous letter about the religious nature of the ancient Baltic peoples Liven and Prussians and is so at the beginning of the scientific study of the ancient people of the Prussians and Prussians , which was then pursued in the Prussian nor their customs and still used their language, which became extinct afterwards. He was one of the last witnesses to the culture of this people, which later became part of the dominant German culture and took over the German language (or Masurian dialects). His son had given him an elegy from the Königsberg university rector Sabinus to Cardinal Bembo, in which he speaks of the sacrifice of goats and snakes occurring among the "Sarmatian peoples" ( Prussians , Samogitians, Lithuanians , Ruthenians etc.). Maletius then described in his letter in detail the sacrifices and rites at weddings, funerals, funeral celebrations, etc., some of which he knew from his own experience. As early as 1551 the letter appeared in a pirated print by Thomas Horner at Luft in Königsberg and was published in 1562 by the same printer (Luft) in a second edition in Wittenberg. Since this edition was flawed, the following year, 1563, the son Jerome published an authentic edition of the letter.

family

He came from the Polish noble family Malecki-Sandecki. His son Hieronymus Maletius succeeded him as archpriest and, like him, worked as a printer and translator.

Prints

• Catechism (luterański) ... przez Jana Maleczkiego S [andeckiego]. Królewiec 1546. Available in Toruń - Biblioteka Uniwersytetu im. Mikołaja Kopernika (Luther's Catechism)

Works

• Epistula de sacrificiis et idolatria veterum Borussorum ... Königsberg 1551

This work experienced the following editions:

• Thomas Horner: Livoniae historia ... De sacrificiis et idolatria veterum Livonum et Borussorum libellus Ioannis Menecii [sic!], In Academia Regii montis: Ioannes Lufft 1551, 4 °, signed: Ha 3048o adl. 8th; Secondary title: De sacrificiis et idolatria veterum Borussorum et Livonum aliarumque vicinarum gentium, ad clarissimum virum doctorem Georgium Sabinum illustrissimi ducis Prussiae etc. consiliarium . Ioannes Meletius [sic!]. Digitized by the WDB
• Libellus de sacrificiis et idolatria Borussorum, Livonum aliarumque vicinarum gentium, ad clarissimum virum doctorem Georgium Sabinum illustrissimi principis Prussiae etc. consiliarium scriptus per Joannem Maletium. [Regimonti 1563] 4 °, signed: Oa 7678o adl.3; Nl 818o adl. 1 b
• Libellus de religione et sacrificiis idolatricis veterum Borussorum, Livonum, Litauorum, aliarumque gentium vicinarum . Secondary title: De religione et sacrificiis veterum Borussorum, libellus Ioanni Meletii olim viro clarissimo Georgio Sabino exhibitus , s. l. 1573. Digital version of the SBB
• Paulus Oderborn : De Russorum religione ... ad Davidem Chytraeum recens scripta, alia eiusdem argumenti de sacrificiis, nuptiis et funeribus veterum Borussorum [Joh. Meletii] ad ... Georgium Sabinum olim missa . Excusae anno 1582 8 °, signed: Uph. o. 5089 adl. 5; Hf 162508o adl. 4; Hf 427752 8o adl. 3; Nc 3228o adl. 2 ("increased and improved by his son Hieron. Pastor of Bialla", according to Christian Gottlieb Jöcher );
• idem, Rostochii 1582 4 °, signed: From 258o adl. 2; Nl 438o adl. 4;
• Reprinted in: Acta borussica . Volume 2, 1731, pp. 401-412.
• Frankfurt collectione script. Polon. Volume II, p. 417 (as quoted by Christian Gottlieb Jöcher )
• German translation in: Messages of the Litterarian Society Masovia . Volume 8, 1902, pp. 177-196.

literature

• Christian Gottlieb Jöcher : General scholarly lexicon. Continuations and additions by Johann Christoph Adelung . Volume 4, 1813
• Old Prussian biography . Volume I, 1939, p. 416
• Polska Akademia Nauk Institut Historii (ed.): Polski Słownik Biograficzny . Volume XIX, Polska Akademia Nauk, Wrocław [u. a.] 1974, p. 297ff.
• Johannes Sembrzycki: The Lycker archpriest Johannes and Hieronymus Maletius . In: Old Prussian monthly . Volume 25, pp. 629-51; Volume 26, p. 668; Volume 40, p. 481
• Hermann Gollub: The two book printers and Archpriest Maletius . Königsberger Contributions 1929, pp. 159–180 (extensive literature references there)
• Paul Tschackert (ed.): Document book on the Reformation history of the Duchy of Prussia . 1st volume, Hirzel, Leipzig 1890, p. 234ff; 2nd volume.