Uwarunkowania rozwoju tradycji grunwaldzkiej w XIX i na początku XX wieku

Abstract

On the cusp of the 19th and 20th centuries the Grunwald tradition was becoming one of the basic instruments of forming the historical awareness, especially among the plebeians, and the feeling of unity in the period between the annexations. A number of factors that led to the revival of the Grunwald tradition which had been disrupted by the partitions appeared in the 19th century. These factors also influenced the change of the character of the Grunwald tradition, its social perception and mythologization. The process should be associated with the current state of the “Polish affair” and “Lithuanina affair”, the course of the nationbuilding processes and the international events. The development of historical writing, political thought and literary works of Romanticism, the programmes of the Spring of Nations, cultural and national emancipation as well as the autonomic freedoms of Galicia also had an impact on the revival. The germinasational policy of the Prussian and German authorities was a significant impulse to develop a stereotype of a German resembling a Teutonic Order Knight. The Grunwald celebrations organised in 1902 and 1910 in Galicia, by their course, mass participation and ideological content revealed the extent of the changes that had taken place in the historical awareness of the Polish society in the 19th century. They also showed the role of the Grunwald tradition in the process of nationalisation of the plebeians, especially the peasants. It were the last celebrations, combined with the unveiling of the Grunwald Monument in Cracow, lasting three days and having a central character, with the participation of delegations from other partitions that reverberated not only in the Polish society.