Leaving Your Hamlet, that is Once More on Bogusław X’s Travel to Germany, Italy and the Holy Land (Supplement 3)

Abstract

In 2004, on the occasion of Poland’s accession to the European Union in January of that year an idea emerged to recall a great European voyage of Duke Bogusław X the Great made in 1496– 1498. With this travel — first to the royal court in Germany, then a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, next, to the Apostolic See and again to the court of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, and to the courts of German prince-electors — great as regards both its time (485 days) and geographical extent (it spanned the two continents: Europe and Asia, and the territory of eight modern states: Germany, Austria, Italy, Croatia, Albania, Greece, Cyprus, Lebanon and Israel), he overshadowed allthe previous ones. His travel was also great in terms of numerous contacts he established with important personages of his times and effects it brought about. The trip was described in a book A Great Journey of the Great Duke (Wielka podróż wielkiego księcia, Szczecin, 2004). It is possible to learn about this trip thanks to many contemporary sources that emerged in the course of the voyage in Pomerania, Germany and Italy. The time pressure I felt when writing the book — and the topic was new to me — had some negative impact on it. Soon after its publication in April, the book was followed by a separate supplement  (1). Then a supplement 2: Little Known Venetian Letter of Bogusław X to His Mecklenburg Brother-in-Law of 1497 (‘Mało znany wenecki list Bogusława X do meklemburskiego szwagra w  1497’, Przegląd Zachodniopomorski 2004, no. 4: 203–210). And now, a supplement 3 presents various additional materials gathered due to the increasing literature on the subject and discoveries of new sources which throw additional light on the circumstances of taking the trip and its course: the duke’s stay at the Apostolic See or the German royal court in Innsbruck. The supplement 3 includes, i.a., some sources on the efforts of the Hohenzollern diplomacy in April 1497 and March 1498 during two stays of the duke at the German royal court, seeking to counteract possible concessions of Emperor Maximilian I to Duke Bogusław that could limit or abolish both Maximilian’s feudal domination over the duke and a succession of the Brandenburg electors in the duchy of Pomerania after the introduction of Bogusław to the circle of German princes. An example of the interesting supplementary information is special attention paid to Duke Bolesław’s efforts to undertake a matter of peasant escapes from the region of Słupsk to the lands belonging to the city of Gdańsk when he was travelling through Italy in January 1498. In 1497, probably in Venice, a literary composition was published entitled Historia della battaglia data da Turchi con nove vele contra la gallea de Pelegrini de l’ano presente describing Bolesław’s deeds and heroic death of his friend Krzysztof of Świdwin rescuing him. The print was recently discovered in the Biblioteca Trivulziana in Milan and its edition in Polish is being prepared. “Together with German, Hungarian, Polish and Bohemian students — we read in the account of the trip — the president of the university met him [Duke Bogusław] near Bologna”, and welcomed him with an excellent oration in Latin; the president was Johannes de Kitscher, who was the probable author of the abovementioned panegyric, persuaded by the duke to come to work to his court in Szczecin. The supplement ends with a praise of the Great Journey and of Duke Bolesław as Knight of the Holy Sepulcher.