Sfinks słowiański i mumia polska

Overview & Synopsis

This book presents a collection of studies devoted to the Polish national identity coming into being in the nineteenth century, and two of its important components: Slavic utopia and the national idea. A return to the roots, that is the discovery of proto-Slavic heritage which proved the antiquity of the Polish nation, sanctioned the right to the territory it occupied. Historic heritage received, as part of the Slavic utopia, a moral warranty in the shape of the best national qualities. These were benevolence, resourcefulness and hospitality in peacetime, and valour, as well as devotion to the family, clan or community in wartime. Most of all, however, Slavicness determined the shape of the future. This is because, in connection with messianism, it guaranteed an extraordinary role for the Polish nation, whose destiny was to lead the World and to redeem the ‘spoilt and demoralised Europe’, as it was then said. After all, Slavicness was treated not only as a repository of myths and legends, but also as a reservoir of enormous might, which was to revive the nation, weakened as a result of the downfall of the virtues of the nobility and elective rulers, who were responsible for the national catastrophe.