The article focuses on the analysis of the role and importance of the theme of old woman in several allegorical images proposed by the Jesuit lecturer, playwright, and author of theatrical performances and drama theatre theorist, Franz Lang in his very important (it marked an high point of his dramatic output) handbook of acting De actione scenica published in Munich in 1727.
The article focuses on the analysis of the role and importance of the figure of an old man in the allegorical images of Judge (Iudex), Usury (Foeneratio) and Alchemy (Alchimia) proposed by the Jesuit lecturer, playwright, and author of theatrical performances and drama theatre theorist, Franz Lang in his very important (it marked an high point of theatrical outpoot) handbook of acting De actione scenica published in Munich in 1727.
Joseph Stanislaw Bieżanowski, a professor at the University of Krakow, a eulogist and poet, in the collection entitled Oraculum Parthenium (Krakow 1668) used a hundred of simple anagrams of Giovanni Battista Agnese published in Rome in 1661. These short (one-sentence) phrases, formed from the letters of the first part of the Angelic Salutation (Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus Tecum), accentuated on Mary’s immaculate purity and freedom from the stain of the original sin on the one hand and her divine motherhood on the other, thus increasing the role and the importance of Mary in God’s plan of salvation. Bieżanowski used these anagrams, making each of them a motto elaborated on in his epigrammatic comment. Epigrams of the Krakow lecturer are characterized not so much by the deepening of the religious reflection, as attention to the formal aspects, the pursuit of artistry. This is reflected in the application, many times within one work, of rhetorical figures highly valued in the Baroque (antitheses, oxymorons), the chiastic structure and interspersing the punch line of the epigram with the anagram from the motto (sometimes in a modified form). Anagram not only served as an additional rhetorical decoration, highlighting the main idea of a work, but also provided a bridge integrating the entire composition. Bieżanowski enclosed the anagrammatic-and-epigrammatic praise of the Virgin Mother of God by an interesting theory of the genre outlined in the preface to Pope Clement IX, whom the University of Cracow gave the collection while making efforts to proceed with the beatification of John Cantius. It combines the literary and theological reflection and in this way exalts the genre, contrary to the opinions of some seventeenth-century theorists. Bieżanowski’s original approach is also evident in the change in the system of anagrams proposed originally by Agnese. In this new system Oraculum Parthenium could perform several functions: educationional, propagandistic and polemical. Above all, however, it was a poetic prayer, complementing the official Marian liturgy.
Analiza elegii Budae a Turcis occupatae querela ze zbioru Tristiów Klemensa Janickiego (The analysis of the elegy Budae a Turcis occupatae querela of Klemens Janicki’s Tristia).This article contains the analysis of the so far little researched elegy from the book of Tristia by an Early Modern Polish poet Klemens Janicki (Clemens Ianicius) written after the Turks conquered Buda in the summer of 1541. The analysis focuses on the composition of Janicki’s elegy, the method and means used by the poet to get the recipients to take action against Turkey imperiling Europe.
The paper contains a translation of a Latin mourning speech, namely a panegyric sermon arranged in Rome by Cardinal Stanisław Hozjusz in honour of King Sigismund II Augustus, the last Polish king of the Jagiellonian dynasty, who died on 7 July 1572. It is one of a few speeches preserved to this day from the abundant oratorio-predicatory output of this Catholic theologian and polemicist, then wellknown in Europe. It was delivered by Stanisław Reszka, the secretary and close collaborator of Hozjusz, on 10 November 1572 at the church of San Lorenzo il Damaso during a solemn funeral service administered by Pope Gregory XIII. The ceremony took place in a magnificent scenery created by an elaborate castrum doloris erected especially for this ceremony by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, the protector of Polish affairs, with the participation of Hozjusz and his close collaborators. The translation is accompanied by explanations that concern events and historical figures, geographical names, quotations, and phrases taken from the Bible and ancient authors. It is preceded by a short introduction in which, apart from the origins and circumstances of the delivery of the speech, its composition and style are discussed. The sermon has a clear structure. It consists of three parts, typical of this type of public utterance. In accordance with the customs of the epoch and the preaching textbooks of that time, the initial part (lamentatio) and the final part (consolatio) are rich in biblical phrases (especially from the prophetic books) that perfectly emphasize the dramatic character of the situation, as well as the significance and further consequences for Poland of the death of the last Jagiellon. The leitmotif that integrates the whole speech is a thought from Prophet Jeremiah (Jer 13:18): “your beautiful crown has come down from your head.” The middle part (laudatio) is filled with the praise of Sigismund II Augustus and the Jagiellonian dynasty. Hozjusz draws here an image of the ideal ruler, enriched with Renaissance elements, such as striving for peace and good relations with neighbours, supporting humanists, excellent and refined customs, as well as a perfect mastery of the art of elocution. Following the postulates formulated by the author himself, the style of this sermon is characterized by simplicity, naturalness, and elegance.
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