Was Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth a Real Republic?

Kings and Generals animated historical documentary series on the Middle and Early Modern Ages continues with a video in which we talk about the Poland-Lithuanian Commonwealth also known as Rzeczpospolita, as we ask if the confederation was a real republic.

#Documentary #Poland #Lithuania

[sanher]

The PLC is one of the most valuable cases to learn from in history. It really shows how political intrigue can severely weaken and ruin a nation, especially with democracies. It's a shame very few people know about the collapse of the PLC because all modern democracies are suffering the same problems and have the same weaknesses such as factionalism and self sabotage

[rotmistrzjanm]

What is also intresting is the fact that while PLC's neighbours reffered to themselves as heirs to Roman Empire (Gernans, Russians and Ottomans) PLC's nobility prefere themselves to compare to Roman Republic

[pll]

Jan Ostrorog: 'this kind of government is a great shame if the Republic can be brought to ruin through the stupidity or stubbornness of a single individual.'

Man really was ahead of his time.

[Nasir]

The commonwealth feared monarchy so much that they forgot the threat of oligarchy.

[Mira-K]

About Liberum veto - originally the total unanimity was intended only for the formal matters like prolonging the sessions or electing the parliament's marshal (speaker). When it was first effectively used in 1652, a deputy from Upita, Siciński, vetoed not the meritum of the session, but the session's prolonging in order to conclude it formally, and then left. The marshall ordered guards to bring the obstructionist back, but he escaped.
The principle in theory and origins made some sense. It wasn't meant to break the sessions, just to -force- encourage compromises - "noone goes home until you agree" mechanism - something familiar to Americans on jury duty, I bet). Siciński wasn't the first obstructionist, but the first one to escape instead of being coerced to withdraw the veto. It changed the whole deal.
Important thing here: Deputies formally were not 'members of parliament' but 'envoys' from their constituency, obliged to vote according to instructions of their land's assembly. Possessing such written instructions was the proof of their mandate. To proceed without a deputy was like excluding his entire Land of the Commonwealth. Non possumus, as they'd say.

In this situation it could have been still just handwaived and unanimity applied to those still present but A - the marshal was extreme formalist, and B - this particular session going down the drain was actually convenient to many factions, so noone really insisted. The Session was not prolonged, could not be formally closed in time, and became void as if it never happened. This created the precendence and liberum veto started to be applied commonly.

[ArghastOfTheAlliance]

About 6 years ago I asked if K&G are planning to make videos about the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and they responded to my comment and said "Yes"! I guess they took all that time to master the pronunciation of Polish names, which they totally nailed. Looking forward to see more videos about the PLC, its battles and the wider history of Eastern Europe!

[KomradZX]

No other big channels are making content like this. I’m usually watching tiny channels which is fine but having a higher production standard really sets your videos apart.

Thanks 🙏 ❤

[TheGeneralGrievous]

As a Polish person, I really appriciate the video on the history of my country, and Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in this case - the Rzeczpospolita. 👑🇵🇱 Thank You! ❤

[Asgoga]

As a Lithuanian i'm glad you made video about part of our history, knowing how important PLC was to European history, it's unfortunate there are not many good english language documentaries about it.

[MrSmooge]

As a Pole i must say this was a very professional, condens, and all around good essey (i hope this is the right word). The movie was not to long, historicaly accurate and had matching animations. I watched it with pleasure. I can only praise yet another good work of your team :)

[Artur_M.]

It's great to see you covering this topic. I think you did pretty well. Especially since the state of serious scholarship of this subject available in English seems to be a bit lacking. It's been almost a decade since the 1st volume of the Oxford history of Poland-Lithuania by Robert I. Frost (ending at the Union of Lublin in 1569) was published. I'm starting to doubt if the vol. 2 will ever see the light of day.
At least the late period and the fall of the Commonwealth are covered pretty well by Richard Butterwick. Edit: I forgot about the book _History of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: State - Society - Culture_ by Urszula Augustyniak.
I'm looking forward to your coverage of the _Rzeczpospolita_ in greater detail in the future. You seriously could make multiple whole series about different aspects of it.

[rennor]

A good example on the pseudo-democratic mindset that dominated the Polish nobility at the time of the signing of the Union of Lublin in 1569 can be found in the work '' De Optimo Senatore" by Laurentius Grimaldus Goslicius.

It was written in the latter half of the 16th century in Venice by a Polish szlachtic noblemen, philosopher and future Bishop of Poznan, Wawrzyniec Goślicki. It's main arguments focus on explaining that in a just, moral and virtous society no one man can be above the law, and that even kings, nobles, bishops and any other figure within the state have to subordinated to the justice system. It also justifies the right of people to overthrone their ruler in cases of tyranny, corruption or negligence of his duties to the people; it also includes defences on religious toleration and the power of assembly and the vote of the multitude in deciding final decisions in legislature.

The work was popular in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth but also in England where passages from its chapters would be distributed to the soliders and supporters of the parliamentarians during the English Civil War, in the form of pamphlets. Thomas Jefferson was also known to have kept a copy of it in his famous library and the treatise would remain well known as an early xample of democratic thought untill the early 19th century.

Excellent presentation by the way. Keep the up the good work!

[Manta]

As a polish citizen i support that content 😁

[DrunklikeaPole]

Polish king Stefan Batory (mentioned at 4:00 ) is famously quoted for saying to a student at Zamość academy: "Disce puer latine, ego faciam te mościpanie" which translates as "Study Latin [young lad] and I shall make thou a Lord". I have little to no doubt that if he were to make a similar statement today it would be in the lines "Watch Kings and Generals and you shall become a statesman [mąż stanu]". Splendid video 👏

[en]

Thank you for finally making a video from the Commonwealths persepctive. I hope there is more in the future! Please, let there be more. It is very important for all East-Central Europeans, not only Poles!

[noone]

Fuck yes I’m in love with early modern history. Would love to see a 1654 Russo-Polish war or 1608 Muscovite-Polish war vid!

[istvanmeszaros]

Fun fact, that the word 'rokos' comes from 'rákos', a Hungarian word. We held our parliament on the great field of Rákos. This is a creek in Pest. In that time we had many big biz with our Polish brothers.

[vries]

One mistake. Polish kings were not elected by parliament as you stated. They were elected by special assemblies of all nobility. This of course had it downsides (votes were bought by magnates from extremely poor nobles known as "golota") but on the other hand was more democratic than the decision of parliament, which mostly consisted of richer nobles.

[michaelstone]

It should also be noted that Protestant historians, (who wrote with a pro Protestant bias mostly British and American), overlook the PLC and the Venetian Republic. (In order to argue that Protestantism goes with constitutionality, and Catholicism with Absolutism, they also overlook Prussia and Sweden on the other side).

[rotmistrzjanm]

Can we take a moment to appreciate how H&G pronounce polish names? That's high quality standard for an YT video documentaries!