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Old Polish Documents of the Prof. Stanisław Poniatowski Archive

The collection of the Library of the Polish Ethnological Society in Wroclaw holds interesting Old Polish documents included in the Archives of prof. Stanisław Poniatowski (1884-1945) - a well-known anthropologist and ethnologist. The said Old Polish documents consists of 15 signature units. These documents are probably part of a collection of materials prepared by Stanisław Poniatowski for the monograph of the Lithuanian Rus - collection of texts of different kinds, which, together with some of the scientific materials by professor Poniatowski, was sent to the Polish Ethnological Society after the Second World War. At present the Old Polish documents have been ordered based on the issues they tackle and their chronology, however, the original arrangement, based on the covers of the documents, have been preserved in the form of a separate unit.

The Old Polish documents from the Archives of prof. Stanisław Poniatowski consist of an interesting collection of property records, notarial deeds, credentials and other legal documents. For the most part, these are entries into regional registers of town, cities, tribunals and other records, confirmed by the witnesses' signatures, officials who prepared them and containing relating official stamps. These documents, dating back to the 17th and 19th centuries, can be an interesting source of the knowledge of ownership and property relations of the Lithuanian Rus, and may also be a valuable source of research into the mentality and culture of the inhabitants. These documents are arranged according to the locality and their owners in relation to individual inventory unit. Particularly valuable are the materials referring to the goods of Mowowida in the Słonimskie District, including the inventories and registers dating from the 17th to the 19th centuries, documents concerning the Lachowicz estate in the Pińsk district and other areas in the Lithuanian Rus such as Kołbowo, Krzywobłoty, Ostrów, Raczkiewicze, Aleksandrów, Boćki, Dworce, Kusin, Łopienica Mała, Roś, Wiszowa, Wołkowysk and many others. Currently, these towns are located in Poland, Lithuania and Belarus.

A separate category of documents are diaries and accounts of everyday life in the Podlasie and the Kingdom of Poland from the 19th century, two of which are unique. Of particular Interest are the memoirs Michał Ostromęcki from 1850 which document his travel from Łomża to Kraków, where the author made a careful analysis of the folk customs of the Kingdom of Poland and made an assessment of the influence of the peasant mentality on the formation of the working class of the period. Another diary of interest is an N.N. report about the circumstances accompanying the abolition of serfdom in 1861 in the ​​Podlasie and Białystok regions and the course of the January Uprising in that area. The author of the account is unknown, however, from the contents of the diary as well as from the provenance (the autograph is stamped "From Z. Gloger's collection"), and Poniatowski’s notation it can be inferred that the authorship could be credited to Jan Gloger (1812-1884), the father of Zygmunt Gloger, a well-known historian and ethnographer.

In addition, in the collection of Old Polish documents of Stanisław Poniatowski is home to numerous economy-related documents such as economic manuals, documents attributing land ownership, economic correspondence, formal request letters, lawsuits, documentation of river transport in Lithuania in the 18th century, genealogical records, tax rates and more.

The Old Polish documents from the Archives can be a valuable source for genealogists who seek to understand the family and property connections of the Kiersnowski, Bęklewski and Wojniczłowicz families and Bakanowski families, but also their relatives or neighbors. Due to the growing interest in genealogical research during the preparation of documents, it was decided to detail the names which occur in the documents in the form of signatures.

The Old Polish Archive of prof. Stanisław Poniatowski was created in the period from 1620 (the oldest) to 1893 (the latest dated document), and are made in Polish, Old Belarusian, Russian and German. They are originals and copies of contemporary documents issued for the needs of litigants of the municipal and land courts, autographs of memories and records. Some documents retain official or private white or paper seals. For the purpose of developing and making the collection available for a wide audience, a record of the materials was prepared on the basis of the 1952 publication, which takes into account the spelling variants of translations from foreign languages. Where it was possible, the descriptions of the units contain annotations of identified names and places. Also, due to the specifics of the Archive, unique in the collection of the Library of the Polish Ethnological Society, it was decided to publish detailed descriptions of the contents of the Archive. The inventory description is supplemented by an index of names and geographical locations listed in the documents of the Old Polish Archives.

 

Register of the units of the Old Polish Archive documents of Prof. Stanisław Poniatowski:

385/1 XIX w. O pośrzednikowstwie (!). [Wspomnienia NN o okolicznościach zniesienia pańszczyzny w 1861 r. w powiecie bielskim guberni grodzieńskiej]. S. 90. [pobierz]

381/2 1850-1896. Materiały dotyczące rodziny Ostromęckich. S.78. [pobierz]

381/1   1846. Uwagi niektóre ekonomiczne z memoriału JW. Tomasza Umiastowskiego, b. prezydenta Sądu Głównego Wileńskiego, skopiowane 1835 roku novembra  2 dnia. S.42. [pobierz]

381/3  XIX w. Dziennik korespondencyjny. S. 222. [pobierz]

385/2 1866-1872. Materiały różne Czesława Ławrynowicza. S. 202; 56. [pobierz]

384/1 1798 –1845. Papiery osobiste rodziny Kiersnowskich. S.60. [pobierz]

382/1 1651 –1863.  Inwentarze,  sumariusze i inne dotyczące dóbr Mołowidy w powiecie słonimskim S. 138. [pobierz]

384/2 1652 –1839. Papiery Kiersnowskich dotyczące dóbr Mołowidy w pow. słonimskim. S. 160. [pobierz]

384/3 1714- 1740. Papiery  różne Wojniłłowiczów i rodzin spokrewnionych. S. 72. [pobierz]

380/1 1769 –1823.Papiery osobiste Bęklewskich. S. 30. [pobierz]

380/2 1765-1827. Papiery Bęklewskich dotyczące dóbr Lachowicze w powiecie pińskim. S.200. [pobierz]

382/2 1620-1803. Materiały różne dotyczące stosunków własnościowych różnych miejscowości na Rusi Litewskiej. [pobierz]

383 1647-1869.Zbiór materiałów różnych gospodarczych dotyczących miejscowości na Rusi Litewskiej. S. 318. [pobierz]

386  1758-1862. Materiały różne z archiwum Stanisława Poniatowskiego. S.144. [pobierz]

 

 

Indices of the of the Old Polish Archive documents of Prof. Stanisław Poniatowski:

• Name index
• Geographical index

 

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