Silva Rerum | 07.07.2015 Kronika Polska (The Polish Chronicle) by Marcin Kromer, the royal secretary and later Warmia Bishop, published in Latin in 1555 under the title De origine et rebus gestis Polonorum[1] contains numerous descriptions of bloody conflicts between rulers, battles and wars that sometimes give way to comments about a surprisingly cold winter or exceptionally hot summer, or the birth of a two-headed calf. However, grand politics and the world of animals are not the only topics discussed in the Chronicle and the author tries to reach deeper into the past, searching for reasons of the afflictions tormenting the country and explaining the God's anger, manifested by the imbalance in nature, in human actions, their greed for power and lack of moderation.
Marcin Kromer eagerly describes all sorts of weird, unnatural phenomena - be it climate anomalies or birth of animals of unusual size or with an unnatural number of heads or limbs. In his interpretation of the rules governing the world, there is only one possible explanation of such abnormalities. Imbalance in the world is caused by human sins. God punishes entire nations for the wrongdoing of their lords and masters. Reversing the natural order, and thus losing access to God and his moral principles, results in human suffering and moral and political anarchy. Kromer's world turns upside down when people transgress their roles and assume personalities that are not meant for them. Men experience female weakness and women demonstrate sexual and political initiative that is not suitable for their gender. An example of such deviation from the proper role is Bolesław the Generous' intervention in Kiev and its consequences.
The Polish ruler got involved twice in Russian matters at the request of Grand Prince of Kiev Iziaslav, whose wife was his aunt Gertrude, Casimir the Restorer's sister. Iziaslav was forced to ask Bolesław for military help in 1068, after he lost his power to his relative Vshehslav, and one more time in 1074, when he was expelled from Kiev by his brothers[2]. During the second campaign in Rus, Kiev was reportedly the scene of violence and sodomy, which in turn led to the destruction of the power of Poles[...] lured by the charms of the exuberant city spoilt by Greek influence, like it had happened before to the Punics of Capua[3]. Immorality and sexual promiscuity during the winter stay in a city known for its moral laxity resulted, as the Warmia Bishop observes, in loss of power and ability to undertake military actions by Bolesław's troops, and Bolesław himself, although conqueror of many nations, was so overcome by promiscuity and extravagance that he ended up as a loser rather than a winner[4]. Unnatural sexual behaviour not only deprived Polish knights of their male strength but also so loudly resounded in their homeland that the wives and daughters of profligate husbands were forced to undertake actions atypical of the women of those times. Betrayed Polish women not only repeatedly committed adultery but also invited to their beds men of lower birth and delivered their illegitimate children, and pretended that their husbands whom they had not seen for the last seven years had died in war.
The sexual misdemeanour of Bolesław's troops in Kiev resulted in their homeland in complete distortion of social balance and moral degeneration. News of the betrayal of their wives caused most Poles to desert the army and finally forced the Polish prince to withdraw from Kiev. Back in Poland, Bolesław held judgement over the deserters and took a particularly cruel revenge on women, who were considered guilty for the situation, removing from them the children born during the absence of their husbands and forcing them to breastfeed pups instead. What shocked Marcin Kromer the most was the fact that Bolesław the Generous was himself married to Krystyna at the time when he indulged himself in sexual pleasures, filthy lust and abominable promiscuity[5]. According to the interpretation of the author of Kronika Polska, the above behaviour of the Polish ruler was the immediate cause of the King's disagreement with Bishop Stanislaus that led to the Bishop's death, Bolesław's exile and Poland's crisis on the political arena. Violation of the roles ascribed to the respective sexes that happened to Bolesław's knights in Kiev, and in Poland meant extramarital relations of knights' wives with men born below them, distorted the balance both in the moral and sexual sphere and disrupted the social order. The world turned upside down and the State lost in a short time both its Krakow Bishop and its King.
[1] German translation Mitnächtischer Völckeren Historien, Bazylea 1562, in Polish Kronika Polska, Krakow 1611 (here quoted from the second edition, Sanok 1857).
[2] See M. K. Barański, Dynastia Piastów w Polsce, Warsaw 2005, p. 151.
[3] Kronika Polska, p. 179., see in Latin original De origine, Basel 1568, p. 59.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid, p. 180.
Translation: Lingua Lab
