"A glorious death" in the patriotic propaganda of the times of king Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski

Abstract

The article discusses the renewal of the tradition of “a glorious death” understood as the most noble sacrifi ce made on the battlefield to prove one’s patriotism and love of freedom, observed in the years 1764–95. Assuming that the change in the attitude of the nobility to sac-rifi ce in battle was a fact, the author explores the role of propaganda in promoting patriotic conduct, forgotten in the time of the Saxon kings of Poland. He highlights the impact of the royal court, which had long abstained from patriotic propaganda, focusing instead on propagating Enlightenment civic ideals, especially models of husbandry. The court had to engage in patriotic propaganda and a war with Turkey as a result of the fi rst partition. Part of this action was a celebration of the centenary of the battle of Vienna, which, however, did not bring the intended effects and was even mocked at. Earlier, patriotic propaganda had been applied by the opposition led by the hetmans, which used the slogans of fi ghting for liberty as a tool against the King, criticizing him for his subservience to Russia. On the other hand, the opposition group centred around Puławy promoted the ideology of enlightened Sarmatism, which invoked Polish and ancient Spartan traditions, propagating a   glorious death as worthy of a true citizen. Thanks to applying many propaganda instruments this ideology gained a wide recognition and infl uenced the attitudes of society (at least the overly declared ones) after 1785 and especially in the last years of the Commonwealth.The article also surveys various forms of propaganda applied in the era — from Seym  speeches through fi ction, journalism and theatre, organizing spectacular events (e.g. the unveil-ing of a monument to King John III Sobieski, the ritual fi rst haircut of young magnates at the beginning of the Four Years’ Seym, the staging of Matka Spartanka [The Spartan Mother] at an opposition convention in Puławy) to the foundation of the Corps of Cadets. One of the problems for the propagandists of the time was the lack of contemporary national heroes, instead of whom they had to invoke the heroic military leaders of the 17th c. (Żółkiewski, Chodkiewicz, King John III Sobieski) and vague ancient Greek and Roman models. The article postulates further research on the true role of propaganda in the time of fast political and social changes culminating at the fall of the Commonwealth and resulting in radical changes in the attitudes of the society.