Courtiers and Court Life in Poland, 1386–1795 , ed. Bożena Czwojdrak

This collection of essays by a team of Polish authors edited by Bożena Czwojdrak offers a clear and fairly comprehensive insight into the courtiers and the functioning of the royal court in the Kingdom of Poland and later in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries. The issue of courtiers and court life is frequently discussed among European medievalists, primarily in Western European historiographies, while the historiographies of Central and Eastern European states, as in many other cases, unfortunately still lag behind. This makes the publication an even more valuable contribution, as, despite its declared chronological scope from 1386 to 1795, it captures court life in the Polish context within a broader chronological framework. The geographical scope is limited primarily to Poland, which is particularly debatable after 1569, but the editor logically justifies this limitation in the introduction. Due to the lack of primary sources, such as records of royal court expenditure, it is very difficult to reconstruct the functioning of the royal court before 1388. Research for this period is therefore limited to comparisons with the operation of neighbouring royal courts, which probably influenced the form and functioning of the Polish royal court after 1320 (the coronation of Władysław Łokietek). The newly established royal court probably adopted elements from the more opulent royal courts of the period, particularly the Hungarian and Bohemian courts. In a later period, foreign elements were introduced by members of the Vasa dynasty and later still by the Wettin dynasty.