Tęgowski, Jan(Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika w Toruniu, 1996)
The interregnum period after the death of Ludwik Węgierski (Louis of Hungary) was one of the most difficuIt moments in Polish history. Internal struggles in Great Poland, the inconsistant policy of the widowed queen Elżbieta Bośniaczka and Siemowit IV joining the competition for the Polish crown, deepened the political crisis of the Polish kingdom. In such a implicated situation it was to Bodzanta that the time came to be active in the archiepiscopal capital of Gniezno. In this article, on the basis of sources known to date and on inedited works, we have tried to recreate the process of the political maturation of this church dignitary. His career was atypical for medieval Poland, comparable only to the career of Mikolaj Trąba, for he came from a rather insignificant. Little Poland, ancestral line, the Szeligs. His role was even more difficult in this very difficult interregnum period. The evolution of the political position of Bodzanta – from a servant faithful to the royal will with the rank of archbishop, through a supporter of reconciliation of the Piast candidacy for the throne and loyalty to the Anjou dynasty, to a leading position in the Polish political elite deciding its fate both in negotiations with Elżbieta Bośniaczka and with Siemowit IV and Władyslaw Opolski - was a consequence of his maturation to the role fitting his position. Archbishop Bodzanta together with other participants of the public meeting in Radomsko which took place in March 1384 strove for the conclusion of peace in Great Poland through an attempt at compromise with the former Great Poland starost, Domarat from Pierzchno. He was to live to see the end of the civil war and the interregnum period, as well as the baptism of the Lithuanian Great Duke Jagiełło. He crowned two monarchs: Jadwiga and her husband Władyslaw Jagiełło. For one rather short pontificat, this is a great deal....
Tęgowski, Jan(Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego, 2011)
The history of mutual relations between the dynasties of Poland and Lithuania in the Middle Ages is undoubtedly one of the most interesting topic for a historian researching the Middle-aged history of this part of Europe. A determinant of the intensity of contacts between the Piast and Giedyminowicz dynasties is the moment of family connections entered by them via marriages. lnitially, it was marrying a female representative of the Giedyminowicz dynasty, who accepted the religion of their husband s and became mothers of Christian princes. The first Piast who decided to marry Giedymin's daughter, Elżbieta, was Wacław (Wańko), a prince of Płock, and son of Bolesław the Second. A early as the 14th century shows a series of marriages with female representatives of a Lithuanian dynasty in a Piast dynasty from Mazowsze. A baptism of Lithuania was a result of an increasing number of marriages between the two dynasties. Ali of them were concluded in order to gain common political aims and, infrequently, aims of the promoters of these marriages. Most often it was concerned with a mutual defense against their common enemies. Usually, the first years of marriages were in accordance with political calculations, and, with time, the paths of both parties used to fall apart.... Die Geschichte der gegenseitigen Beziehungen zwischen den Herrscherdynastien von Polen und Litauen im Mittelalter ist fiir die den Europateil erforschenden Mediavisten eine der interessantesten Forschungsthemen. Die lntensitat ihrer gegenseitigen Kontakte hing von den aufeinanderfolgenden Verschwagerungsetappen ab. Die Piasten heirateten die Vertreterinnen der Giedymins Dynastie, und diese nahmen darnit die Konfession ihres Mannes an und wurden Miitter von christlichen Herzogen. Der erste Piast, der sich entschieden hat, Giedymins Tochter, Elisabeth zu heiraten, war der Herzog Wenzel von Plotzk (Wańko), Sohn des Bolesław Ił. Schon im 14.Jh. hat man in der masowischen Linie der Piasten mit mehreren Ehen mit den Vertreterinnen der litauischen Dynastie zu tun. Die Folge von der Taufe Litauens waren die immer haufiger geschlossenen Ehen zwischen Giedymins und Piasten Familien. Alle Ehen dienten politischen Zielen der beiden Seiten oder auch deren Promotoren und zwar v. a. dem Schutz vor dem gemeinsamen Feind. In den ersten Jahren stimmten geschlossene Verbindungen meistens den politischen Oberlegungen iiberein, manchmal aber waren die Wege der Ehepartner auch mit der Zeit getrennt....