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Grunwald Swords
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Battle of Grunwald
{{see also|Battle of Grunwald}}{{multiple image| align = left| image1 = Armoiries Saint-Empire monocéphale.svg| width1 = 70| alt1 = | caption1 = | image2 = POL województwo zachodniopomorskie COA.svg| width2 = 70| alt2 = | caption2 = | footer = Modern renditions of the arms borne by the grand master's heralds}}The battle of Grunwald was part of the Great War fought during 1409â1411 between a PolishâLithuanian coalition led by King WÅadysÅaw II and Grand Duke Vytautas (Alexander) on one side and the Teutonic Order aided by West European knights and led by Grand Master Ulrich von Jungingen on the other side. It was the decisive battle of the war and one of the largest in medieval Europe.As both sides were preparing for the battle in the morning of 15 July 1410, two heralds carrying two unsheathed swords were announced to King WÅadysÅaw II. According to Jan DÅugosz's chronicle, they bore the coats of arms of their respective masters: a black eagle in a golden field of King Sigismund of the Romans, and a red griffin in a silver field of Duke Casimir V of Pomerania. The heralds had been sent by the grand master to WÅadysÅaw II and Vytautas, but since the latter was busy making his troops ready for the battle, it was only the king, accompanied by his closest aides, who received the envoys. The heralds spoke in German while the royal secretary, Jan MÄżyk of DÄ browa, served as an interpreter.{{Citation
| last = DÅugosz
| first = Jan
| author-link = Jan DÅugosz
| title = Annales seu cronicae incliti Regni Poloniae
| url =weblink}}; translated excerpts in: {{Citation
| last = Mikos
| first = Michael J.
| author-link = Michael J. Mikos
| title = Polish literature from the Middle Ages to the end of the eighteenth century: A bilingual anthology
| place = Warszawa
| publisher = Constans
| year = 1999
| isbn = 978-83-901014-3-9}} They delivered, according to DÅugosz, the following message:
File:Wojciech Kossak, Dwa miecze.jpg|thumb|right|Two Swords by Wojciech KossakWojciech KossakAs they spoke, Teutonic forces did, in fact, withdraw from previously occupied positions. The king accepted the swords and, according to the letter he later wrote to his wife, responded with the following words:}}While sending swords as a formal gesture challenging the enemy to battle was customary at that time, adding insults was not. Hence the envoys' speech was considered grossly boastful and impudent, as can be seen from a letter sent by Jan Hus to King WÅadysÅaw II where the Bohemian religious reformer praised the PolishâLithuanian victory at Grunwald as a triumph of humility over pride.}}| first = Jan
| author-link = Jan DÅugosz
| title = Annales seu cronicae incliti Regni Poloniae
| url =weblink}}; translated excerpts in: {{Citation
| last = Mikos
| first = Michael J.
| author-link = Michael J. Mikos
| title = Polish literature from the Middle Ages to the end of the eighteenth century: A bilingual anthology
| place = Warszawa
| publisher = Constans
| year = 1999
| isbn = 978-83-901014-3-9}} They delivered, according to DÅugosz, the following message:
From war trophy to royal insignia
{{see also|Polish Crown Jewels}}{{for|the sword-related terminology used in this section|Sword#Morphology}}The king sent the two swords to Kraków and deposited them, together with Teutonic army banners and other war trophies, in the treasure vault of the Royal Wawel Castle. Eventually, the "two Prussian swords", as they were described in a treasury inventory in 1633, became treated as part of Polish-Lithuanian crown jewels. They were used in royal coronations throughout the existence of the PolishâLithuanian Commonwealth (1569â1795) and possibly also earlier, during the dynastic union of the two nations under the House of Jagiellon. Since the pair of swords had been given to two rulers â of Poland and Lithuania â each of the weapons was associated with one of the two constituent nations of the Commonwealth.{hide}Citation
| last = Lileyko
| first = Jerzy
| title = Regalia polskie
| place = Warszawa
| publisher = Krajowa Agencja Wydawnicza
| year = 1987
| isbn = 83-03-02021-8|language=pl{edih}
File:Wladyslaw-Jagiello.jpg|thumb|left|The monument to King WÅadysÅaw II JagieÅÅo in Central Park, New York CityNew York CityDuring a coronation ceremony, the king-elect made a sign of the Cross three times with Szczerbiec, or the principal coronation sword. Immediately afterwards, one of the bishops assisting in the ceremony handed the Grunwald Swords to the king who in turn passed them on to the Crown (i.e., Polish) and Lithuanian sword-bearers (miecznicy). After the coronation, the king returned from the cathedral where the ceremony had taken place to the royal castle, preceded, among others, by the two sword-bearers carrying the Grunwald Swords as symbols of the king's reign in the two nations.Unlike Szczerbiec and other ceremonial swords stored in the royal treasury, the Grunwald Swords were simple battle swords that would have been typical for armament of early 15th-century European knights. At some point in time they were embellished with hilts made from gilded silver. Additionally a little shield with the coat of arms of Poland, the White Eagle, was attached to the blade of one sword and, analogically, a similar shield with the Lithuanian Pursuer was fastened to the other one.Two of the elective kings of PolandâLithuania were crowned without the use of the Grunwald Swords. King Stanislaus I LeszczyÅski was crowned in Warsaw in 1705 with a makeshift set of royal insignia given to him by King Charles XII of Sweden and quickly destroyed after the ceremony. The set probably did not include an equivalent of the Grunwald Swords. During the War of the Polish Succession, LeszczyÅski's supporters sequestered the Polish Crown Jewels from Wawel and hid them at the Jasna Góra Monastery in CzÄstochowa to prevent Stanislaus's rival Frederick Augustus Wettin from using them for his coronation. Hence, Augustus III used his own set of crown jewels for his 1734 coronation. His set included two sheathless ceremonial swords, described by an anonymous witness of the ceremony as "two huge épées", that were meant to replace the Grunwald Swords as symbols of Poland and Lithuania. The Polish sword had a pommel in the shape of an eagle's head, a cross-guard in the form of an eagle's talons, and a little crowned heraldic shield with the arms of Poland on the blade. Its Lithuanian counterpart had a pommel shaped like a lion's head, a lion's paws as the cross-guard, and on the blade an armorial shield of Lithuania below a grand-ducal hat. Those two swords were used again in a mourning ceremony on the third anniversary of the death of King Augustus II, Augustus III's father, in 1736. Afterwards, they were moved to the Armory (Rüstkammer) in Dresden where they could still be seen at the end of the 19th century. Their current location is unknown.| first = Jerzy
| title = Regalia polskie
| place = Warszawa
| publisher = Krajowa Agencja Wydawnicza
| year = 1987
| isbn = 83-03-02021-8|language=pl{edih}
Salvation and loss
File:PuÅawy - Temple of Sybill.jpg|thumb|Between 1796 and 1830, the swords were kept in the Temple of the Sibyl at PuÅawyPuÅawyThe Grunwald Swords were used for the last time in a coronation of a Polish king â that of Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski â in 1764 in Warsaw. They are mentioned in the last inventory of the royal treasury of 1792. During the KoÅciuszko Uprising in 1794, Kraków was captured by the Prussian army, which occupied the Wawel Castle and looted its treasure vault. However, the Prussians, probably uninterested in the material value of two simple iron swords and unaware of their historical and symbolic significance, left the Grunwald Swords behind.After Prussia ceded Kraków, by the terms of the Third Partition of Poland, to the Habsburg Empire in 1796, the swords were retrieved from the devastated treasury by historian Tadeusz Czacki who handed them over to Princess Izabela Czartoryska. The princess was an art collector known for her interest in Polish national memorabilia. The Grunwald Swords were placed among other patriotic souvenirs in the Temple of the Sibyl, her private museum established in the garden of the Czartoryski Palace in PuÅawy.The palace was seized by the Russian government during the November Uprising of 1830â1831. Most of the collection from the Temple of the Sybil had been evacuated to France shortly before the uprising broke out, but the Grunwald Swords were hidden in a parish priest's house in the nearby village of WÅostowice (now part of PuÅawy). In 1853, after the priest's death, the house was searched by Russian gendarmes, or security police, who confiscated the swords as illegal weapons and took them to the fortress of ZamoÅÄ. Their subsequent fate is unknown.Symbolic use
File:Order Krzyża Grunwaldu kl. I-awers.jpg|thumb|upright|1st class Order of the Cross of GrunwaldCross of GrunwaldBeing reminded of Polish military victories over the Teutonic Order used to stir German sensibilities to such an extent, that the inclusion of the Grunwald Swords on a 1938 postage stamp commemorating King Vladislaus JagieÅÅo and Queen Jadwiga resulted in a formal diplomatic protest of Nazi Germany. In the interest of "maintaining good neighborhood", Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs asked the Polish Post to withdraw the stamp from circulation; on the 1939 version of the stamp, the swords were replaced by a heraldic ornament.{{Citation|title=Znaczki zamiast armat|journal=Poczta Polska|issue=34/2005|pages=8â9|publisher=Dyrekcja Generalna Poczty Polskiej|location=Warszawa|issn=1230-9230|url=http://www.poczta-polska.pl/messageShow.php?id=84|format=PDF|access-date=8 April 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110606041956weblink|archive-date=6 June 2011|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}In 1943, Gwardia Ludowa, a communist resistance movement in occupied Poland introduced its own military decoration, the Cross of Grunwald, featuring the Grunwald Swords on its obverse. It was later adopted by the People's Republic of Poland as the second highest military award. The cross ceased to be awarded in 1987 and was formally discontinued in 1992. The swords featured in the Polish Navy Jack in the years 1946â1955.In modern Poland, the Grunwald Swords remain a popular military symbol, especially in Warmia and Masuria. The commune of Grunwald uses the two swords in its coat of arms.See also
- Szczerbiec, Poland's principal coronation sword
- Cross of Grunwald, Polish Communist-era military decoration
References
{{reflist}}External links
{{commons-inline|Miecze grunwaldzkie|Grunwald Swords}}{{National symbols of Poland}}{{Notable swords}}{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2017}}- content above as imported from Wikipedia
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