Historical calendar: the anniversary of the death of 1 of the more controversial and misunderstood rulers of Poland – Zygmunt III Waza.
Today in our calendar we will look at the life and activities of this monarch.
Zygmunt was born in 1566 in Gripsholm Castle, Sweden. He was the boy of Prince of Finland, later King of Sweden John III Vasa and Catherine Jagiellonka. His youth came to the final period of Scandinavian Protestantization. He was born in captivity due to the fact that his Catholic parents were interned by Lutheran ruler Eric XIV, who feared the Catholic separation of Finland from Sweden at the time.
Sigismund's father took over the state in 1569. This enabled his boy to grow up in peace and to get appropriate education for his future functions. In 1587, Jan III exhibited Zygmunt as a candidate during the Polish free election after Stefan Batory's death. Partially, the Jagiello origin of the 21-year-old prince and the efforts of Polish elites to bring together Sweden decided that he became ruler of the Republic of Poland.
As a quiet and modest person, it was very hard for him to find himself in Polish realities. For a good morning he was thrown into the vortex of war with the Habsburg candidate and in the typical democratic quarrels of magnate and noble parties. He didn't do so well that he planned to abandon the crown to the benefit of Ernest Habsburg which came out and ended in a immense political scandal. Over time, the young king learned to function in a abroad reality.
He tried to play opposing parties and grow the monarchy. He considered the restoration of the king's strong position to be the only way to reduce the magnate's self-will, the nobility's dissmocracy, and to improve the functioning of the state. At the same time, as a very devout man, he tried to strengthen the influence of Catholicism, in the context of the civilizational failure he considered the Protestant revolution to be. He was a generous patron and guardian of Catholic missions at the ends of the Republic.
Thanks to his initiative, Latin civilization has strengthened and moved further east. In this work he worked closely with the Order of the Jesuits and his large representatives specified as Peter the Complaint.
In 1589 the Moscow Patriarchate was established, which claimed the right to spiritual sovereignty over the Orthodox population of the Republic. The consequence of Orthodox dignitaries and the king to this very dangerous event for territorial integrity and the home governance of the country was the beginning of work on the implementation of the alleged "Brzeska Union".
By her power, the Orthodox could pass under the authority of the pope without major changes in ceremoniality. The Union came into force in 1595 and mostly fulfilled its hopes and united the country around 1 secular and spiritual power. Unfortunately, Sigismund III acted in almost full loneliness in both interior and abroad politics. The nobles and magnates did not realize his farsighted policy, focusing on trivial current affairs and fighting for peculiar interests.
The royal drive to improvement the power system, rise taxes and the army's numbers met with open hostility and led the defenders of noble democracy to establish the alleged Rokosz Zebrzydowski. In the conflict of Guzov of 1607, the faithful troops of the king defeated the opponents, however, the ruler gave up any of his postulates. Earlier, in 1592 he took the throne after his late father, which led to the Polish-Swedish individual union.
In the meantime, the opposition, led by Prince Charles Sudermanski, became attached to Sigismund's power in Sweden. The country was already mostly protestantized and the mighty did not want for monarch-innovatives. They were especially afraid of the actions of Polish Jesuits, who could bring Catholicism back to their country. The return of the Papals threatened to receive looted during the Reformation of ecclesiastical and monastic property, which, of course, could not be approved by the nobility who participated in the plunder.
The convention of the ables demanded that Sigismund curse freedom of Lutheran religion in Sweden, which he besides did. By contrast, the king, through reciprocity, was incapable to safe the freedom of religion for Catholics. Attempts to introduce tolerance acts were torpedoed by Swedes. Despite a affirmative postulate, Protestant elites with Karol Sudermański continued to game against the king until the armed uprising began.
The pretext for the open war was the provocation carried out during the illegally convened Swedish parliament of the alleged Riksdag on which it was decided to ban Mass in the Catholic rite and to expel Catholics from the country. In 1598 the Polish parliament allowed intervention in Sweden. Sigismund set out overseas at the head of 5,000 troops, mastered the capital and defeated Charles in the conflict of Stegeborg. But he did not let the slaughter of the fleeing enemy due to the fact that he wanted to reconstruct power alternatively than massacre his subjects.
This proved to be a mistake – yet another conflict at Linköping was pending, but Sigismund suffered immense losses. He had to withdraw, and shortly afterwards he returned to Poland. Based on the mass of slanders and anti-Catholic phobias, Riksdag of 1599 deposed the king and took his place as ruler's several-year-old son, Władysław Vasa. However, the condition for him to take over the crown was to control to Lutheranism, to which Sigismund could not give permission.
The fresh ruler of Sweden was yet Karol Sudermański, who began governments by physically removing the remnants of Catholics and supporters of the overthrown monarch. The dispute over the crown shortly turned into a long-term Polish-Swedish war, during which Swedes were assisted by Protestants from another countries specified as Holland and England. As we can see, Sigismund lost after his first successes, as he did not get adequate military support from the internally dissmocratic Republic of Poland.
Swedish experience has strengthened Sigismund III in Catholic faith. Seeing the civilizational failure related to Protestantism, he began to talk out for counter-reformation. Although in political life he had a strong connection with Jesuit views, for the remainder of his life he remained tolerant of the innoisseurs, which was a pedigree of Catholic principles. Unlike Protestant lands that burned Catholicism with fire and sword, he did not destruct congregations or churches or persecute anyone for spiritual reasons.
Many believe that Sigismund III Vasa destroyed the spiritual tolerance introduced by the Warsaw Confederacy. There's inactive not adequate to tell them there was tolerance in Protestant countries. Sigismund evidently did not destruct tolerance. On the contrary, he expanded it. He stood for peace in the spirit of Catholic morality. Thanks to him, the counter-reformation in Poland celebrated its top triumphs. Peacefully recovered were erstwhile plundered by Protestant temples (e.g. in Toruń and Elbląg) and fresh ones were built.
Sigismund besides pressed the Duke of Kurland, resulting in an act of spiritual tolerance issued in Mitava in 1617. The same was actual of the Prussian lentil.
Throughout the country, there was a massive conversion of nobles and magnates to Catholicism. It turned out that Protestantism was a temporary fashion in Poland and not a permanent phenomenon and that the religion of Luther or Calvin could not be brought here peacefully. King Sigismund's politics, of course, met with the discontent of fanatical Protestants. In 1620 Calvinist Michał Piekarski carried out an unsuccessful effort on his life.
The conflict with Sweden has evolved into a long-term war between 2 countries. Polish troops were victorious in the field (e.g. at Kircholm in 1610), but due to the failure to implement the king's postulates, they were poorly and irregularly paid, resulting in the impossibility of the final, victorious ending of the struggles. Subsequent wars with Sweden led to the ravages of Polish lands on the Baltic. The appellates of the king and the hetmans to the dizmocratic parliament proved to be the voice of the cryer in the wilderness. R
The self-deprecating magnate led the Republic to enter the war with Moscow. The east neighbour, as a consequence of interior chaos in the day, the alleged sadness proved to be a weak opponent. Tsar Vasil IV Shujski paid tribute to Zygmunt. The Boyars donated Moscow throne to the boy of the Polish King Władysław, but subject to his transition to Orthodoxy. Sigismund did not consent to this, and he is inactive falsely accused of being greedy of power, which resulted in the failure of influence in the east.
In fact Sigismund refused, among others, due to the juvenile age of a prince who in 1611 was only 15 years old and was not yet ready to execute specified a advanced state function. That's why the Russian militants offered a young man to control him. Moreover, the condition of the throne was to force the passage of Orthodoxy, which the pious Polish king could not agree to. However, the most crucial origin was rather different.
The King simply feared for Władysław's life. A fewer years earlier, the Russians had murdered their Tsar. In addition, Sigismund lost respective children, and Władysław was at the time the only boy who survived the baby period. He had mediocre wellness and was susceptible to various diseases. To realize Sigismund III's actions you should be a father and love your child. Then the substance is very simple; of course not for those who believe in the conspiracy explanation of the possessive lust for power of Sigismund, fueled supposedly by the Jesuits.
The eventual consequence of the wars in the east was the annexation of Smolenszczyzna and Siewierszczyzna to the Republic of Poland. erstwhile Protestants started the 30 Years War in 1618, the Polish king unofficially supported the Catholic camp. He understood that if the Protestants destroyed the empire and overthrow the Catholic emperor, the next blow would go to the Republic of Poland. Thanks to his organized help, Vienna was saved.
In response, Turkey, which was a silent ally of the Protestant Union, began preparations for war against Poland. The defeat of Chocim buried ambitious sultan plans.
At the end of his life, Sigismund continued to argue with Parliament about raising taxes and army numbers. After the death of Constance’s second wife, he suffered from intellectual and physical health, which he had not recovered from.
It is worth noting that Zygmunt III raised his boy well and prepared him to service as monarch. He sent him on a journey around Europe to gain cognition of various states, political models, weapons and tactics of the individual armies participating in the 30 Years' War. In another words, Wałdisław IV went through the same way as the celebrated car-reformer Peter I a fewer decades later.
Thanks to this, Władysław IV proved to be as large a ruler as his father – 1 of the last on the Polish throne who had an thought to defend and even strengthen Poland's power position. In this case, it was about his beginning of the Silesian Revindiction and the Turkish War project. Unfortunately, he besides faced a dissmocracy of nobles, which was the main origin of the crisis and yet the collapse of the country.
Sigismund III died on April 30, 1632.
Previous entry from our calendar is available Here..
