Pożary w miastach Rzeczypospolitej w XVI-XVIII wieku i ich następstwa ekonomiczne, społeczne i kulturowe

ENThe monograph is one of the two parts of the publication, whose first part was a catalogue published in May, 2020 containing information on nearly 5,000 fires in Polish and Lithuanian cities and towns between the 16th and 18th centuries. The data was used to compile numerous lists and tables which will be analysed in the subsequent parts of this dissertation. The aim of this pioneering work is to describe fires in the early modern towns of the Commonwealth of Two Nations in a synthetic way. The conflagrations that destroyed Polish villages have been deliberately omitted, and the in-depth analyses concentrate on the chosen period and do not refer to well-documented medieval fire disasters. As the consequences of the fires were the same for the city dwellers regardless of their origins, this work explores conflagrations in the times of war and peace. The dissertation covers the period from the beginning of the 16th century to the end of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1795. Its explores almost the entire area of the Commonwealth of Two Nations with the exception of fiefdoms (the Duchy of Prussia, Livonia, Moldavia) and the regions that belonged to the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania for a short time (Lauenburg and Bütow Land, Smolensk and Chernihiv Voivodeships, Silesian borderlands). The lands lost by Poland after the First (1772) and the Second (1793) Partition have been analysed until October 1795.The books consists of the introduction, four chapters and the conclusion. Three chapters have been written by Andrzej Karpiński, the fourth one by Elżbieta Nowosielska. Chapter One, "The Causes of Fires,” discusses the typology of Polish and Lithuanian towns, their development and the causes of their regress, the size and the location of towns and city agglomerations. It also describes the factors conducive to conflagrations and the various reasons for them (wars, invasions, arsons, so called lighting fires, careless handling of fire). Chapter Two, “The Course of Disasters,” consists of two parts. The first part discusses the number of fires in towns, their extent, frequency, duration and the involvement of people in fighting it. The second part shows the most tragic fires in selected Polish and Lithuanian cities and towns (Cracow, Poznan, Warsaw, Vilnius, Lviv, Gniezno, Piotrków Trybunalski, Kalisz, Zamość, Przemyśl, Grodno among others). Chapter Three, "The Consequences of the 16th-18th Century Fires in Polish and Lithuanian Towns,” analyses demographic, socio-religious, political and economic results of the disasters. Most information relates to economic consequences of the fires in the nationwide, local and individual aspect. It also discusses the changes in the urban, architectural and cultural spheres resulting from fires. Chapter Four, “Fire Protection,” is devoted to a detailed description of fire protection legislation and the measures, which were to prevent conflagrations effectively. These included, among others, the formation of appropriate fire services, enforcing new building regulations in cities and storing fire equipment. In an attempt to see the real consequences of demanded reforms, Polish solutions are juxtaposed with the European fire prevention legislation.The scholarly apparatus of the monograph, whose integral part is the above-mentioned catalogue, consists of: an extensive, Oxford style bibliography, footnotes, an English summary and indexes (subject and town names index), illustrations, lists and tables. The dissertation is largely descriptive, using wherever it was possible, the results of quantitative research. Comparisons, pro and retrogression were applied more sparingly, although the authors also relied on archaeology, climatology, the history of art and literary studies. As the authors wanted to make the most efficient use of the available resources relating to the First Commonwealth within the limit of a small study, the information concerning different types of fire disasters in Europe was deliberately reduced. As for the resource material, it is immensely varied and scattered. Most sources give information regarding fires and their consequences. This is why the research was conducted in numerous Polish, Lithuanian, Belarussian and Ukrainian libraries and archives, among others, the Central Archives of Historical Records in Warsaw, the National Archives in Krakow, the State Archives in Bialystok, Lublin, Poznan, Przemyśl and Rzeszów, Central State Historical Archives of Ukraine in Kyiv and Lviv, Lithuanian State Historical Archive in Vilnius, the National Archive of the Republic of Belarus in Minsk, the Princes Czartoryski Library in Cracow, the Scientific Library of the PAAS and the PAS in Cracow and the Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences in Vilnius. Moreover, the authors used numerous series of source materials and many unpublished works. [From the publication]