Sunday, December 18, 2011

Pan Zawadzki with king Charles I of England, Scotland etc



Salve,
sometime during 1633 our king Władysław IV sent his envoy, starosta of Swiecie pan Jan Zawadzki, to the various royal courts of Europe, including the Stuart court in London.
In June 1633 Polish embassy reached England.
There is a description of the gifts from our king to the King of England, and here as always, our good king regaled his English counterpart several riding horses, dressed and with then typical horse tack used in Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth:
''Rzędom też oprawnym bardzo się dziwują, że w Anglji takich niewidali, także też i koniom, jakoż Cavalcator Królewski powiedział ża żadnego takiego u Króla niemasz.''
 -Our adorned, [precious stones etc], horse furniture (back in XVII-XVIII century ''rząd koński'' included both all the harness and the saddle with stirrups)  they are wondering about since they have not seen those in England, also they have not seen the horses [of our embassy], thus the Royal Master of Horse has stated that there is no horse similar [to ours] in the Royal stables.
 ...
Po prywatnej audyencyi oddał Jegomośś te konie Królowi Jegomości ubrane w rzędy z pałaszami z buławami. Dzianeta po usarsku z rzędem turkusami osadzonym, lamparth na niem, na gniadego, drugi rząd po Arabsku łuk, sajdak, rząd barzo piękny, w nim turek cisawy których obu rączości i gotowości wysławić nie mogą.
 -After a private audience [of our envoy with the King] the envoy gave these horses to His Royal Highness tacked with horse furniture, with palashes (pałasz) and maces (buława).  Bay jennet in winged hussar fashion tack, his harness adorned with turquoises, with a leopard pelt [under the saddle]; second horse furniture was in in an Arabian fashion, with a bow and bowcase, his tack very beautiful, carried by a chestnut Turkish hors;  they, [the English], cannot praise enough the swiftness and [level] of dressage of both [our] horses..

 ...

Also the Polish envoy brought another 'horse gift ' for the English monarch, a carriage with 6 carriage horse, presumably all the same in color and size (their color has not been given in the depiction). as it was our Polish custom of the times. There were also priceless Siberian sables for the queen,
...

...
ps
the images are from a later part of XVII century, from Sweden, and show two manners of presenting Polish horses : winged hussar horse tack and 'Arabian' tack . The hussar horse furniture in the top image lacks the wild cat, leopard, tiger or lion pelt.

3 comments:

Kadrinazi said...

Englishmen were also very surprised by Polish haircut ;)
http://kadrinazi.blogspot.com/2010/12/dzianetha-po-usarsku-z-rzedem-turkusami.html
Funny thing, when I describe that on my blog one year I also used picture of horses send to Sweden :)

Dario T. W. said...

hey Michal,
Irena Turnau - in her book Polish national Costume - uses this legacy diary/notes to reconstruct their appearance etc, so this Legacy is one of the most important primary sources to the period of 1630s.
The Certamen Equestre prints are the best representations of the parade Polish horse harness/tack, Dahlberg's drawings are also very good ones (print showing horses taken after the battle of Warsaw) but I do not have good quality images. The Ossolinski's entry into Rome by DolaBella I am reserving for another series of 'posts' - and he did not draw distinctive hussar-tacked horses and 'cossack/arabian'-tacked ones separately. The 1672 Certamen Equestre images of Polish horses seem like a good choice here and in many other posts... :) And after horses I go...

Dario T. W. said...

Certamne Equestre was republished/reprinted in 2005 - http://books.google.com/books?id=noCtQQAACAAJ&dq=certamen+equestre+Jonas+Nordin&hl=en&sa=X&ei=rZjvTqTRHciKgweIwMWYCQ&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA
A pdf of digitalized book can be ordered from the Sweden National Library