Wojciech Kordyzon

Dialogue and Controversy in «Tragedy on Mass» (1560) by Bernardino Ochino: Study and Text Edition provides a complex critical edition of Trajedyja o Mszej [Tragedy on Mass] by Bernardino Ochino. This anti-Roman literary dialogue propagating the Protestant perspective on the Eucharist and related ceremonies was anonymously translated into Polish, printed in 1560 in the printing shop run by Daniel of Łęczyca in Pińczów and financed by Francesco Lismanini, who acted as one of the leaders of the Reformed congregation in Lesser Poland. Part I of the book comprises the monographic study of the text and discusses its diverse historical aspects, literary patterns, contexts, and reasons for its publication. Chapter 1 introduces the biography of the author, provides literature review and an outline of the Tragedy’s plot. Chapter 2 lays out select information on the Reformation Eucharistic controversies in the early modern era and serves as an essential background for the main problems posed by Ochino’s work. In Chapter 3, the production of the Polish translation is discussed, exhibiting the differences between the Polish and Italian versions of the text, as well as presenting hypotheses on the main innovations introduced either by the anonymous Polish translator or the original manuscripts sent to Poland. The Polish edition is, in fact, the editio princeps of the text as corresponding Italian and Latin versions were not published until 1561. Chapter 4 analyses the circumstances of the text’s publication in 1560. It includes a depiction of the current state of the Reformed congregation in Pińczów and presents elements of its publishing programme, part of which was Ochino’s work, while also discussing educational and persuasive goals set by this circle to inform about and convince to their religious agenda. Chapter 5 comparatively discusses the literary aspects of the text, which was designed as a dialogue. Other dialogues that were published in Poland or by Polish authors are introduced and cover the thematic scope of Ochino’s work. This chapter analyses how the authors, who had been exploring problems similar to Ochino’s, chose to shape their works in terms of genre to construct their fictional debates and meet their persuasive goals. In Chapter 6, the context of the Reformation Apocalypse exegesis is employed to examine how Ochino and other Protestant authors combined the quasi-tragical structure (applied by the type of Protestant writings referred to as the tragoedia sacra) of the polemical texts with the expression of millennialist views. Chapter 7 deals with the question of literary sources (both Latin and vernacular) for the construction of the allegorical figures used in the Tragedy and consequently identifies three main areas as relevant contexts: German and Swiss Reformation literature from the beginning of the 16th century (by Pamphilus Gengenbach, Hans von Rüte, Niklaus Manuel, Johannes Atrocianus), the writings of the Italian diaspora in the mid-16th century (by Francesco Negri, Celio Secondo Curione) and English Protestant pamphlets of circa 1530–1550 (particularly those of William Turner and William Punt). Chapter 8 summarises the main arguments and examines perspectives for further studies. Part II provides the annotated critical edition of the Polish text. It comprises a detailed description of the transcription guidelines designed to transcribe the text, reflecting the specificity of the preserved early printed text witnesses; the critical apparatus; the transcribed text of the Tragedy; and a commentary, including linguistic, factual and contextual annotations. The edition is supplied with an index of early Middle-Polish vocabulary as well as an index of biblical references. The supplement additionally contains the edition of the fragmentally preserved Polish translation of Ochino’s Tragedy of the Papal Supremacy (1558).

The paper presents information about a reissue of Postępek prawa czartowskiego (The Trial of the Devil’s Law), an anonymous early printed book attributed to Sebastian Sternacki’s printing shop, dated approximately 1619, and omitted from scholarly editing until now. Due to physical damage to the unique copy of editio princeps (Brest-Litovsk 1570), the existing state of art is incomplete, and reference to the early 17th c. full-text edition allows to fill the missing gaps. As based on the latter copy, an edition of fragments unknown to this day was prepared, namely the beginning of chapter I, a part of chapter II, prefatory verse Przedmowa do czytelnika łaskawego (Foreword to the Gentle Reader), and Dialog abo Rozmowa o Sprawiedliwości Świeckiej (Dialogue or Conversation on Secular Justice), a piece appended to the reissue of The Trial.

The paper serves to delineate the figures of early modern Protestant women included in Erazm Otwinowski’s paraenetic poetic collection Sprawy abo historyje znacznych niewiast (Affairs or Histories of
Notable Women, 1589), namely Anne Askew, Jane Grey, Olympia Fulvia Morata and an anonymous“duchess,” presumably Vittoria Colonna or Caterina Cibo. As its purpose, the article accomplishes an identification of possible (oral or written) sources of information about the heroines and interpretation of intertextual references made by the poet. All that allows the author to depict the parenetic patterns for pious women that Otwinowski outlined, combining apology of martyrdom, learnedness, and religious exile.

This paper discusses the development of the vernacular catechism as a printed genre. The process is exemplified by the editions published in Königsberg between 1545 and 1575 where the catechisms were printed in several vernacular languages (German, Lithuanian, Polish, Prussian) in printing shops run by Hans Weinreich, Aleksander Aujezdecki, and Hans Daubmann. The paper seeks to analyse the material in terms of linguistic coverage in the Duchy of Prussia and, via analysis of the peritextual elements, how the print agents presented their work to the recipients. The aspects of book design, such as the volume, format, and decorations, are included in the analysis to indicate the intended book prestige and usage.

The article presents the Polish edition of the 1556 catechetical instruction addressed to children known as the Spiritual Milk; its Latin version was edited by Pietro Paolo Vergerio. The first part contains bibliographical information about the printing and the characteristics of the Polish text. It also discusses the question of the audience of the translation and the functionality of its typographical solutions. The second part presents a transcription of the text together with a linguistic commentary and a detailed account of the applied transcription rules.

The article analyses the 1559 edition of Liberum Arbitrium by Francesco Negri da Bassano. The publishing address of “Pesclavii” (Poschiavo) has been considered false and, based on an analysis of woodcut initials and the identification of watermarks on the printing paper, it is indicated that the print sine nomine was most probably made by the printing house of Daniel of Łęczyca at Pińczów. This edition is compared with the 1559 Geneva edition of the same text by Jean Crespin’s typography. Textual differences are pointed out (minor modifications of paratexts and supplements to the Pińczów edition with the fragments that included Polish Reformation writers, Andrzej Trzecieski and Mikołaj Rej). Moreover, the author discusses the possible place of the text within the publishing programme of the Lesser Poland Protestant community Protestant around 1559, and the characters probably associated with the anonymous edition of the tragedy (especially Francesco Lismanino and Giorgio Negri) as well as possible reasons for the falsification of the publishing address, together with their potential propaganda significance for the Reformation movement in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

The aim of this article is to discuss the ways in which Christ’s Biblical words “hoc est corpus meum” are used in Ochino’s translated text, which was published in Pińczów in 1560. First, the context of the preparation and Polish translation of the work (the recent death of Jan Łaski and the aims of the Lutheran community in Lesser Poland) are discussed. Next, the methods and conditions for the introduction of paraphrases in texts in the work, which attest both to the persuasive and educational as well as more general perspective of early modern semantic changes appearing in theological discussions in vernacular languages, are subject to analysis.

Mass before the Tribunal. The Personification of the Mass in the Polish Translation of Bernardino Ochino's Dialogue in the Context of the European Reformation Literature of the First Half of the 16th Century.

The first part of the paper is to introduce the main motif of Bernardino Ochino's Trajedyja o Mszej (Tragedy on Mass) published in Polish translation in 1560. The work tells the story of a trial of the personified Mass indicted by figures that can be identified with the Reformation and the individuals engaged in it. The Author discusses the structure of this literary dialogue and describes briefly the characters involved in the plot with their polemical background (these include in particular personifications of the Mass, the Lord's Supper, and the Roman Church, as well as figures of the Pope, Satan, Holy Spirit, and a metonymic protagonist named the Lover of God's Glory). The second part presents the context of literary tradition, where Mass was personified for controversial purposes, mainly by authors connected with the Reformation. The motif of a personified Mass was probably introduced in Swiss pamphlets of the 1520s (Krankheit und Testament der Messe by Niklaus Manuel, Querela Missae by Johannes Atrocianus).

The concept of accusing Mass of dishonesty and performing her trial was recognised as an innovation of English Protestant writings of the late 1540s (esp. William Punt’s and William Turner’s dialogues). The aforementioned texts are juxtaposed with Ochino’s dialogue to show the probable origins of the concept used in his text, as well as to specify additional motifs combined by him (and consequently the Polish translator). The similarities between Ochino’s work and the texts chosen, as well as Ochino’s connections with the places of publication of these texts, allow us to see them as part of a small yet consistent subtype of Protestant polemical writings, which Ochino chose to use and modify for controversial purposes.

The article presents a possible interpretation spectrum of the miniatures, especially that of the fiddler (viellator), that appear on folio 18r of the Florian Psalter, containing the text of Psalm 14(13) (Dixit insipiens...). The methodology applied involves recognizing the roots of cultural sources of the motif. In the case of the fiddler miniature, these are i.a. changes in medieval musical culture, its conceptualization by the theologians of the time, representations of fiddlers in book illuminations, as well as iconographic and exegetical tradition of Psalm 14(13). In the context of the debate about the iconography of this work the article attempts to interpret it based on considering possible meanings of the visual material in relation to the text it accompanies.