Eulogies, or: Friends of Science as Eulogists of (Not Always the Same) Freedom

Abstract

The author of the article analyses the texts of selected eulogies delivered by the most eminent members of the Warsaw Society of Friends of Sciences: Jan Albertrandi, Stanisław Kostka Potocki, Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz and Stanisław Staszic. The subject of his interest is the way each of them approached the problem of freedom, giving laudations (usually in honour of particularly distinguished compatriots) at various moments of the Society’s history – from its beginning, through the period of the Duchy of Warsaw, to the years preceding the outbreak of the November Uprising. However, this is not only about freedom considered in connection with the collapse of the Polish state and the threat to the Polish community, but also about personal freedom,  regarded as something that can be achieved in other spheres of a person’s life than that primarily related to the political situation of the nation they belong to (e.g. in their involvement in the development of science).