A Polish Sattelzeit? New Concepts in the Political Language at the Twilight of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Abstract

The political discourse in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth changed deeply in the second half of the eighteenth century. New concepts, terms and notions were integrated into it, some of them drawn from the vocabularies of Western philosophers. The article tries to answer the question what these concepts or notions were, and how their adaptation informed the language itself and the descriptions of the political world and political-system projects formulated in it. Based on the analysis of theoretical treatises as well as writings produced as part of current political debate of the years 1764–92, the author seeks to demonstrate the ways in which the political disputants of King Stanislaus Augustus’s time endeavoured to face the state’s crisis through introducing new words and ideas, and in which the language was adapting to the challenges of the changing socio--political situation. She argues that the concepts which appeared in the last quarter of the century in the Polish political language were fundamental to the description and view of the world – to the extent that a breakthrough in Polish discussion on society and state is identi fi able along these lines.