Challenges and Pitfalls in the Study of the Historiographical “Afterlife” of a Thirteenth-Century Prince. Reflections on Paweł Żmudzki’s Book

Abstract

In historiography, Leszek the Black, a prince in Krakow in the late thirteenth century, acquired the fame of a ruler victorious in wars with external enemies and a reputation for being entangled in internal conflicts. His fame contributed to the fact that, in the sixteenth century, Polish heraldic legends associated the origins of a number of noble coats of arms with Leszek. The historiographic image of the ruler through the centuries is the subject of Paweł Żmudzki’s book, the content of which is discussed in this article. The review highlights the advantages of the approach, which is focused on examining the narratives and the plot threads contained in them. The comments concern possible additional explanations of the positive image of Leszek the Black in sixteenth-century historiography and problems related to the methodology applied by the monograph’s author.