The Sobieski Family: History, Culture and Society. Insights between Rome, Warsaw and Europe.

Abstract

The new issue of Eastern European History Review (n.3/2020) brings together the scientific research products presented at the international conference held in Warsaw in October (18-19) 2019, focusing on The Sobieski Family: history, culture and society. Insights between Rome, Warsaw and Europe. The books deals with themes related to the history and characters of a family, the Sobieski, which was able to catalyze the attention and interest of the whole European continent between the end of the Seventeenth-century and the beginning of the following century. With great scientific freedom and rigor – and aware of a grounded and broad historiographical tradition, already rich in monographs and contributions – the articles highlighted the intense relationships connecting Poland with Italy and, more generally, with Europe, and revolving around the stories of the members of this Polish family. An articulated universe of new perspectives emerged from the retrieved information about the Royal Family’s deeds and personal, public and private, possibly “heroic” events, that confirmed how much the memory of the Sobieski is still alive in the collective imagination of Poland and in Italy, in particular. A country held so dearly by the Sobieski family, both for the celebration and glorification by the Holy See of the figure Jan III as the Defensor Fidei par excellence – after the liberation of Vienna from infidels – and for the political asylum granted by the city of Rome to the widow Maria Kazimiera from 1699 to 1714.