Editing Szlachta (section)

=== Etymology ===
In Polish, a nobleman is called a "''szlachcic''" and a noblewoman a "''szlachcianka''".

The Polish term ''szlachta'' derived from the [[Old High German]] word ''slahta''. In modern German ''Geschlecht'' – which originally came from the [[Proto-Germanic]] *''slagiz'', "blow", "strike", and shares the [[Anglo-Saxon]] root for "slaughter", or the verb "to slug" – means "breeding" or "gender". Like many other Polish words pertaining to nobility, it derives from Germanic words: the Polish word for "knight" is ''rycerz'', from the German ''Ritter'', meaning "rider". The Polish word for "coat of arms" is ''herb'' from the German ''Erbe'' ("heritage").
17th-century Poles assumed ''szlachta'' came from the German ''schlachten'', "to slaughter" or "to butcher", and was therefore related to the German word for battle, ''Schlacht''. Some early Polish historians thought the term might have derived from the name of the legendary proto-Polish chief, [[Lech, Czech, and Rus'|Lech]], mentioned in Polish and Czech writings. The szlachta traced their descent from Lech, who allegedly founded the Polish kingdom in about the fifth century.<ref name="races-old-world">{{cite journal
| last1 = Hutton
| first1 = Richard Holt
| author-link1 = Richard Holt Hutton
| last2 = Bagehot
| first2 = Walter
| author-link2 = Walter Bagehot
| date = January 1864
| title = The Races of the Old World
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=4u4RAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA482
| journal = [[National Review (1855)|National Review]]
| location = London, England
| publisher = Robson and Levey
| access-date = 9 Oct 2014
}}</ref>{{rp|482}}

The Polish term ''szlachta'' designated the formalized, hereditary<ref name="szacki--inherited--1995">{{cite book
 | last = Szacki
 | first = Jerzy Ryszard
 | author-link = Jerzy Szacki
 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=gU6_JbBHkXoC&pg=PA48
 | title = LIBERALISM AFTER COMMUNISM
 | year = 1995
 | publisher = [[Central European University Press]]
 | location = Budapest, Hungary
 | pages = 48
 | quote = ... the Polish nobility was a closed group (apart from a few exceptions, many of which were contrary to the law), in which membership was inherited.| isbn = 9781858660165
 }}</ref> [[aristocracy]]<ref name="races-old-world--aristocracy--caste" /> of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, which constituted the nation itself, and ruled without competition.<ref name="dmowski-szlachta-the-nation">{{cite book
 | last = Dmowski
 | first = Roman Stanisław
 | author-link = Roman Dmowski
 | editor-last = Duff
 | editor-first = James Duff
 | editor-link = James Duff Duff
 | chapter-url = https://archive.org/details/RussianRealitiesAndProblems
 | title = RUSSIAN REALITIES AND PROBLEMS
 | year = 1917
 | publisher = [[Cambridge University Press]]
 | location = Cambridge
 | page = 116
 | chapter = Poland Old and New
 | quote = In the past the nobility in Poland constituted the nation itself. It ruled the country without competition on the part of any other class, the middle class being small in numbers and wealth, and the peasants being [[Serfdom|serfs]].}}</ref><ref name="polish-peasant-not-belong-to-polish-nation">{{cite book
 | last = Boswell
 | first = Alexander Bruce
 | author-link = :pl:Alexander Bruce Boswell
 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=loBDAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA116
 | format = GOOGLE EBOOK
 | title = POLAND AND THE POLES
 | year = 1919
 | publisher = [[Dodd, Mead and Company]]
 | location = [[New York City]], [[New York (state)|NEW YORK]], U.S.A.
 | pages = 116–117
 | quote = The Polish peasant in the past was a very humble member of the Polish community – in fact he scarcely belonged to it at all. He had for 350 years no civic rights whatever. He was the serf of his master. It was only the easy-going and patriarchal relations between squire and peasant that made life tolerable for the latter.}}</ref><ref name="only-szlachta-are-citizens" /><ref name="topor-jakubowski--2002">{{cite periodical
 | last = Jakubowski
 | first = Theodore
 | editor-last = Suligowski
 | editor-first = Leonard Joseph
 | title = Claiming Inherited Noble Status
 | periodical= White Eagle: Journal of the Polish Nobility Association Foundation
 | date = Spring–Summer 2002
 | page = 5
 | location = Baltimore, MD
 | url = http://pnaf.us/pdfs/white-eagle-spring-summer-2002.pdf
 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170412052147/http://pnaf.us/pdfs/white-eagle-spring-summer-2002.pdf
 | archive-date = 12 April 2017
 | quote = ... the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth of Two Nations (from 1385 until the Third Partition of 1795) paralleled the Roman Empire in that -- whether we like it or not -- full rights of citizenship were limited to the governing elite, called szlachta in Polish ... It is not truly correct to consider the szlachta a class; they actually were more like a caste, the military caste, as in Hindu society.}}</ref><ref name="krasinski--szlachta-are-poland">{{cite web
 |last = Gliński
 |first = Mikołaj
 |title = Slavery vs. Serfdom, or Was Poland a Colonial Empire?
 |date = 8 October 2015
 |website = Culture.pl
 |location = [[Warsaw]], [[Poland|POLAND]], EU
 |url = http://culture.pl/en/article/slavery-vs-serfdom-or-was-poland-a-colonial-empire
 |access-date = 23 June 2017
 |archive-url = https://archive.today/20170624062330/http://culture.pl/en/article/slavery-vs-serfdom-or-was-poland-a-colonial-empire
 |archive-date = 24 June 2017
 |quote = The boundaries between nobility and peasants (and other social groups) persisted well into the 19th and 20th centuries. A shocking proof of how terribly effective this Sarmatian ideology was, can be found in a personal letter of [[Zygmunt Krasiński]], one of the three greatest Polish Romantic poets in the 19th century (and a descendant of an aristocratic family). In the mid-19th century Krasiński wrote to his English friend Henry Reeve: 'Believe me and rest assured that apart from aristocracy there's nothing in Poland: no talent, no bright minds, nor sense of sacrifice. Our third state [bourgeoisie] is nonsense; our peasants are machines. Only we [szlachta] are Poland.'
 }}</ref> In official Latin documents of the old [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth|Commonwealth]], the hereditary szlachta were referred to as "''nobilitas''" from the Latin term,{{citation needed|date=April 2021}}. Until the second half of the 19th century, the Polish term ''{{linktext|obywatel}}'' (which now means "citizen") could be used as a synonym for szlachta landlords.<ref name="szlachta-equals-citizen">{{cite book
| last = Struve
| first = Kai
| editor-last = Wawrzeniuk
| editor-first = Piotr
| editor-link = Piotr Wawrzeniuk
| chapter-url = https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:214737/FULLTEXT01.pdf
| type = History
| title = SOCIETAL CHANGE AND IDEOLOGICAL FORMATION AMONG THE RURAL POPULATION OF THE BALTIC AREA 1880-1939
| chapter = Citizenship and National Identity: the Peasants of Galicia during the 19th Century
| year = 2008
| publisher = [[Södertörn University|Södertörns högskola]]
| location = [[Flemingsberg]], [[Huddinge Municipality|Huddinge municipality]], [[Stockholm County|Stockholm county]], [[Sweden|KINGDOM OF SWEDEN]]
| isbn = 978-91-85139-11-8
| page = 77
| quote = The fact that the Polish term obywatel ("citizen") could be used as a synonym for gentry landlords until the second half of the 19th century shows how strong this concept was within Polish culture.}}</ref>

Today the word ''szlachta'' simply translates as "nobility". In its broadest sense, it can also denote some non-hereditary honorary knighthoods and [[baron]]ial titles granted by other European monarchs, including the [[Holy See]]. Occasionally, 19th-century landowners of commoner descent were referred to as ''szlachta'' by courtesy or error, when they owned manorial estates, but were not in fact noble by birth. ''Szlachta'' also denotes the Ruthenian and Lithuanian nobility from before the old Commonwealth.

In the past, a misconception sometimes led to the mistranslation of "''szlachta''" as "gentry" rather than "nobility".<ref>{{Cite book
 | last = Michener
 | first = James Albert
 | author-link = James A. Michener
 | title = POLAND
 | publisher = [[Random House]]; New York City, NEW YORK, U.S.A.
 | date = 1983
 | isbn = 0-394-53189-2
 | quote = Minor nobility: Linguistically, this category causes trouble. Some Polish writers refer to 'gentry', which doesn't quite sound right in English. Whereas some European writers use the term 'petty nobility' [analogously to ''[[Petite bourgeoisie]]''], but the adjective has unfortunate connotations.| title-link = Poland (novel)
 }}</ref><ref name="zamoyski-not-gentry-not-nobility">{{cite book
 | last = Zamoyski
 | first = Adam
|author-link=Adam Zamoyski
 | title = The Polish Way: A Thousand-year history of the Poles and their culture
 | orig-date = 1987
 | year = 1998
 | edition = Fourth Printing
 | isbn = 0-7818-0200-8
 | publisher = [[Hippocrene Books]]
 | location = New York
 | page = [https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/55 55]
 | quote = One cannot substitute the terms 'nobility' or 'gentry' for szlachta because it had little in common with those classes in other European countries either in origin, composition or outlook.
 | url = https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/55
 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book
 | last = Davies
 | first = Norman
 | author-link = Norman Davies
 | title = GOD'S PLAYGROUND: A HISTORY OF POLAND, VOLUME I - THE ORIGINS TO 1795
 | year = 1982
 | isbn = 0-231-05351-7
 | publisher = [[Columbia University Press]]
 | location = New York City
 | page = 206
 | quote = For the sake of precision therefore, it is essential that szlachta should be translated as 'Nobility', szlachcic as 'nobleman', and stan szlachecki as 'the noble estate'.}}</ref> This mistaken practice began due to the inferior economic status of many ''szlachta'' members compared to that of the nobility in other European countries (see also [[Gentry#Two principal estates of the realm|Estates of the Realm]] ''regarding wealth and nobility'').<ref name="zamoyski-warrior-caste">{{cite book
 | last = Zamoyski
 | first = Adam
|author-link=Adam Zamoyski
 | title = The Polish Way: A Thousand-year history of the Poles and their culture
 | orig-date = 1987
 | year = 1998
 | edition = Fourth Printing
 | isbn = 0-7818-0200-8
 | publisher = [[Hippocrene Books]]
 | location = New York
 | page = [https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/55 55]
 | quote = A more apt analogy might perhaps be made with the [[Rajput]]s of northern India. ... unlike any other gentry in Europe, the szlachta was not limited by nor did it depend for its status on either wealth, or land, or royal writ. It was defined by its function, that of a warrior caste.
 | url = https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/55
 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book
 | last = Zamoyski
 | first = Adam
|author-link=Adam Zamoyski
 | title = The Polish Way: A Thousand-year history of the Poles and their culture
 | orig-date = 1987
 | year = 1998
 | edition = Fourth Printing
 | isbn = 0-7818-0200-8
 | publisher = [[Hippocrene Books]]
 | location = New York
 | pages = [https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/57 57–58]
 | quote = While land provided the majority with a livelihood, it was not the only or even the predominant source of wealth for the magnates, whose estates were not large by the standards of the barons of England or the great lords of France. ... The magnates only started accumulating property on a large scale at the beginning of the fifteenth century.
 | url = https://archive.org/details/polishwaythousan00zamo/page/57
 }}</ref> The ''szlachta'' included those rich and powerful enough to be [[Polish magnate|great magnates]] down to the impoverished with an aristocratic lineage, but with no land, no castle, no money, no village, and no subject peasants.<ref>{{Cite book
 | last = Michener
 | first = James Albert
 | author-link = James A. Michener
 | title = POLAND
 | publisher = [[Random House]]; New York City
 | date = 1983
 | isbn = 0-394-53189-2
 | quote = Minor nobility: ... The category includes men almost rich and powerful enough to be magnates, and all intervening levels down to the roving rascal with no castle, no money, no village, no peasants, one horse and pride unbounded.| title-link = Poland (novel)
 }}</ref>  Historian M.Ross wrote in 1835: "At least 60,000 families belong to this class, of which, however, only about 100 are wealthy; all the rest are poor."<ref name="szlachta-poor">{{cite book
 | last = Ross (of Durham)
 | first = M.
 | chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=fqxDAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA51
 | title = A history of Poland from its foundation as a state to the present time; including a full account of the recent patriotic struggle to re-establish its independence. To which is prefixed, a descriptive view of the country, its natural history, cities and towns, and the manners and customs of its inhabitants
 | year = 1835
 | publisher = Pattison and Ross
 | location = Newcastle upon Tyne, England
 | page = 51
 | chapter = A Descriptive View of Poland: Character, Manners, and Customs of the Poles
 | quote = At least 60,000 families belong to this class [szlachta], of which, however, only about 100 are wealthy; all the rest are poor.}}</ref>

A few exceptionally wealthy and powerful szlachta members constituted the ''magnateria'' and were known as [[magnate]]s ([[magnates of Poland and Lithuania]]).

{{Clear}}