Beautiful full color album featuring the best of Poland in landscape, art and history.
The Polish word ojczyzna (homeland) used to have two meanings. The older one simply referred to the father's property or inheritance. The newer meaning accepted only in the 17th century was created by broadening the scope of the concept of ojcowiczna (family estate or property), and supplanted the Latin term "patria."
This picture album presents in images and texts the story of Poland, the homeland. The willow-lined road with a remote cottage in the background - perhaps the cottage of the Romantic poet Mickiewicz in his native Lithuanian village, or Chopin's Zelazowa Wola in the Mazovian plain. The Tatra Mountains or the boulder fields and hills of the Swietokrzyskie range, which inspired so many exquisite works of art: music by Moniuszko, Szymanowski, Gorecki, Kilar, or paintings by Wyczolkowski. The ruined ducal castles and palaces, which still impress visitors with the vestiges of their affluence, in spite of the trail of destruction left by so many foreign invasions.

Wawel and the Chapel of St Leonard - the crypt with the tombs of the national heroes: King Jan Sobieski, General Kosziuszko, Prince Jozef Poniatowski and many others. The churches built all around the land since the time of Prince Mieszko in the 10th century, with the shrine of Jasna Gora holding decisive primacy among them. The defence of the shrine against the Swedes in 1656 and so many other battles, not always won, but always evoking some common cause that the Poles fought for. From Legnica (1241) to Vienna (1683) to the Battle of Warsaw (1920) - the signs of the Poles' participation in the defence of Christendom in Europe. From Grunwald (1410) to Orsza (1514) and Kirchholm (1605) to Raclawice (1795), consecutive confederations and risings to September 1939 and the Warsaw Uprising (1944) - the signs of the will to defend the heritage entrusted to Poles by generations of their ancestors. Indeed battles, knights and soldiers abond in the history of Poland. They had to be especially numerous in or for Poland to remain on the map of Europe. But there are also Polish "Sarmatians" immortalized in 17th century portraits; there is the king, Stanislaw August Poniatowski, carried on the shoulders of the reformers on 3rd May 1791, immediately after the first Constitution in Europe was adopted; there is also the Solidarnosc trade union, which gave an impulse to crush the foundations of communism; and there is John Paul II - in this context he is one more symbol of the great Polish traditions of freedom.

It is not easy to understand the phenomenon of a country where one was not born and raised since childhood. It is not easy to imagine the atmosphere, aromas, ever-present elements of tradition without letting them slowly penetrate one's mind through first-hand experience. It is perhaps even more difficult in the case of Poland - its turbulent past abounds in events whose significance often escapes foreign eyes. We do hope, however, that the present volume will, at least to some extent, assist you in understanding Poland and the mindset of its inhabitants. We also hope that it will help you to discover for yourself those qualities of the land that we hold to be the most praiseworthy and beautiful.