The presented data set comprises of a transcription from manuscript, English and Polish translation, and photographs of two poems by Kaspar Schütz (1540-1594) who was a poet, writer, jurist, and secretary in the townhall of the old Danzig (now Gdańsk) in the second half of the 16th century.
The poems were probably meant as a literary intermezzo, an elegant poetical elaboration of somewhat fictional prosaic account on the early history of the later-to-be Royal Prussia region. The account itself is a part of an unfinished historical work named Rerum Prussicarum historia ('A history of Prussia by the Baltic Sea'). Kaspar Schütz intended to widen the circle of target readers by writing simultaneously both in German, and in Latin. However, the result of this multilingual project might not have been entirely satisfying for the author: K. Schütz completed only the German part of the literary endeavor (the first edition in 1592; the second one as posthumous in 1599, fifteen books). The unfinished Latin version (eight books in total), probably because of the death of the writer, was revised and printed over one hundred years later (Danzig 1769, T.J. Schreiber) by an eminent historian and scholar from old Danzig, Gottfried Lengnich (1685-1774).
The first poem is a short poetical description of two rivers: Vistula (called with a rare variant of the name, Istula) and Mottlau (Motława in Polish) which eventually finds its end in the waters of the Baltic Sea. The subsequent poetic fragment is both longer and murkier: it recounts a dramatic death of Vidutus on a pyre, who, according to K. Schütz, was a leader of the Prussian people at the very early stage their history.
The original manuscript written by Schütz himself has survived intact and is now a part of the collection of the Gdansk branch of the Polish State Archives (in Polish: ‘Archiwa Państwowe: Archiwum Państwowe w Gdańsku’ [www: https://www.gdansk.ap.gov.pl/]). The two extant volumes (with four books per each; in folio format), are signed respectively with call numbers APG 300, R/Nn, 16 and APG 300, R/Nn, 17. The two poems are to be found in the first book of the work (pp. 22-23; 55-60).
Both the transcription and translation were made by the group of undergraduate students during the course on editorial techniques of ancient and Neo-Latin texts. The transcription is organized on the basis of the following rules:
a) in general, the spelling of Latin observes the orthography recommended by modern dictionaries of classical Latin (e.g., Lewis & Short, Gaffiot, Korpanty),
b) the punctuation, unlike the rhetorical one from the manuscript, is syntactic-oriented and similar to the Polish punctuation system.
Nota bene!
If you intend to use the photographs from this data set, please remember to cite the official name of the Polish State Gdansk Archive (Archiwum Państwowe w Gdańsku) and the call number of the photographed manuscript (APG 300, R/Nn, 16).
(2023-04)
