Agnieszka Wieczorek

Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń

Self-Portrait of Stanisław Mateusz Rzewuski (1662–1728) in the Light of Correspondence to his Sons from the 1720s

In the 1720s, the Grand Hetman of the Crown Stanisław Mateusz Rzewuski (1662–1728) sent his two sons, Seweryn Józef (died 1754) and Wacław Piotr (1706–1779), on a foreign educational journey in Western Europe. The main destination of the young magnates was France, and the most important stage of the peregrination was their stay in Paris, where they continued their education abroad under the tutelage of their tutor – Marcin Kawiecki (died ca. 1751). The letters of Stanisław Mateusz Rzewuski to his sons and tutor, written in the course of the young Rzewuskis’ travels in Europe, which date from 1720–1726, have been preserved. The analysis aims to create a self-portrait of the father recorded in his correspondence with his sons and tutor, and to show both the relationship between the father and sons (along with the emotions accompanying them), and the character traits of the hetman as a caring guardian.