Chapter Polski epizod w biografii Johanna Wernera Pausa

Abstract

The Polish Episode in the Biography of Johann Werner Paus. The research inspiration for this article is Johann Werner Paus' entry in his travel journal of his trip from Saxony to Russia in 1701. Paus wrote that he received from the organist in Kaunas Volckmari 40 Dialogi lat.germ.et polonium and briefly learned the pronunciation of Polish sounds with the help of this organist. This sentence marked the path of research in this article, which allowed to discover a broad political, religious and cultural context accompanying the creation of the originally Latin-Polish dialogues by Nicolaus Volckmar. But it wasn't his own concept. While creating Viertzig Dialogi, Volckmar modified earlier phrasebooks by other authors, also adding a Polish part to them. After his death, yet another version of the Vierztig Dialogi was created, with an additional Latin part, by the publisher of Volckmar's works. And it was this version, with the added Latin part, that was received by Johann Werner Paus on his way to Moscow. It was his first encounter with the Slavic languages, and probably the first step to extraordinary scientific achievements in Russia.