Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz

Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz ( born February 16, 1757 the estate Skoki near Brest -Litovsk, † May 21, 1841 in Paris) was a Polish scholar, poet and statesman.

Life

Obtained his education Niemcewicz in the cadet school in Warsaw, in 1777, he was adjutant of Prince Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski and later spent several years in France, England and Italy.

As a member of the Livonia province and Marshal of the Sejm four-year olds 1788-92 he was one of the advocates of the rights of the third estate. In 1794 he fought under Tadeusz Kościuszko as his aide against the Russians in the Kościuszko Uprising and fell at the battle of Maciejowice in captivity. From this he was released in 1796 by Tsar Paul I and followed Kościuszko via Sweden and England to America. In 1802 he returned to Warsaw. 1803 lived in Paris, in 1804 went again to America, but later returned to Poland. As here in 1812 several districts armed for national independence, the nobility of Brześć chose him to marshal. After the defeat of the French army, he again went to North America. Later, however, he returned to Warsaw, where he was hired by the Congress of Vienna in the new Kingdom of Poland as Secretary of State and Chairman of the Constitution Committee and in 1828 was appointed president of the Warsaw Society of Friends of Sciences.

After the failure fortunes of the November Uprising of 1830 he fled first to London, then to Paris, where he died on 21 May 1841. In Montmorency, where he was buried, a monument to him was erected in 1841.

Works

• " Władysław pod Varna " ( Ladislaus to Varna), tragedy in 1788
• " Kazimierz Wielki " ( Casimir the Great ), tragedy in 1792
• " Powrót posła " ( The Return of the provincial deputies ) 1791
• " Śpiewy historyczne " ( National Historical Songs of Poland) 1816
• " Dzieje panowania Zygmunta III " ( History of the reign of King Sigismund III. Poland ) 1836