“Capua” and “European Kostroma”. Warsaw from 1813 to the 1820sthrough the eyes of Russians

Abstract

The subject of research in the article are the characteristic features of the Russian vision of Warsaw, associated with the era of the Russian army's foreign campaigns of 1813–1814 and the establishment of the Polish state under the aegis of Russia in 1815. The bulk of the material consists of ego-documents. Diaries, travel notes, and memoirs of military men who passed through the Polish lands in 1813–1815, as well as those who stayed in the Kingdom of Poland or arrived there to serve after 1815, are examined. Among the latter are officers from the Russian Guards regiments stationed in Warsaw, who, like the Polish army, were under the command of Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich, and civilians (primarily Prince Petr A. Viazemsky, who served in the chancellery of Nikolai N. Novosiltsev, the Emperor’s personal representative in the administration of the Kingdom of Poland). The picture is completed by the guidebooks published in Russian in 1818–1822, which reflected the official image of a prosperous Warsaw. The focus lies on descriptions of Warsaw, its comparison with other Polish cities, and the correlation of impressions of the Polish capital with general perceptions of Poland. Most notable are the historical precepts about Poland’s past and Russian-Polish relations to Warsaw. There is a connection between the images of Warsaw’s transformation and the later established judgments about the prosperity of Poles under the sceptre
of Alexander I. Assessments of the city through the prism of personal experience and the author’s own biography also prove to be revealing. The topics of the enlightenment role of the capital as well as Warsaw as a centre of entertainment and pleasant pastime are most clearly visible in this connection. Warsaw both attracted and repelled Russians, depending on the degree of their incorporation into local life. For example, Petr A. Viazemsky, who at first disparagingly called Warsaw the “European Kostroma”, began to regard it more highly as he became closer to the educated Polish society.