>
> As far as I know, the first literary manifestation of Sarmatism in
> the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was Maciej Miechowita's _Tractatus
> de Duabus Sarmatiis_ (1517), mentioned here eight years ago.
>
Time flies.
I just ordered this book from the library; wonder what it's about:
Schedel, Hartmann
Sarmatia, the early Polish kingdom : from the original Nuremberg Chronicle by Hartmann Schedel, printed by Anton Koberger in 1493
transl., with introduction and notes by Bogdan Deresiewicz
>
> See
>
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/8728
With my usual MO I'll assume those medieval sources were written in good faith, but with the annoying characteristic of being the result of the author's total evaluation of the material available to him, oral or written, local and classical, without any evaluation of of the validity or likelihood of of the individual components.
So, arbitrarily, seemingly, I'll extract the following from Master Víncent's chronicle:
Some leader based in what was then (M.V.'s time) Poland and with a past somewhere southeast of Europe was attacked by and repelled Roman forces three times while attempting to conquer Bavaria. The Roman consul Caesar then gave up (and appointed that leader as a friend of Rome), declaring Bavaria to be an area outside of Roman interest, earning the enmity of the senate in return; that leader then subdued Bavaria. Caesar later saw that leader as a threat to Roman interests and attacked him.
That would explain the fishy business of why Ariovistus was appointed friend of the Roman people by Caesar.
The mention of a brother-in-law relationship might indicate that scraps of the Voccio story were included too in the chronicle.
Torsten