Sigismund I, the Old

King of Poland (r. 1506-1548)

• Born: January 1, 1467
• Birthplace: Unknown
• Died: April 1, 1548
• Place of death: Cracow, Poland

Sigismund I defended Poland’s eastern front from invading forces, had his army disempower and secularize the Teutonic Order, and incorporated the duchy of Mazovia, now the province of Warsaw. He provided protection for Jews and promoted tolerance of Orthodox Christians, and he is often associated with Poland’s golden age for his arts patronage.

Early Life

Sigismund (SEE-gihs-muhnt) was the son of Casimir IV, king of Poland, and Elizabeth of Habsburg. Nothing indicated that Sigismund would ascend the Polish throne, as he had four elder brothers; one of them died prematurely. All the brothers received excellent educations. The eldest brother, Vladislav II , became the king of Bohemia in 1471 and king of Hungary in 1490. The second brother, John I Albert, succeeded the Crown of Poland after his father’s death in 1492. The third brother, Alexander I, became grand duke of Lithuania.

Without a better prospect, Sigismund stayed at his brother Vladislav’s court in Buda from 1498 to 1501. This sojourn permitted him to imbibe Renaissance culture and art. Living in Buda Castle, the prince held a miniature court. Although unmarried at the time, Sigismund had a concubine, with whom he had three children.

Vladislav had been endowing his brother with several Silesian duchies since 1498. Finally, in 1501, Sigismund moved to Silesia. The prince, as governor of Silesia and Lusatia, undertook monetary reform and managed to unify Silesian money in 1505.

In 1501, King John I Albert was succeeded by Alexander, who died unexpectedly in 1506. Sigismund immediately hastened toward Lithuania. Proclaimed the grand duke there, he hoped to be elevated to the Polish throne, which was legally elective. In fact, he was elected in December of 1506 and solemnly crowned in January of 1507 in the Wawel Cathedral. He commenced his reign as a mature forty year old.

He accentuated his reign by marrying Barbara Zápolya, the daughter of a Hungarian prince. Barbara bore him two daughters, but she soon died (1515).

Life’s Work

Having ascended the Polish throne, Sigismund resigned his rights to the Silesian duchies. The situation in his kingdom was complex. The king often had to give up his pacifist tendencies and throw himself into the whirlpool of international conflicts. During the first years of his reign, his policy was strongly anti-Habsburg.

The kingdom’s treasury was almost empty, so Sigismund tried to augment his revenue through enlarging the salt mines in Wieliczka and Bochnia and through annual taxes; he also tried to impose a tax for the army. He also avoided bestowing the royal estates and tried unsuccessfully to repurchase those that had been leased. Yet most of his projects went unrealized.

Among international problems, what seemed most critical was the threat of the Teutonic Order , a religious order of knights, which, in 1309, had established a military principality in East Prussia (now in Poland). The grand masters, taking advantage of the Holy Roman Emperor’s mandate to protect the Church, consistently refused to swear allegiance to the king. Sigismund tended to a compromise with the Habsburgs in order to find a solution to the problem of the Teutonic Order. During the congress of Vienna (1515), the emperor promised to stop inciting Muscovy and the Teutonic Order against Poland, but in return he expected several dynastic advantages in Bohemia and Hungary. Finally, the grand master, Albert von Hohenzollern, after a short war with Poland, declared that he would adopt Lutheranism and swear the oath to the Polish king as his secular vassal, duke in Prussia. Albert paid his homage in Kraków Main Square in 1525. In the nineteenth century, this scene inspired the Polish artist, Jan Matejko, to create the well-known work Hołd Pruski (the Prussian homage).

In 1526, after the death of the last piast of Mazovia, which was a hereditary fief subordinated to the Crown, Sigismund incorporated this province into Poland. In the same year, the young Hungarian king, Louis II, Vladislav’s son, was killed in the Battle of Mohács . Also, the Bohemian throne, formerly Jagiellonian, became empty.

The situation in Hungary grew complex in face of the Ottoman Turkish threat. Sigismund sought neither the Hungarian nor the Bohemian throne. When Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I and John Zápolya, the vaivode (governor) of Transylvania, rivaled for the Hungarian crown, Sigismund supported Ferdinand in hopes of keeping the Turks far from Poland. Hungary as an Austrian dominion might be the best barrier against the Turks, and Sigismund was anxious to keep the peace. Even after the famous victory at Obertyn (1531), where the grand hetman (chief army commander) of the Crown, Jan Tarnowski, had crushed the Moldavians and their hospodar (prince) Petrylo, Sigismund did not allow him to invade Moldavia, which was paying homage to the Ottomans. Instead, in 1533, a treaty with the Turks was signed.

In 1518, Sigismund married the niece of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, Italian princess Bona Sforza, with whom he had five children (but only one son), and who also became a personification of new cultural models. Bona strengthened the position of the dynasty and suggested that Sigismund elect his son grand duke of Lithuania and then also king of Poland vivente rege (while the king is still alive). In 1530, she achieved the coronation of Sigismund II Augustus , then ten years old, who became coruler with his father. Sigismund I became known as the old king. Bona led anti-Habsburg policy. She opposed the decision of marriage between the young king and the archduchess Elisabeth of Austria, which concluded in 1543.

Sigismund was the main protector of Renaissance art in Poland. Between 1507 and 1537, he rebuilt and extended his Wawel Royal Castle, and he commissioned many Italian artists. The courtyard of the castle, with its arcaded cloisters, and the Sigismund Chapel in the Wawel Cathedral, are pearls of Renaissance architecture. Sigismund commissioned the largest church bell in Poland (the Sigismund Bell), made by Johan Behem in 1520.

Toward the end of his long reign, Sigismund grew increasingly passive. He was easily influenced by senators and by his wife, Bona, who, in fact, reigned in his stead and replaced the old, unruly senators with new ones. The last days of Sigismund’s life were adumbrated by a sad message: The young king, Sigismund II Augustus, secretly married his mistress, Barbara Radziwill. This decision caused opposition in many political circles and discord between the young king and Bona, who suspected some intrigue on the Radziwills’ side. The offended queen retired to Mazovia and then left for Italy, taking a large fortune with her. Thus, the end of the old Jagiellonian reign was sealed.

Significance

Scholarly assessment of Sigismund’s reign varies: Immediately after his death, many panegyrics were printed, conveying a luminous and idealized portrait of the king. This might be due to the hatred of the gentry for Bona and the young king. Nineteenth century scholars criticized Sigismund as the “king of senators” and emphasized his passivity. Twentieth century scholars tried to rehabilitate his legacy by showing his thriftiness and political realism. Paweł Jasienica rather disdained him, considering him an improper man in an improper place, who, with his limited horizons and scant energy, was suited rather to be a treasurer or an administrator of some province.

Generally, Sigismund ruled dynamically, especially during the first half of his reign. He tried to reform diplomatic service, to update the currency, and to codify law. In the realm of international policy, he demonstrated shortsightedness but also common sense. He enjoyed the sympathy of his subjects and enjoyed prominent people in his midst. He protected Renaissance art and architecture, and his name will always be linked with the threshold of the Renaissance and Poland’s golden age.

Bibliography

Halecki, Oscar. Borderlands of Western Civilization: A History of East-Central Europe. San Diego, Calif.: Simon Publications, 2000. Presents the history of the Jagiellonian state from a political point of view in a large cultural and international context. Readers are led through a labyrinth of sociopolitical dependencies and complications. Originally published in 1952.

Jasienica, Pawel. Jagiellonian Poland. Translated by Alexander T. Jordan. Miami, Fla.: American Institute of Polish Culture, 1978. A vivid historical narrative, full of facts and details, yet ravishing reading; a journey through the entire Jagiellonian era. The author’s evaluation of the successive kings is strongly subjective, yet enriched with numerous anecdotes.

Stone, Daniel Z. The Polish-Lithuanian State, 1386-1795. History of East Central Europe 4. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001. This book facilitates a deeper understanding of the specifics of the Polish-Lithuanian union.