Dlugosz, Jan°

views updated

DLUGOSZ, JAN°

DLUGOSZ, JAN ° (1415–1480), Polish cleric and annalist. He acted as secretary to Cardinal Zbigniew Oleśnicki in Cracow, who was violently anti-Jewish. After Oleśnicki's death in 1455, Dlugosz began a history of Poland, which he concluded in 1479. He was appointed archbishop of Lvov in 1478. A primary source for historical material, his annals include a firsthand account of the massacre of the Jews in Cracow in 1407 and the plunder, forcible conversions, and burnings of Jewish houses which accompanied it. His work set the anti-Jewish tone of medieval Polish historiography.

bibliography:

Dubnow, Hist Russ, 1 (1916), 57.

[Natan Efrati]

More From encyclopedia.com