Diariusz zajazdu w Rusiatyczach, czyli jako się panny procesowały : z badań nad staropolskimi rękopisami panien benedyktynek łacińskich we Lwowie

Abstract

The main source of livelihood for the Benedictine nuns of the Chełmno Congregation was the income from a landed estate, and the interest on the invested capital. A difficult economical situation of many convents is reflected in archivist records and chronicles in which we find numerous data concerning lawsuits brought by nuns, though even having won a lawsuit was no guarantee that one would be able to collect one’s dues. It was a problem of this sort that the Lwów nuns had when they signed a contract (a so-called „wyderkaf’) with Stanisław Jan Jabłonowski, concerning a locality named Rusiatycze. In 1742 they tried to recover that estate, which was accorded to them by law, by means of a foray. One of the nuns, Zofia Domicella Konturnicka, wrote a graphic, and rhymed description of that foray in the form of a chronicle. The present article contains an analysis of the origins and the course of the event. The author pays attention to those aspects of the foray which shed light on the customs of the day, and to the significance and functioning of the text itself in the social environment of conventual nuns of the Old Polish era.