Dlaczego polska historiografia cierpi na obsesję korony królewskiej pierwszych Piastów? Różnice w postrzeganiu władzy królewskiej i jej funkcji u ochrzczonych Słowian i Skandynawów. Esej

This paper looks at the ways in which the royal power functioned in newly converted Scandinavia and in the West Slavic Lands. It pinpoints the differences between them and emphasises that contrary to the general understanding, the coronations of the first three Polish kings were not symbols of sovereignty, but dependence on the Holy Roman Empire. This paper analyses the difference in the perception, definition and usage of the concept of royal ideology in the tenth-eleventh-century Poland and Bohemia (or among Western Slavs in general) versus Scandinavia. It demonstrates that while Polish (and Czech) rulers agreed to follow Carolingian (‘Frankish’) model of royal power, the old pagan model of rulership preserved in Scandinavia seemed to secure more power for the king, including the truly royal title. The paper proposes that the West Slavic elites decide to enter the imperial system of Western Europe in an attempt to act as external members of the Christian and Imperial world, but instead they had to accept a new religion, rules, hierarchy and their own subordinate position. Hence, contrary to the general understanding, the coronations of the first three Polish kings were not symbols of sovereignty, but rather of dependence on the Holy Roman Empire.