Topika w muzyce – definicje, historia, znaczenie

The aim of the article is to present the concept of topics in music, which was associated with the presentation of this term in the history of culture and literature. Due to the broader context, it will be possible to present this Greek term more fully in musicology and in relation to the interpretation of selected examples of musical works. The study consists of three complementary parts. The first introduces to the genesis of the concept, which originates from ancient rhetoric and has been described, among others by Aristotle, Cicero or Boethius. The second part of the article is the presentation of the topic in the context of the analyzes of Ernst Robert Curtius, Janina Abramowska and Jacek Jadacki in the field of literary studies. The last and most extensive part of this text is devoted to showing topics in musicology on the example of several authors. The papers on topic theory will be highlighted, which since the 1980s has been mainly developed by researchers from Anglo-Saxon countries.