Osobliwości wyglądu Sarmatów w relacjach cudzoziemców odwiedzających Rzeczpospolitą w XVIII wieku

The main goal of this article is to elaborate how the foreigners who visited Poland during the 18th century described the appearance of Poles. A post-colonial analysis of their diaries and journey reports shows that although they seem to admire traditional Sarmatian attire, its similarity to oriental clothing carries pretty negative connotations. People raised in Western European culture perceive Poles in a very similar way as they perceive inhabitants of the Orient: as a wild, uncivilised nation. In addition, Polish women are described as voluptuous and libidinous. The resignation from the traditional Old Polish attire can be interpreted as a way to avoid these negative stereotypes. It can be also treated as a symptom of constituting a modern hybrid collective identity of Polish people, torn between native culture and Western culture, without a possibility of full identification with any of them.