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See also:SIGISMUND II . (1520-1572), See also:- KING
- KING (O. Eng. cyning, abbreviated into cyng, cing; cf. O. H. G. chun- kuning, chun- kunig, M.H.G. kiinic, kiinec, kiinc, Mod. Ger. Konig, O. Norse konungr, kongr, Swed. konung, kung)
- KING [OF OCKHAM], PETER KING, 1ST BARON (1669-1734)
- KING, CHARLES WILLIAM (1818-1888)
- KING, CLARENCE (1842–1901)
- KING, EDWARD (1612–1637)
- KING, EDWARD (1829–1910)
- KING, HENRY (1591-1669)
- KING, RUFUS (1755–1827)
- KING, THOMAS (1730–1805)
- KING, WILLIAM (1650-1729)
- KING, WILLIAM (1663–1712)
king of See also:Poland, the only son of Sigismund I., king of Poland, whom he succeeded in 1548, and See also:Bona See also:Sforza. At the very beginning of his reign he came into collision with the turbulent szlachta or gentry, who had already begun to oust the See also:great families from See also:power. The ostensible cause of their animosity to the king was his second See also:marriage, secretly contracted before his See also:accession, with the beautiful Lithuanian Calvinist, See also:Barbara Radziwill, daughter of the famous See also:Black Radziwill. But the See also:Austrian See also:court and Sigismund's own See also:mother, See also:Queen Bona, seem to have been behind the See also:movement, and so violent was the agitation at Sigismund's first See also:diet (31st of See also:October 1548) that the deputies threatened to renounce their See also:allegiance unless the king instantly repudiated Barbara. This he refused to do, and his moral courage See also:united with no small See also:political dexterity enabled him to win the See also:day. By 1550, when he summoned his second diet, a reaction in his favour began, and the lingering petulance of the gentry was sternly rebuked by Kmita, the See also:marshal of the diet, who openly accused them of attempting to diminish unduly the legislative See also:prerogative' of the See also:crown. The See also:death of Barbara, five days after her See also:coronation (7th of See also:December 1J5o), under very distressing circumstances which led to an unproven suspicion that she had been poisoned by Queen Bona, compelled Sigismund to See also:contract a third purely political See also:union with the Austrian archduchess See also:Catherine, the See also:sister of Sigismund's first wife See also:Elizabeth, who had died within atwelvemonth of her marriage with him, while he was still only crown See also:prince. The third See also:- BRIDE (a common Teutonic word, e.g..Goth. bruths, O. Eng. bryd, O. H. Ger. prs2t, Mod. Ger. Bract, Dut. bruid, possibly derived from the root bru-, cook, brew; from the med. latinized form bruta, in the sense of daughter-in-law, is derived the Fr. bru)
bride was sickly and unsympathetic, and from her Sigismund soon lost all See also:hope of progeny, to his despair, for being the last male of the Jagiellos in the See also:direct See also:line, the See also:dynasty was threatened with extinction. He sought to remedy the evil by liaisons with two of the most beautiful of his countrywomen, Barbara Gizanka and See also:Anna Zajanczkowska, the diet undertaking to legitimatize and acknowledge as his successor any See also:heir male who might be See also:born to him; but their complacency was in vain, for the king died childless. This See also:matter of the king's marriage was of great political importance, the Protestants and the Catholics being equally interested in the issue. Had he not been so See also:good a See also:Catholic Sigismund might well have imitated the example of See also:- HENRY
- HENRY (1129-1195)
- HENRY (c. 1108-1139)
- HENRY (c. 1174–1216)
- HENRY (Fr. Henri; Span. Enrique; Ger. Heinrich; Mid. H. Ger. Heinrich and Heimrich; O.H.G. Haimi- or Heimirih, i.e. " prince, or chief of the house," from O.H.G. heim, the Eng. home, and rih, Goth. reiks; compare Lat. rex " king "—" rich," therefore " mig
- HENRY, EDWARD LAMSON (1841– )
- HENRY, JAMES (1798-1876)
- HENRY, JOSEPH (1797-1878)
- HENRY, MATTHEW (1662-1714)
- HENRY, PATRICK (1736–1799)
- HENRY, PRINCE OF BATTENBERG (1858-1896)
- HENRY, ROBERT (1718-1790)
- HENRY, VICTOR (1850– )
- HENRY, WILLIAM (1795-1836)
Henry VIII. by See also:pleading that his detested third wife was the sister of his first and consequently the union was uncanonical. The See also:Polish Protestants hoped that he would take this course and thus bring about a See also:breach with See also:Rome at the very crisis of the See also:confessional struggle in Poland, while the Habsburgs, who coveted the Polish See also:throne, raised every obstacle to the childless king's remarriage. Not till Queen Catherine's death on the 28th of See also:February 1572 were Sigismund's hands See also:free, but he followed her to the See also:grave less than six months afterwards. Sigismund's reign was a See also:period of See also:internal turmoil and See also:external expansion. He saw the invasion of Poland by the See also:Reformation, and the democratic upheaval which placed all political power in the hands of the szlachta; he saw the collapse of the See also:ancient See also:- ORDER
- ORDER (through Fr. ordre, for earlier ordene, from Lat. ordo, ordinis, rank, service, arrangement; the ultimate source is generally taken to be the root seen in Lat. oriri, rise, arise, begin; cf. " origin ")
- ORDER, HOLY
order of the Knights of the See also:Sword in the See also:north (which led to the acquisition of See also:Livonia by the See also:republic) and the consolidation of the See also:Turkish power in the See also:south. Throughout this perilous transitional period Sigismund's was the See also:hand which successfully steered the See also:ship of See also:state amidst all the whirlpools that constantly threatened to engulf it. A far less imposing figure than his See also:father, the elegant and refined Sigismund II. was nevertheless an even greater statesman than the stern and majestic Sigismund I. Tenacity and See also:patience, the characteristics of all the Jagiellos, he possessed in a high degree, and he added to them a supple dexterity and a See also:diplomatic finesse which he may have inherited from his See also:Italian mother. Certainly no other Polish king so thoroughly understood the nature of the ingredients of that See also:witch's caldron, the Polish diet, as he did. Both the Austrian ambassadors and the papal legates testify to the care with which he controlled " this nation so difficult to See also:lead." Every-thing went as he wished, they said, because he seemed to know everything beforehand. He managed to get more See also:money than his father could ever get, and at one of his diets won the See also:hearts of the whole See also:assembly by unexpectedly appearing before them in the See also:simple See also:grey coat of a Masovian See also:squire. Like his father, a See also:pro-Austrian by conviction, he contrived even in this respect to carry the Polish nation, always so distrustful of the Germans, entirely along with him, thereby avoiding all serious complications with the ever dangerous Turk. Only a statesman of See also:genius could have mediated for twenty years, as he did, between the See also:- CHURCH
- CHURCH (according to most authorities derived from the Gr. Kvpcaxov [&wµa], " the Lord's [house]," and common to many Teutonic, Slavonic and other languages under various forms—Scottish kirk, Ger. Kirche, Swed. kirka, Dan. kirke, Russ. tserkov, Buig. cerk
- CHURCH, FREDERICK EDWIN (1826-1900)
- CHURCH, GEORGE EARL (1835–1910)
- CHURCH, RICHARD WILLIAM (1815–189o)
- CHURCH, SIR RICHARD (1784–1873)
church and the schismatics without alienating the sympathies of either. But the most striking memorial of his greatness was the union of See also:Lublin, which finally made of Poland and Lithuania one See also:body politic, and put an end to the jealousies and discords of centuries (see POLAND, See also:History). The merit of this crowning achievement belongs to Sigismund alone; but for him it would have been impossible. Sigismund II. died at his beloved Knyszyne on the 6th of See also:July 1572, in his fifty-second See also:year.
See Ludwik Finkel, Characteristics of Sigismund See also:Augustus (Pol.) (See also:Lemberg, 1888) ; Letters to See also:Nicholas Radziwill (Pol.) (Wi1na, 1842) ; Geheime Briefe an Hozyus, Gesandten am Hofe See also:des Kaisers Karl V. (Wadowice, 1850); See also:Adam Darowski, Bona Sforza (Pol.) (Rome, 1904). (R. N.
End of Article: SIGISMUND II
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