Rodzina staropolska wobec zagrożenia przemocą i bezprawiem
The old Polish family and the threat of violence and lawlessness

Summary/Abstract: Old Polish family was threatened with violence and lawlessness on a scale unimagin able to modern man. On the one hand, these threats were the result of constant wars that carried conflagration, looting and the specter of slavery. On the other hand, specific understanding of justice by the nobility and assertion of their rights using military measures against their neighbors were the reason the wars were sometimes more violent and onerous than armed conflict. Old Polish family was also destroyed from the inside, usually through violence from the father, who in a patriarchal model had unlimited power, which was often abused in cruel and ruthless way. The only remedy was the law, but Old Polish system of justice lacked effective enforcement of the sentence, which gave the criminals a sense of impunity and the victims – despair and helplessness.

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