Language / Polish language would look better written in Cyrillic Script? [212]


Or it was the other way round. First, Mieszko had coined a plan to become Christian and then as part of pursuing his plan he decided to take Dobrava from Czechia for wife.

The possible motives behind Mieszko's decision are best (in my view) explained in the book "Nawrócenie i chrzest Mieszka I" written in Polish by Philip Earl Steele, an American historian from Ohio.

Language / Polish language would look better written in Cyrillic Script? [212]



About 1000.


This is very recent indeed...


Probably not. Such a tribe may have never existed. The name could have been placed on maps later on and secondary to the already existing name of the Polish state.

News / Poland on course to end European winter/summer time [19]


It's not cancelling DST. It's extending DST onto the whole year. Thus the summer time is going to become standard time in Poland if the bill gets through.

Why do people want to comment on something they have absolutely no idea about?

News / Poland on course to end European winter/summer time [19]


I think the reason behind the proposal is that most people hate the change of time twice a year.


If you love that, you should support the idea of abandoning DST in Poland or in true fact support the idea of extending DST onto the entire year. I once experienced this kind of a 'dark morning' myself two years ago when my biological clock woke me up in accordance with the hour of DST in the middle of ... January. My eyes skipped the hour figure on my digital clock upon waking up and I only saw the '00' minutes figure, so I thought I was getting up at the right time of 6:00 hours for work, while in fact it was 5:00 hours. What a lovely winter morning it was when I went outside! A bit of snow in the air (prószył śnieg) and a layer of snow on the ground, but why the hell it was so dark around me!? I walked to the station in almost complete darkness. Oh, it is just a bit more cloudy today - I thought to myself - and it was only at the Warsaw West station that I saw on the station clock I was there one hour earlier than usual.

News / Poland on course to end European winter/summer time [19]


It is more of a question of blaming PSL.


You perhaps don't know it, but about 65% of the European population is against the present winter/summer time arrangement. They would prefer the unchanged time throughout the year.


And you will precisely have them once the winter/summer time arrangment is abolished in Poland. Either your Polish is not good enough to pick up this important difference or you have automatically assumed a return to the normal (winter) Polish time throughout the year in the proposal. In reality, the proposal is to fix the summer time and not the winter one, so it is effectively going to be a change of the time zone for Poland. Thus you should either opt for the present arrangment or for the fixation of the winter time if you don't like dark mornings in winter.

Language / Polish language would look better written in Cyrillic Script? [212]


Is this that famous version of English that Polo so often speaks of?

News / Abortion still under control in Poland [2986]


Correction, if you have 3 kids, you get 1.000 zł since the first child is exempted from the programme unless the income per person in the family does not exceed 800 zł.

News / Tusk turning his back to idea about Intermarium (New Commonwealth), seeing only EU as future for Poland [124]

Gerhard Schröder may be a good recipient of this suggestion ...

News / Tusk turning his back to idea about Intermarium (New Commonwealth), seeing only EU as future for Poland [124]


You are an extremely pathetic figure when you are talking to someone in this way.


Then tell your silly government to start using the rouble instead of using the euro. The rouble should be the currency of choice in your country, so you could partly feel as living in your beloved Russia.

News / Tusk turning his back to idea about Intermarium (New Commonwealth), seeing only EU as future for Poland [124]


There have always been a lot of so-called 'intellectuals' in the so-called 'rotten West' who are easily lured by what Russia is saying to them and then eagerly promoting Russia's cause. They have always been very naive and because of that comrade Lenin coined the term 'useful idiots' to describe their naivety, but also their usefulness for Russia. In the times before comrade Lenin the term could have well been applied to Voltaire and his admiration for Catherine II, for example.

News / Tusk turning his back to idea about Intermarium (New Commonwealth), seeing only EU as future for Poland [124]


And you have not?

News / Charles Crawford on PiS just after the 2015 election [29]



You really don't know this famous abbreviation?

Genealogy / Looking for ancestor's grave in a cementery in Warsaw [9]


I suppose there is not.


An idea would be to consult the administration of one of the Warsaw cemeteries and ask them for further guidance on the matter.

Genealogy / Looking for ancestor's grave in a cementery in Warsaw [9]


The fact that your Dad was born in Warsaw does not mean his parents' grave is in Warsaw.

For Warsaw, there is a registry for the three main city cemeteries (Cmentarz Północny, Południowy, Wojskowy) which will give you the date of birth and the date of death and the exact place when that person is buried. However, some other important cemeteries (for example Cm. Bródnowski, Cm. Powązkowski) are excluded. I have just found my grand parents' grave using their search engine! Click the "wyszukaj grób" and then put in the surname or date of birth or date of death.

cmentarzekomunalne.com.pl/mapa/index.php

USA, Canada / What Airline do you take to Poland from Chicago? [105]


Yes, you are just looking in the mirror while saying that ...

Language / IS "MURZYN" word RACIST? [686]


Actually, murzynek Bambo.

Murzynek Bambo w Afryce mieszka,
Czarną ma skórę ten nasz koleżka ...

But there exists to new version of this story, a rather unfriendly one:

Murzynek Ahmed w Londynie mieszka
Głowę ci uciąć chce ten koleżka ...

Genealogy / Do I look Polish? (my picture) [376]

Not if he took this silly thing off his head.

History / Poland and Britain started WW2 [356]


What do you mean by 'meteoric rise'? There was solid political and economic background behind it.The Allies put too much strain on the German economy after the WWI in demanding and executing war reparations which triggered evil forces to swim up onto the surface of the German society and then take it over completely

UK, Ireland / Polish lorry driver arrested for smuggling 9 million cigarettes [64]


... which country may be neglected as being too small. Didn't your sister experience this notion of Ireland in France?

News / Tusk turning his back to idea about Intermarium (New Commonwealth), seeing only EU as future for Poland [124]

[moved from]


The countries invited do not want to be in the Intermarum

Genealogy / THE MEANING AND RESEARCH OF MY POLISH LAST NAME, SURNAME? [4500]

The modern version of Siemowit is "Ziemowit".

Language / IS "MURZYN" word RACIST? [686]

Not sure what this discussion is about. The word 'Murzyn' may have started to sound racist for some posh segments of society in Warsaw, but not that much in the so-called 'province' (according to the famous French definition, the 'province' is everything beyond Paris, so in Poland it would be everything beyond Warsaw). Everything must be seen in context, however. In everyday speech 'Murzyn' will not be considered racist by most people and they will use it freely as a neutral word. On Breakfast TV they would tend to avoid using this term, however, replacing it with other synonymes unless when they will be asking the black person John Godson if he has something against using it knowing that he has nothing. Thus we may say the word has just begun its travel from the registry of neutral words to the registry of 'suspicious' ones. That's the present state of affairs concerning the usage of this word in Poland, I think. It is highly unpredictable if it travels further in that direction since the Polish language has no good equivalent for replacing 'Murzyn' with another word as was the case with the word 'gej' replacing 'homoseksualista' or 'pedał' or ' pederasta'.

On the other hand, using the term 'Bambo' standing alone for describing a black person will be considered offensive by the majority Poles despite the fact that such a name is known to them from literature and was meant neutral there ("Murzynek Bambo"). 'Bambo' would be considered a nick used in bad faith when people have the word 'Murzyn' at their disposal. Besides, it would be phonetically too close to the word 'bambus' which word is evidently and beyond any doubt racist.

It is worth mentioning here the verse "Woman is the ***** of the World" by John Lennon perhaps. And here again, the context is not racist at all, but one which refers to the exploitation of one race by another.

How does that fit the 'political correctness' issue? It does partly in my view as some people have begun to perceive it as an uncomfortable one on the basis of PC perhaps, but also it fits the pattern of the natural evolution of words in the course of changing its meaning irrespectively of any PC. Didn't the word 'kobieta' or 'aktorka' (see the dramas of Gabriela Zapolska for the latter one) have a very offensive meaning once?

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


But its circulation has fallen gramatically over the recent years. Also the paper has become much thinner over the recent year and at the same time the price has gone up substantially.

Genealogy / Are Silesians people German/Germanic? [178]


These facts are widely known. However, you have declined to comment on my question:



There are also some Silesians who don't regard themselves as Poles.

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]


No, I don't.


This is on-topic. The majority of the groups listed by Maf in his typology consist of people who are either Luzatians or Sarmatians which is why those posts are on topic. And the thread is devoted to "Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession", isn't it?

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]


A very interesting typology indeed. The next step could be trying to assign every (or exemplary) member to a particular category (excluding Crow as he constitutes a category for himself).

Prey tell into which category would you assign me as I cannot find anything for myself :-).

Genealogy / Are Silesians people German/Germanic? [178]


Where is it precisely? What's the name of the closest village or place?


That would be utterly sensational. If this is true, I doubt it has been passed unnoticed by scholars.


If the pagan cemetery is 800-900 years old, the Germanic runic inscriptions are extremely unlikely. At this time the entire Lower Silesia area was predominantly Slavic as mass immigration and settlements from Germany and other Western European countries had not started yet. Besides, pagan Slavic people did not bury the dead, but cremated them. It was Christiany which changed burial traditions in Poland. And until 1138 all Silesian was united with Poland, and next it continues under the Piast rulers

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]


This attitude is rather common among the expats living in Poland who come to post on this forum, not only was it typical for Sobieski (Panie, świeć nad jego duszą!).


This is perhaps quite close to the truth, Crow. Speaking precisely, Luzica takes its name after the land which is full of water and damp. You can also recognize the same root in the Russian word 'ług" which means 'acid' or 'acidic liquid/water'. This root is also present in the Polish word 'kałuża' (puddle of water). If you add 'ka-' to the word 'Łużyce (the Polish name for 'Luzica'), you get the word 'kałużyce', a very similar one to the word 'kałuże' (puddles), 'kałużyce' meaning 'big cuddles', although the latter word has disappeared from usage. And remember that in the early Middle Age period these parts of Europe had much more water than thay have today.

Of course, 'łyżka' may have exactly the same root as 'kałuża' (tool you used to take some acidic liquid as were probably ancient soups into your mouth).


I'd say they are closely related as it is very easy to imagine a German saying Sorb rather than Serb. Notice that in their own languages the 'Sorbish' people call themselves Serbja (Upper Lusatia) or Serby (Lower Lusatia). 'Sorbs' is a German name denoting a Serb living in Polabia which land was not German, but Slavic in the early Middle Ages.

"Serb" most probably meant 'kinsman' in proto-Slavic. This meaning can be distantly traced in the Polish name of 'pasierb' meaning 'stepson'.

News / Poland's post-election political scene [4080]


Just so. Plus the funny way in which it was withdrawn. They said they withdraw the project on the request of Jarosław Kaczyński which was really hilarious and reminded people who remember the PRL era the practices of that time. What the younger generation thought of it only God knows, but probably they might have thought that Our Great and Dearest Leader Chairman Jarosław Kaczyński is precisely someone exercizing supreme authority over the country, a person that can easily over-ride the will of the government or parliament.

Language / Polish slang phrases - most popular. [630]


A szto eto? is in Russian and means "and what is this?"