The Annals of Jan Dlugosz: A History of Eastern Europe from A.D. 965 to A.D. 1480

Hitherto our knowledge of what happened between the Rivers Oder and Dniepr from AD 965 to AD 1480 has come largely from western sources. This English translation and abridgement of Jan Dlugosz' Annales seu cronici incliti regni Poloniae , a medieval chonicle ranked on the level of those of Froissart and de Commynes, opens up the history of Eastern Europe to the non-Polish reader. The abridgement is on the basis of readability and the text contains a number of interesting stories, such as that of a tramp revealed in death to be a secret royal courier. This is an abridged edition in English of the great medieval chronicle "Annales seu cronicae incliti regni Poloniae". This is a contemporary history of the half-forgotten lands between the rivers Oder and Dnieper: Byelorus, Bohemia, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland and the Ukraine from A.D. 965 to A.D. 1480. Jan Dlugosz wrote his great chronicle in Latin in the later years of his life. Copies were made, but it was not until A.D. 1511 that the text was printed. "Annales seu cronicae incliti regni Poloniae" was translated into German in 1594 and into Polish in 1868 and a new edition was started in 1960 (though the crucial final Book 12 has yet to appear). Thus this English abridgement makes Dlugosz' great work available for the first time to others than specialist scholars. Because of the enormous length of the Annales even those able to read the original will find "The Annals" a useful introduction and guide for further study. Dlugosz' great work is now considered as important as the famous chronicles of "Froissart and de Commines". It is certainly an essential, if not the most important, source book for medieval East European studies today, which hitherto have been hampered by the lack of translations of this basic material and thus lacking the different perspectives provided by "The Annals". By Maurice Michael ; With A Commentary By Paul Smith ; [edited By Jane Allan]. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. This Edition ... From Roczniki Czyli Kroniki Sławnego Królestwa Polskiego, The Polish Translation Of The Latin By Julia Murkówna--t.p. Verso.