POTOCKI, STANISLAW FELIX (17521805)

This article appears in Volume V22, Page 209 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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POTOCKI, STANISLAW FELIX (17521805) , Polish politician, son of Franciszek Salezy

Potocki

, palatine of Kiev, of the Tulczyn line of the family, was born in 1752. He entered the public service, and owing to the influence of his relations became grand standard-bearer of the Crown at the age of twenty-two. In 1782 he was made palatine of Russia, in 1784 a lieutenant-general, and in 1789 he

purchased

PURCHASED

the rank of a general of artillery from the Saxon minister, Bruhl, for 20,000 ducats. Elected deputy for Braclaw at the famous Four Years' Diet, he began that career of treachery which was to terminate in the ruin of his country. Yet his previous career had awakened many hopes in him. A grand seigneur ruling patriarchally in his vast estates, liberal, enlightened, a generous master and a professed patriot, his popularity culminated in 1784 when he presented an infantry regiment of 400 men as a free

gift

GIFT (a common Teutonic word, cf. Ger. die Gift, gift, das Gift, poison, formed from the Teut. stem gab-, to give, cf. Dutch geven, Ger. geben; in O. Eng. the word appears with initial y, the guttural of later English is due to Scandinavian influence)

to the republic. But he identified the public welfare with the welfare of the individual magnates. His

scheme

SCHEME (Lat. schema, Gr. oxfjya, figure, form, from the root axe, seen in exeiv, to have, hold, to be of such shape, form, &c.)

was the division of Poland into an oligarchy of autonomous grandees exercising the supreme power in rotation (in fact a perpetual interregnum), and in 1788 he won over to his views two other

great

GREAT

lords, Xavier Branicki and Severin Rzewuski. The election of Malachowski (q.v.) and Kazimierz Sapieha as marshals of the diet still further alienated him from the Liberals; and, after strenuously but vainly opposing every project of reform, he retired to Vienna whence he continued to carry on an active propaganda against the new ideas. He protested against the constitution of the 3rd of May 1791, and after attempting fruitlessly to induce the emperor

Leopold

LEOPOLD (M.H. Ger. Liupolt; O.H. Ger. Liupald, from hut, Mod. Ger. Leute, " people," and paid, " bold," i.e. " bold for the people ")

to take up arms " for the defence of the liberties of the republic," proceeded with his friends in March 1792 to St

Petersburg

PETERSBURG

, and subsequently with the connivance of the empress Catherine formed the confederation of Targowica for the maintenance of the ancient institutions of Poland (May 14, 1792), of which he was the

marshal

MARSHAL (med. Lat. marescalcus, from O.H.Ger. marah, horse, and scalc, servant)

, or rather the dictator, directing its operations from his castle at Tulczyn. When the May constitution was overthrown and the Prussians were already in occupation of

Great

GREAT

Poland,

Potocki

(March 1793) went on a diplomatic mission to St

Petersburg

PETERSBURG

; but, finding himself duped and set aside, retired to Vienna till 1797, when he settled down at Tulczyn and devoted himself for the remainder of his life to the improvement of his estates. He wrote On the
Polish Succession (Pol.) (Amsterdam, 1789); Protest against the Succession to the Throne (Pol.) (ibid. 1990); and other political works.
See

Friedrich

FRIEDRICH, JOHANN (1836— )

Schulz, Poland in the year 1793 (Pol.) (Warsaw, 1899); Josef Zajaczek, History of the Revolution of 1794 (Pol.) (

Lemberg

LEMBERG (Pol. Lwdw, Lat. Leopolis)

, 1881). (R. N. B.)

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