ZYGMUNT GLOGER’S IMAGINED EARTH

Abstract

The article examines the meaning of the word “earth” in the journalism of Zygmunt Gloger (1845-1910). He was the Polish ethnologist, historian and archaeologist, whose collected writings have recently been published in the three-volume Miscellaneous Works (Białystok 2014-2016). Gloger is also the author of the four-volume The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Old Polish Culture (Warsaw 1900-1903). The publication does not explore the linguistic meanings of the lexeme “earth”, but interprets what the author himself calls the “imagined earth”. Gloger loved archeological expeditions and trekking through the river valleys, during which he tried to discover secrets of the earth. For him, the earth is rich in different meanings: it is the planet, the native land, the soli, the family land, and the depository of ancient secrets. In his writings and lectures, Gloger would sketch an imagined earthly theater, the spectacle of imagination that represents the prehistory of the “modern” 19th century Poles.