Early Modern Polish Women Writers

In the period between 1526 and 1686, five major figures of Polish women authors stand out: these are Anna Vasa, Anna Memorata, Magdalena Mortęska, Maria Anna Marchocka, and Anna Stanisławska. A princess, two nuns, and two noblewomen, they penned medicinal works, Latin poetry, contemplative writings, and spiritual and secular autobiographies. But there were also countless lesser known and anonymous Polish gentle- and noblewomen, both cloistered and laity, who produced spiritual autobiographies, family chronicles, commonplace books, and letters. Most of these texts were contained within the sphere of autobiography, and more innovative, imaginative literary works by Polish women authors were yet to be written in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.