A rokosz () originally was a

gathering Gather, gatherer, or gathering may refer to: Anthropology and sociology *Hunter-gatherer, a person or a society whose subsistence depends on hunting and gathering of wild foods *Intensive gathering, the practice of cultivating wild plants as a st ...

of all the Polish ''

szlachta The ''szlachta'' (Polish: endonym, Lithuanian: šlėkta) were the noble estate of the realm in the Kingdom of Poland, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth who, as a class, had the dominating position in ...

'' (nobility), not merely of deputies, for a ''

sejm The Sejm (English: , Polish: ), officially known as the Sejm of the Republic of Poland ( Polish: ''Sejm Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej''), is the lower house of the bicameral parliament of Poland. The Sejm has been the highest governing body of ...

''. The term was introduced to the

Polish language Polish (Polish: ''język polski'', , ''polszczyzna'' or simply ''polski'', ) is a West Slavic language of the Lechitic group written in the Latin script. It is spoken primarily in Poland and serves as the native language of the Poles. In ad ...

from

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Cr ...

, where analogous gatherings took place at a field called Rákos. With time, "rokosz" came to signify an armed, semi-legal rebellion by the szlachta of the

Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and, after 1791, as the Commonwealth of Poland, was a bi-confederal state, sometimes called a federation, of Crown of the Kingdom of ...

against the king, in the name of defending threatened liberties. The nobles who gathered for a ''rokosz'' formed a "

confederation A confederation (also known as a confederacy or league) is a union of sovereign groups or states united for purposes of common action. Usually created by a treaty, confederations of states tend to be established for dealing with critical iss ...

".Juliusz Bardach, Bogusław Leśnodorski, and Michał Pietrzak, ''Historia państwa i prawa polskiego'' (Warsaw: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 1987, p.225-226) The institution of the rokosz, in the latter sense, derived from the

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

right to resist royal power. The rokosz took its authority from the right to refuse obedience to the king, as stipulated in the Privilege of Mielnik (''przywilej mielnicki'', signed October 23, 1501) and later in the

Henrician Articles The Henrician Articles or King Henry's Articles ( Polish: ''Artykuły henrykowskie'', Latin: ''Articuli Henriciani'') were a permanent contract between the "Polish nation" (the szlachta, or nobility, of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth) and a ...

of 1573. Two of the best-known rokoszes are the 17th-century Zebrzydowski Rebellion and the 16th-century

Chicken War Chicken War or Hen War ( pl, Wojna kokosza) is the colloquial name for a 1537 anti-royalist and anti- absolutist ''rokosz'' (rebellion) by the Polish nobility. The derisive name was coined by the ''magnates'', who for the most part supported the ...

References

Rebellions in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth {{Poland-hist-stub

See also

References