Page - 25 - in Universities in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 - A Social History of a Multilingual Space

Chapter 1 ♦  25 an amateur historian, primarily interested in source research;21 however, he was internationally known and was one of only three Habsburg schol- ars invited to become members of the Society for Older German History (Gesellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde), which edited the prom- inent series Monumenta Germaniae Historica.22 The Ossolineum, devised as a provincial institution, increasingly became a Polish one, however. In the 1830s the institute printed conspiratorial writings and edited sources on the November Uprising (1830–31); as a result, it was placed under po- lice control, and its activities were severely limited. It was revived only after 1848. Despite its struggles, it continued to forge an understanding between the speakers of the two Galician languages, bringing together the allegiances of Polish and Ruthenian scholars.23 The Ossolineum was also linked to other Polish institutions in Cracow, Warsaw, and Poznań/Posen, and its publications clearly envisioned a space different from the Galician one.24 The Cracow Academic Society Linked with the University of Cracow (Societatis Litterariae cum Universitate Studiorum Cracoviense Conjunctae / Towarzystwo Naukowe Krakowskie z Uniwersytetem Krakowskim połąc- zone) became a cradle of Polish-language scholarship after 1815, even if it was of only local importance because it was part of the Free City of Cracow (1815–46). In the period before 1863, however, it was in the Grand Duchy of Posen and the Russian Empire’s Kingdom of Poland (from 1867 Vistula Land) that Polish-language scholarship thrived, escaping Metternich’s censorship.25 In particular, the Russian Empire provided, until 1831, very favorable condi- tions for universities under the protection of the tsar and the local aristocracy, allowing them to teach in Polish.26 In Prussia chairs of Slavic languages were created at the universities in Berlin and Wrocław/Breslau, and societies con- centrating on Slavic languages and history emerged; several of the émigrés from the Habsburg Empire who were teaching in Prussia moved back to the Habsburg Empire after 1848 and were instrumental in Habsburg government measures to strengthen loyalty after that time.27 While the Ossolineum was an independent, private institution, Ruthenian scholarship flourished around state-sponsored institutions, namely, the Studium Ruthenum (Студіум рутенум), established in 1787, and the Stauropegion Institute (Stavropihiys’ky Instytut, or Ставропігійський інститут), established in 1788 as the Greek Catholic successor to the Orthodox Dormition Brotherhood (Uspens’ke Bratstvo).28 Both were closely associated with the Greek Catholic Church, and both educated and organized