Thaddeus Kosciusko
angrystaffofficer.com
Thaddeus Kosciusko
1–10 of 117 posts
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#2Possibly interesting, but the writing style makes me question if the facts aren't over-exagerrated or twisted to fit the narration.
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#3I'm curious why the hell is his name anglicised. It should be Tadeusz Kościuszko. In reverse it would be like writing Albert Einstein as Albert Ajsztain in Polish, because that's how it's pronounced. No one ever does this.
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#4Possibly interesting, but the writing style makes me question if the facts aren't over-exagerrated or twisted to fit the narration.
I thought the article was mostly a shorter, cribbed version of his Wikipedia entry.[1]
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#5I'm curious why the hell is his name anglicised. It should be Tadeusz Kościuszko. In reverse it would be like writing Albert Einstein as Albert Ajsztain in Polish, because that's how it's pronounced. No one ever does this.
It was anglicized so that most of their readers can actually pronounce it. In the article they provide the original name. We do this all the time in Poland: Ludwik XIV instead of Luis XIV, Jerzy Waszyngton instead of George Washington, and gazillion other historical figures. Nowadays maybe a bit less popular but definitely a thing. So “no one ever does this” is not really true, is it?
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#6Possibly interesting, but the writing style makes me question if the facts aren't over-exagerrated or twisted to fit the narration.
The jocular style had me clicking the close button after three paragraphs ... "(long story, don't ask)"
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#7I'm curious why the hell is his name anglicised. It should be Tadeusz Kościuszko. In reverse it would be like writing Albert Einstein as Albert Ajsztain in Polish, because that's how it's pronounced. No one ever does this.
In the exact same way that people say "Yuri Gagarin" instead of Ю́рий Гага́рин.
I work with several Polish people who intentionally anglicise their names due to the phonetics being awkward / not existing in English (E.g. Tomasz Vs Thomas).The same with German and Chinese people - it's either for convenience or a best approximation.
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#8I'm curious why the hell is his name anglicised. It should be Tadeusz Kościuszko. In reverse it would be like writing Albert Einstein as Albert Ajsztain in Polish, because that's how it's pronounced. No one ever does this.
It was anglicized so that most of their readers can actually pronounce it. In the article they provide the original name. We do this all the time in Poland: Ludwik XIV instead of Luis XIV, Jerzy Waszyngton instead of George Washington, and gazillion other historical figures. Nowadays maybe a bit less popular but definitely a thing. So “no one ever does this” is not really true, is it?
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Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#9I'm curious why the hell is his name anglicised. It should be Tadeusz Kościuszko. In reverse it would be like writing Albert Einstein as Albert Ajsztain in Polish, because that's how it's pronounced. No one ever does this.
I don't know about that, Szekspir (Shakespeare) is, for example, quite a common sight in Poland.
Re: Thaddeus Kosciusko
#10Kościuszko had been venerated as a saint during communism in Poland (first Polish Division formed in Sovitet Union was named after him, my school was named after him and many others). But today is omitted from history and forgotten.
The problem with Kosciuszko (and some other Polish officers of the era like Jakub Jasiński) is that they were deadly serious with abolishing slavery in America and serfdom in Poland (basically the same institution), giving full citizenship rights to all human beeings and liquidating privileged landowning class (szlachta - nobility).
This did not sit well with people who hijacked narrative of Polish history - descendants of landowning class bancrupted by Industrial Revolution in second half of XIX century. They romanticesed good old days of szlachta and have always perceived Kosciuszko as troblesome figure and rabble rouser.