The study looks into the wealth and earnings of the first Russian court poet of the 17th century, Simeon of Polotsk (1629‑1680). Simeon was in many respects a unique figure for 17th‑century Muscovy. His social status was far from common for besides being a regular hieromonk, at the same time he founded and managed a printing house supported by Tsar Aleksey Mikhajlovich (an institution that printed books without the license of the Moscow patriarch), and was probably the only monk to be accepted to the Tsar’s service as a poet and preacher. His private life and especially fortune are fascinating: residing in a house specially built for him on the territory of the Zaikonospasskiy monastery in Moscow, Simeon earned his living rather than live by the means provided by his monastery and by the end of life he had accumulated a great sum of Russian silver kopeks and golden chervonets comparable in worth to the money princes would have had for charitable donations at their funerals. When living in Moscow, Simeon received everything needed for his everyday life from the Tsar’s court: food, hay for his horse (provided by the Tsar as well), paper for writing. The supplement to the article discusses the date of Simeon’s relocation to Moscow from Polotsk and examines the circumstances under which he was accepted to the royal court.

The main goal of the paper is an attempt to find specific models for Stephen Báthory’s medals with the reverse LIVON(ia) POLOT(ia)Q(ue) RECEPTA and to precise the general opinion, repeated from early 17th century, that the engraver borrowed the appearance of his specimen from a Roman coin of emperors Vespasian and /or Titus. An analysis of the iconography and the inscriptions layout suggests that there were Vespasian’s sestertii RIC II2 161–162 with the mirror-reversed picture or figures from Titus’ sestertii RIC II2 150–153 which had an impact on the reverse of the Polish king’s medal. The paper presents also the medal as a part of propaganda actions of the Polish court after the Truce of Jam Zapolski in 1582, because at the same time panegyrics Gratulationum triumphalium ex Moscoviticis orationes III by Andreas Patricius Nidecki and De bello Moscovitico commentariorum libri sex by Reinhold Heideinstein were published.

The Triumphs (Triumphi) by Petrarch is a series of six poems honouring the allegorical figures of Love, Chastity, Death, Fame, Time and Eternity, who vanquish each other in turn. The Italian poem sequence was virtually unknown in Poland (although a Polish translation of The Triumph of Love appeared c. 1630, only few readers would have read it as it was circulated exclusively in a small number of hand-made copies). The illustrations, however, caught the eye of the printers and became immediately popular. They depicted each of the victorious figures riding on triumphal chariot, followed by procession of captives. This article examines the Polish verses inspired by the illustrations rather than the text of the Trionfi i.e. written in the course of the late 17th and 18th century.

The author of the most remarkable poetic response to the pictorial representations of Petrarch's Triumphs was Samuil Gavrilovich Piotrowski-Sitnianowicz (aka Symeon of Polotsk). As a student of the Academy of Wilno, he came across an emblem book with copperplate engravings of the Triumphs designed by Maarten van Heemskerck in 1565. His Polish verses (composed c. 1650–1653) follow loosely the Latin epigrams (subscriptiones) by Hadrianus Junius (Adriaen de Jonghe). Symeon of Polotsk was the first Polish-language author whose verses reflected in extenso the pictorial representation of the Triumphs (before him verses inspired by Petrarch's allegories had been written by Mikołaj Rej, Maciej Stryjkowski and Stanisław Witkowski).

Wespazjan Kochowski's volume of miscellaneous pieces in verse published in 1674 includes an epigrammatic poem The Triumph of Love, inspired by Plate One of the Triumphs. However, Kochowski's description suggests that he must have seen an engraving showing Cupid's victims under his feet. That iconographic variant appears, among other, in the woodcuts of Bernard Salomon (1547) and the copperplates designed by one of van Heemskerck's pupils (mid-16th century) or Matthäus Greuter (1596).

The following two poems were written about a century later. In 1779 Franciszek Dionizy Kniaźnin published in his second volume of Erotyki [Erotic poems] a song called The Triumph of Love. Its scenic arrangement, inspired by the illustrations of Petrarch's first Triumphus, is adapted to present twenty-one pairs of suitors. The description is stylized in conformity with the current Rococo manner and spiced up with touches of parody. A similar treatment of this subject can be found in some 17th-century paintings, for example in the Triumph of Love by Frans Francken the Younger, or an identically titled picture by the Italian Baroque artist Mattia Preti. The other poem, On the picture of the 'Triumph of Death', can be found in Franciszek Karpiński's Zabawki wierszem i przykłady obyczajne [Diversions in Verse and Moral Exemplars] published in 1780. It names eleven preeminent ancient conquerors and rulers, all cut down by Death personified by a scythe-wielding skeleton. Karpiński's description was no doubt inspired by a copperplate engraving produced by Silvestro Pomarede and designed about 1748–1750 by Gianantonio Buti after Bonifacio de' Pitati. In each of the two prints most of the figures on the ground round the chariot are identified by name. It may also be noted that Karpiński rounds of his poem with two stanzas evoking the last plate in the cycle, The Triumph of Eternity.