Stefania Ulanowska. Tajemniczy życiorys, niepublikowane fragmenty twórczości

Abstract

Stefania Ulanowska (1839–post 1912) was an ethnographer and folklorist, one of the first Polish women to enter into these fields of study. Reconstructing the biographies of XIX century women academics and artists can be a thankless task. This applies especially to lesser known personages, amongst whom we must number Ulanowska. Academic and artistic activity was at the time reserved for men, with very few exceptions. Not much is known about Ulanowska’s parents, childhood and youth, or even her local origins. We can suppose that she was born in the eastern, Belarusian part of the Vitebsk Governorate, into a family of the minor local gentry. More is known about her life as an adult and married woman. She married Władysław Ulanowski in 1860, and in 1862, their only child, Adam Ulanowski, was born. Stefania’s husband was a doctor, educated in Dorpat (presently Tartu, Estonia). He practiced first in the countryside, and then moved to Vilnius in 1862 with his family. Władysław’s professional employment provided the means for Stefania to explore her interests and pursue knowledge. Unfortunately, their financial situation rapidly deteriorated after the January Uprising. Their capital was confiscated, and Władysław was deported into the depths of Russia. The family did not return until 1871, when they moved to Krakow. Władysław intended to undertake further study there, and started working at a Krakow clinic. In 1873 he contracted cholera and died. After his death, Ulanowska spent several years in Latvia, returning to Krakow at the cusp of the 1870s and 1880s. We do not know exactly how she supported herself. She wrote and published many articles, largely in quotidian newspapers, however the earnings from this were unlikely to have been sufficient; she may have also worked as a home tutor. In the 80s, she carried out a series of fieldwork studies in the Krakow area, especially in Rabka, and also in Masovia. These studies led to her writing numerous articles on folk customs and symbolism, and also more thorough works which had the character of ethnographic monographs of select areas. Her most important work was a publication in three parts, Łotysze Inflant polskich (The Latvians of Polish Livonia). She collected the material for this work over several years of fieldwork in the Vilani region of Lithuania. Ulanowska did not have a university education; her broad knowledge base was gained through autodidacticism. She had a fluent and functional knowledge of Russian, English, and French, with a lesser knowledge also of German. She also knew the Latgalian dialect of Latvian well. In her ethnographic work, she used methods which were at the time novel: interview and participatory observation. She maintained contact with several high-profile academics, including R. Zawiliński, I. Kopernicki, L. Malinowski (the father of Bronisław Malinowski), and, above all others, J. A. Karłowicz, with whom she corresponded over the course of many years. From 1891, Stefania Ulanowska lived in Russia, first in Moscow and then in more remote locations such as Taganrog, Novocherkassk, and other, smaller towns, where she worked as a home tutor. She did not return to her academic and artistic work. Instead, she dedicated her energy to supporting the family of her son Adam, who turned out to be an inept and careless man, incapable of supporting his numerous family, which consisted of a wife and six children. The date of Ulanowska’s death, as well as the place of her burial, remain unknown.