Page:Henryk Sienkiewicz - Potop - The Deluge (1898 translation by Jeremiah Curtin) - Vol 1.djvu/28

xviii omitted in the transliteration on account of the extreme difficulty, for any one not a Pole, of pronouncing r followed by the French j.

All Polish words, with few exceptions, are accented on the syllable next the last, the penult. The exceptions are foreign names, some compounds, some words with enclitics. Polish names of men and places are accented, with very few exceptions, on the penult.

map, though diminutive, contains data through which the reader may see, at least in part, the historical course of the Commonwealth.

The territory is indicated which was lost to the Teutonic Knights, and which became later the kingdom of Prussia. On the east are indicated the Russian lands which became connected with Poland, and which rose against Polish rule in 1648. These lands are included between the lines running north and south on the map, and which are designated, respectively, "Western limit of Russia before the Tartar invasion," "Eastern limit of the Polish Commonwealth at the accession of Yan Kazimir."

The names of more important places mentioned in and  appear also on the map. A few of these names are not so familiar in their Polish forms, which I have preserved; therefore the German is given, as follows:—

highest military rank in Poland was grand hetman; next in order came field-hetman, which has appeared inadvertently in these volumes as full hetman. "Your worthiness," so frequently used, would be better translated "your dignity," "dignity" being used in the sense of "office." The terms Pan, Pani, and Panna are applied, respectively, to a gentleman, a married lady, and an unmarried lady; they are now equivalent to Mr., Mrs. or Madame, and Miss.