(Cambridge Concise Histories) Jerzy Lukowski, Hubert Zawadzki - A Concise History of Poland-Cambridge University Press (2006)

The Commonwealth’s failure to reassert its position over the Ukraine combined with the opposition to the Vasas’ supposedly absolutist intentions to break the back of Poland’s pre-eminent position in eastern Europe. Domestic politics fused with the foreign policies of its neighbours. Opponents of strong monarchy, that is, defenders of noble liberties, saw nothing wrong in conniving with foreign rulers to thwart any moves towards more effective government. The treaty of Stockholm of 1667, between Sweden and Brandenburg, was the first in a long series of agreements between neighbour-states aiming specifically to block any political reform in the Commonwealth.

The effects appeared starkly under John Casimir’s successors. The magnate families which had backed French or Austrian candidates would not forgive Michael Wisniowiecki’s elevation, forced on them by szlachta gathered in unprecedented numbers for the election (80,000 according to some observers). Disgusted by endless grandee rivalries, the nobility insisted on one of their own -the impoverished scion of a once great family, whose father had distinguished himself (more by brutality than effectiveness) in the wars against KhmePnytskyi. A coterie centred around the primate, Nicholas Prazmowski, and the grand Crown hetman, John Sobieski, spent most of Wisniowiecki’s brief reign plotting his overthrow. When, in T67Z, Poland was invaded by the Turks, it stood on the verge of civil war. Once Kamieniec Podolski fell and Lwow was besieged, Polish negotiators had little choice but to capitulate. By the treaty of Buczacz, Podole and Kamieniec were ceded outright to the Porte; the right-bank Ukraine was placed under its overlordship. The Rzeczpospolita agreed to pay an annual tribute to the Turks. The Sejm of February-April 1673 rejected the terms; it voted unprecedented sums for a new army; but it could not heal internal divisions. Sobieski’s spectacular destruction, in November, of a Turkish army at Khotin could not be followed up, as Lithuanian forces, commanded by his rival, Michael Рас, refused co-operation; the unpaid Crown troops deserted in droves.

Yet the victory created a huge wave of euphoria, which secured the throne for Sobieski (King Michael died before news of the victory arrived). To Michael Рас, and to most magnate clans, every victory the new king gained would be one for Sobieski and his family (Wisniowiecki at least had the good grace to be impotent) and promised to do nothing at all for the liberties that constituted the Commonwealth. Рас would not furnish the military support from Lithuania which Sobieski needed. At Zurawno in October 1676, the king had to settle for a renewal of the terms of j 672 - the Turks dropped only the demand for tribute.

Sobieski’s plans for recovering Ducal Prussia for Poland (preferably as a hereditary Sobieski fief) were dashed by the same opposition. His hopes of building up support around the Sapieha family in Lithuania backfired as the Sapiehas exploited his patronage to tighten their own grip on the Grand Duchy and then turned against the king as virulently as had the Рас family. Monarchs would continue to be hamstrung by an opposition which elsewhere would have been viewed as treasonable; in Poland-Lithuania its mischief was genuinely seen as a defence of ancestral liberty.