Countess Emilia Plater · BARRICADES PROJECT

Title

Countess Emilia Plater

Description

Emilia Plater was born into a noble family within the Polish Lithuanian commonwealth. From an early age she was trained in fencing, shooting and riding horses, all of which were uncommon for 19th century aristocratic girls.
When Polish resistance to the parcelling out of the country among the Great Powers broke out in 1830, Plater sought to join the patriots. Rejected because of her gender, she cut her hair and arranged her uniform to conceal that she was a young woman. She managed to assemble and lead a regiment consisting of 280 infantry, 60 cavalry and several hundred peasants, equipping them at her own expense with war scythes. She led her regiment in some of the most bitter clashes with the enemy, refusing to stand down until her fatherland (Poland) was liberated. For this, she was awarded the rank of captain, the highest rank a woman could receive at that time. After refusing to follow orders and becoming separated from the main force, Emilia became seriously ill and died. Following her death and the defeat of the uprising her estate was confiscated by Russian authorities.

It is not known how much of this life story actually took place and how much is a part of Polish mythology. Nonetheless, her significance as a female contributor to the Polish national effort is undiminished. Her involvement in the revolt has attracted feminists interested in her transgression of gender boundaries and challenging the overrepresentation of male presence in the national revolts of the 19th century. Plater is an exemplar of those Polish women who challenged cultural taboos of their time in the national cause. Plater’s death was widely publicised in the Polish press, contributing to her construction as a national martyr. Her status as an example for all Poles can be seen in the inclusion in school curricula of Adam Mickiewicz’s poem ‘Śmierć Pułkownika’ (Death of a Colonel), which pays tribute to her efforts. The poem became an important piece of propaganda, implanting nationalistic ideals amongst the very young. More widely, Plater has become a national heroine immortalised through art, literature and statues, and finding both domestic and international fame as the symbol of the ‘fighting girl’.
Plater is celebrated in both Lithuania and Poland, uniting the two historiographies. Her image is preserved and circulated in currency: the litas commemorative coin of Lithuania and the 20 & 50 Zloty bank notes of Poland.. Plater is also immortalised in the ‘Clematis Emilia Plater’, a flower that is known to have strong vines, easy to grow, amenable to training and flowers profusely over a long period of time, the name was proposed by Brother Stefan Franczak from Warsaw.

Emilia Plater remains a highly respected and celebrated individual who fought to free her native Poland from servitude. She remains today, a symbol standing for nation independence and against the subjugation of women.
“…The ancients would have raised altars to such a splendid example of female patriotism as being something divine; in the Middle Ages knights and men at arms would have flocked to her banners from the remotest corners of Christendom, as to a crusade..”
(Caleb Cushing: Sutherland, 2017)

Contributor

Danielle Henney

Spatial Coverage

Poland

Temporal Coverage

1830

Bibliographic Citation

Abramovich, W (2018). May 2018 – Emilia Plater – Polish Joanna d'Arc. [Online] Available at: Maj 2018 – Emilia Plater – polska Joanna d’Arc – Poloniki.pl (Accessed: 12/01/2020)

Clematis 'Emilia Plater' (Viticella Group) (gardenia.net)
Dray, J (2017). Emilia. [Online] Available at: Emilia (activerain.com) (Accessed: 02/01/2020)

Sutherland, A (2017). Emilia Plater: National Female Hero Of Polish And Lithuanian People.