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Post-Tridentine liturgical books printed in Poland have not attracted much attention from book historians. However, given their special, sacred, and confessionally unifying status, they provide interesting material for comparative study of printing in the large European cities (e.g., Antwerp, Venice), and smaller provincial centers such as Kraków. The paper presents as products of the printing press the Psalterium, Antiphonarium and Graduale Romanum printed in Kraków in 1599-1600 by Andrzej Piotrkowczyk as well as later editions of these works. The decision to commission them in a local print shop rather than abroad came after prolonged debates within the Polish Catholic hierarchy. Materials used by the printer (paper, type, ornaments etc.) and the results he achieved (typography) are analysed at the backdrop of European printing and related to more general problems involved with the production of complex and voluminous books in the economic and cultural realities of an Eastern European city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this edition of Marcin Białobrzeski's Kazanie o przyjmowaniu ciała i krwie Pana Jezu Krysta pod jedną osobą is to remind an important voice in the discussion between Catholics and Protestants about the manner of receiving the sacrament of the Eucharist under one or two kinds. Beginning with Jan Hus, one of the postulates raised by the supporters of the reform of the Catholic Church was to introduce the practice of administering Holy Communion to the laity under two kinds, to which the Catholic Church's legislation opposed. In Protestant communities, the Eucharist was administered under both kinds and lay Catholics also demanded the introduction of this practice. In 1578, in response to ever more frequent postulates, bishop Marcin Białobrzeski gave the Good Thursday sermon in Kamieniec Podolski, in which he explained to the audience the reasons why Catholics were administered Holy Communion under one kind only. The sermon was written down and published a year later in Cracow in the press house of Andrzej Piotrkowczyk, and next included in a collection of his sermons entitled Postylla ortodoxa (1581) as a sermon for Good Thursday. The bishop mainly called for retaining love and unity recommended by Jesus during the last supper. The main message of the sermon was to prove the complete sufficiency of receiving the Eucharist under the form of bread only. He also strove to demonstrate that the Eucharistic kinds are disproportionately insignificant as compared to the question of faith in Christ's sacramental presence in the Holy Communion. Białobrzeski drew his arguments from the Holy Scripture, the writings of the Church Fathers, the council and synodal legislation, as well as from the studies of history and nature. Apart from the rational line of thought, he also tried to convince his listeners to this practice by engaging in an apparent dialogue with them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]