THE NOBLEMAN'S PARADISE 181Balsam, when added to tar, ceases to be balsam but turns to tar; and tares, though sown
in the finest field, will not become wheat.... So, if a noblewoman marries a peasant, she
will certainly give birth to an ignoble child. For what purity can come from such impu-
rity, what perfume from such a stench! It's a wise proverb: Nightingales are not born
from owls.^23
Mikolaj Rej (c. 1505-69), poet and pundit, who had none of Trepka's fanatic-
ism, likened the szlachta to the Cedars of Lebanon, taller and fairer than every-
one else.
Trepka (1584-1640), author of the Liber chamorum (Book of Hams), devoted
a lifetime to defending the purity of the noble estate. He was a cuss and a crank
of the most tiresome kind; but his book is a wonderful guide to the social atti-
tudes of his day. In his early days, he had sued a number of acquaintances for
ignobility, and was himself involved in various cases of kidnap, assault, horse-
stealing, and minting. In 1630, having sold his family lands, he settled in
Cracow, where he had nothing to nurse but his grievances. All the while, by
examining court records, by travelling round the fairs and assemblies of the
province, and by recording every piece of scandal or libel which came his way,
he compiled a dossier on all the people he suspected of falsely parading as
nobles. (Ham, the ignoble son of Noah, was taken to be the ancestor of all such
rascals.) In his introduction, Trepka explains with no small spite how plebeians
'screw their way' into the noble estate. The great magnates helped their clients
to noble titles with impunity. The burghers of Cracow were all provided with
fraudulent documents. Fathers, whose daughters insisted on marrying a peas-
ant, preferred to adopt the son-in-law into the family clan than to risk a public
blot on their escutcheon. Others simply added a -ski to their name, and hoped
they would not be exposed. There was wide scope for enterprising blackmail. A
'Ham' could count on finding a witness to his nobility, by threatening to bring
a case of nagana against anyone who refused to oblige. Alternatively, he could
arrange a spurious nagana against himself, which, when no witnesses came for-
ward, would persuade the court to issue the required certification. It was, as
Trepka well knew, a dirty game, and, from Abramowicz to Zyznanski, he rev-
elled in it.^24
The relative value placed on the different estates was nicely calculated in the
legal institution of 'Giowszczyzna' or 'Head-money' (Wergeld), which
remained the normal practice for settling cases of assault and murder until the
reforms of 1764. In such cases, the family of the aggrieved party was required to
bring the body or the corpse to court within twelve weeks, or to demonstrate the
nature of the injury (vulneratus, saucius, laesus, or concussus). On judging the
evidence, the court would then order a fine against the accused in accordance
with a tariff fixed by statute. These tariffs, like those of a modern insurance
company, were calculated with coldblooded precision. In 1347, a statute from
Wielkopolska put the price of a noble life at 30 groats; a noble nose, arm, or leg
at 15; and a noble finger at 3; a dead peasant was costed at 6 groats, and
an injured one at 1^1 / 2 By this reckoning, one dead nobleman was worth five