The Author undertakes an analysis of role of the Napoleonic legend in the Polish historical studies of the I 9th and 20th centuries.

The city of Homs, formerly known as Emesa, strategically located in the central region of Syria, has been long linked to a folk belief that portrays its inhabitants as mad and fool. Historical and traditional sources also link the alleged madness and foolishness of the Homsians to the day of Wednesday, the so-called “Day of the Fool” or “Homsians’ Feast”, which is considered a special day. The legend regarding the “Day of the Fool” and its celebration during Wednesdays has been passed down orally in the local culture and its origins likely trace back to ancient times when the city was still called Emesa. Therefore, this article attempts at reconstructing history and origins about this folk belief, and exploring the reasons behind the supposed madness and foolishness of the inhabitants of Homs and their connections to Wednesdays by comparing three studies published after 2000s in Arabic by Homsian intellectuals, namely Al-Aḥmad, Samʽān, and Kadr.

The fundamental importance of cartographic signs in traditional maps is unquestionable, although in the case of multimedia maps their key function is not so obvious. Our aim was to search the problem of cartographic signs as a core of multimedia maps prepared by non-cartographer in on-line Map Services. First, pre-established rules for multimedia map designers were prepared emphasizing the key role of the cartographic signs and habits of Web-users. The comparison of projects completed by a group of designers led us to the general conclusion that a cartographic sign should determine the design of a multimedia map in on-line Map Services. Despite the selection of five different map topics, one may list the general characteristics of the maps with a cartographic sign in the core.

The Gdansk chronicle by Bernt Stegmann was written in the East Central German language (Ostmitteldeutsch) in 1528 and is the oldest surviving historiographic artefact concerning Gdansk. The article sums up the author’s latest findings concerning the circumstances in which the chronicle was written and the probable addressee of the work. She also puts forward some hypotheses regarding the origin of the compiler, discusses the structure of the manuscript and the manner of its production.
The chronicle is a compilation of some older historiographic sources, which place the history of the Main City of Gdansk in world history: the Jerusalem rulers and the history of the Teutonic Order. It is a type of a universal town chronicle. The content is moralizing – the compilation is a collection of historical examples teaching how to rule the town properly. It was probably written for didactic purposes for young Hans Kremer, the future mayor of Gdansk.
Bernt Stegmann was a merchant trading in such places as Stockholm and Reval. The toponymic criterion indicates that his family could originate from the area of Brandenburg or Braniewo, while the dialect in which he wrote the chronicle as well as the numerous Silesian threads in the content also make it possible to be open to the hypothesis that Stegmann’s family could have come from Silesia. This question remains unresolved. The manuscript was written and made personally by Bernt Stegmann, as indicated by the atypical arrangement of its sections and non-professional binding.