The importance of home education and upbringing in Polish gentry houses in Lithuania was the consequence of the strong necessity to protect traditional values and social norms of the landed gentry. These norms and values were threatened due to the processes of social modernization and the Russification policy of the Tsar’s government. The author of the article focuses on the contents of the educational process, whose aim was the socialization of the young generation. Pupils were coached to take up their duties as landowners but often also to choose professions which were the traditional haunt of the intelligentsia. The knowledge of etiquette and of the rules of participation in social life was still of great importance. But the knowledge and skills needed to deal with the challenge of modern economy also gradually became the order of the day. Patriotic matters also gained prominence, and the model of “the Polish Mother”, a child’s first teacher of patriotism was more and more emphasized. The nature of patriotic emotions, fostered by education, was quite complex. It consisted of the family tradition and of national history (treated often as myth and as a basis of national ideology). Teaching of ethical norms was crucial and they were transmitted primarily by the means of religious instruction.
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