Rej, Mikołaj

Rej, Mikołaj, b 4 February 1505 in Zhuravno, near Zhydachiv, Galicia, d 4 November 1569 in Rejowiec, in the Kholm region. Polish writer and moralist, and Calvinist polemicist. His prose works were marked by their folksy and simple style and the use of many Ukrainian loanwords. They were very popular in Ukraine and had an important influence on the baroque literature of the 16th and 17th centuries, especially the didactic gospels.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]