The prosperity of Poland's Golden Age, the political success of the Polish-Lithuanian union, and its unique political system based on a democratic republic of the gentry who elected their own kings gave rise to the cultural-ideological formation of Sarmatism. Based on a beautiful though highly unhistorical myth of the Polish gentry being descended from the Antique tribe of Sarmatians who allegedly defeated Alexander the Great and/or Julius Caesar, it became synonymous with the mentality of 17th- and early-18th-century Polish nobility. 

In a good Baroque tradition, Sarmatism brought  together a variety of seemingly  incompatible elements. Its strong Catholicism was only matched by a veritable obsession with Antiquity; its obviously democratic tendencies and its staunch rejection of Western as well as Russian absolutism were combined with a strong sense of class solidarity; national pride in the Commonwealth's institutions and culture went hand in hand with an openness to the West and, more characteristically, a fascination with the Orient - even, or especially during, a century of bitter struggle against the Ottoman empire. The oriental influence was especially important in arts and crafts, as evidenced in the traditional Polish gentry costume (presented here in two Rembrandt paintings).

Sarmatism had a tremendous impact on later Polish cultural eras. Reviled by Enlightenment, it was vindicated by the Romantics. having survived the common-sense Positivist literary realism, it enjoyed a triumphant come-back with the work of Henryk Sienkiewicz, Poland's first Nobel Prize winner (1905).

Its evaluation in modern Poland is far from uniform. Some see it as a reactionary and provincial product of a degenerate social class; others praise its 'love of liberty and chivalry, and simplicity of morals,' and describe it as a natural product of a virile and self-assured nation.