The article describes two accounts of Poland and the culture of its people. The first of these dates from 1784 and was written by the Marquis de Ségur, a French diplomat travelling to St Petersburg. The second, from 1840, was written by the Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz, at the time working as a professor at the Collège de France in Paris. I try to show the most important differences between the Enlightenment and Romantic images of Poland. An important context is provided by Larry Wolff’s monograph, which 30 years ago initiated a new phase in research on the European invention of Eastern Europe.