On 25 June 1572 Sigismund Augustus, the last male descendant of the house of Jagiellon which had ruled in central and eastern Europe for nearly two hundred years, died at his favourite country residence at Knyszyn. This monarch of great dignity and exceptional humanity, gifted in languages, a good stylist and orator, a connoisseur of art and a passionate collector of tapestries, left his vast kingdom, largely his life-work, without an heir. This kingdom was a sort of union of various states which had previously been independent or semi-independent but which had been united under the Jagiellon dynasty. It included the kingdom of Poland, the grand duchy of Lithuania with its Ruthenian territories, the duchy of Mazovia, royal Prussia (Danzig Pomerania), ducal Prussia, the duchy of Curland, and Livonia. This vast federation, as well as being called a kingdom, was known as the Rzeczpospolita, a commonwealth of various nations or states, as Sigismund Augustus used sometimes to describe it. This emphasised the fact that the union consisted of several nations differing in creed, race and language, but together making a political unity, under one king, with a central parliament and a common foreign policy. It was obvious that the immediate future would show whether the idea of union which Sigismund Augustus had fostered during his reign, and had bequeathed to his dominions in his will, would survive his death and become a source of political strength in this part of Europe.