Polish and Central European citation styles and ISO 690

Polish and Central European citation styles are two systems, set by the department rather than the country: footnotes (przypisy dolne), with a full reference in the first note and Polish or Latin abbreviations after it, and author-date, which Polish, Czech and Hungarian guides alike call Harvard. EdCitation publishes this guide. It rests on eleven university and library guides from Gdańsk, Kraków, Szczecin, Plzeň, Prague, Nitra, Budapest and Debrecen, and on the Polish standards body's catalogue, all read on 26 September 2026. Translations in brackets are ours.

Every guide read here says the same first thing in its own words: one system, used consistently, and the supervisor chooses. Whichever you use, EdCitation's free Verify references checks a Polish, Czech or Hungarian list entry by entry against the publishers' records; our test run, with its faults, is at the end.

How does the Polish footnote system work?

Each citation is a small raised numeral pointing to a note printed below the text, and a work's first note gives it in full. The University of Gdańsk library lists three ways of citing, Harvard, numbered and running footnotes, and asks that one be used "konsekwentnie" (consistently) through the whole paper (Biblioteka Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, n.d.). Uniwersytet Jagielloński (2021), in its American Studies guide, calls footnotes the "system oksfordzki (tradycyjny)", the Oxford (traditional) system.

The first note

Gdańsk says the first note must hold "wszystkie bibliograficzne elementy obowiązkowe" (all the obligatory bibliographic elements), with the page. The two guides then order the name differently. Gdańsk puts the surname first, "Brzeziński, Jerzy, Metodologia badań psychologicznych, Wyd. 5, Warszawa: Wydaw. Naukowe PWN, 2004, s. 15", while the Jagiellonian guide, prepared by Rafał Kuś, puts the initial first and runs the year on after the publisher without a comma. A journal title goes in Polish quotation marks, „…”, before the year.

Tamże, dz. cyt. and their Latin twins

Gdańsk's table pairs each Polish abbreviation with a Latin one and asks you to choose one language and "konsekwentnie stosować jedną formę" (consistently use one form):

• tamże or ibidem: the same work as the note directly before; add the page if it changes.
• dz. cyt. or op. cit.: a work cited earlier, not in the note before; the author's name comes first.
• tenże (taż for a woman) or idem (eadem): the same author as the note before, a different work.
• loc. cit.: the same work and the same page, straight after.
• cyt. za or cit. per: quoted at second hand.

A run of notes in the Jagiellonian pattern, with two books checked in the National Library of Poland's catalogue (pages show the form only):

¹ J. Brzeziński, Metodologia badań psychologicznych, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN 2004, s. 15. ² Tamże, s. 34. ³ R. Kuś, PBS. Amerykańska telewizja publiczna, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego 2013, s. 142–153. ⁴ J. Brzeziński, dz. cyt., s. 27. ⁵ M. Szpunar, O doniosłości niepewności i myśli słabej, „Zeszyty Prasoznawcze” 2021, tom 64, nr 3 (247), s. 87–99.

Kraków adds that two works by one author take enough of each title to tell them apart, and that a paraphrase needs a note as much as a quotation. For where the Latin forms came from, and which English styles still allow them, see ibid., op. cit. and loc. cit. explained.

How do Polish universities teach Harvard?

As surname, comma, year, comma and "s." with the page, all in brackets, and a full list at the end. Uniwersytet Jagielloński (2020), at its Institute of Entrepreneurship, gives "(Panasiuk, 2019, s.29)" and the list entry "Panasiuk, A., 2019. Rynek turystyczny: struktura, procesy, tendencje. Warszawa: Difin." with the year after the name, as UK Harvard does.

Where one university disagrees with itself

The two Jagiellonian guides differ on "et al.". Entrepreneurship shortens three or more authors to "i inn." ("Bartkowiak i inn., 2016"); American Studies names up to three and writes "i in." from four. American Studies puts the year in brackets in the list and writes [bdw] (bez daty wydania, no date) when there is none. Gdańsk's example drops the comma: "(Szafrańska 1998)".

What is PN-ISO 690:2012, and is it still in force?

PN-ISO 690:2012 is the Polish adoption of ISO 690:2010, and the Polish Committee for Standardisation's shop marks it withdrawn. Polski Komitet Normalizacyjny (n.d.) gives its dates as published 31 October 2012 and withdrawn 31 October 2023: 45 pages, 232.40 zł before VAT, replacing PN-ISO 690:2002 and PN-ISO 690-2:1999. Its scope says it "nie narzuca konkretnego stylu" (does not impose a particular style) of notes or citations.

What we could not read or confirm

The standard's text is sold, and we have not read it. The shop's search for "PN-ISO 690" lists no successor, so we could not confirm what, if anything, now stands in its place in Poland. Library guides still name it: the Szczecin University of Technology library bases its list advice on PN-ISO 690:2012 and says the standard fixes no layout, so its sheet is only the library's own proposal (Biblioteka Główna ZUT, n.d.).

How do Czech and Slovak universities cite under ISO 690?

Through national standards issued in 2022, ČSN ISO 690 and STN ISO 690, as university libraries interpret them.

Czechia: ČSN ISO 690:2022

The University of West Bohemia's guide in Plzeň, written by Z. Firstová, dates the new version to 1 December 2022 and names three methods: name and date (Harvard), numbered references and running notes. Its front page warns that the standard "umožňuje různé způsoby citování" (allows various ways of citing), so a brief that says only "ISO 690" does not fix a format (Firstová, n.d.-a, n.d.-b).

Firstová (n.d.-c) lists what changed from 2011:

1. The first five authors are always given; after five, "a další", "et al." or all of them.
2. The access date follows the link, introduced by "citováno".
3. DOIs and handles are written as links.
4. The medium, usually "Online", follows the title without square brackets.
5. Numbering by typography alone, "9 (2), 29-33", is no longer allowed.

The same page reports "chyby, rozpory a nejednoznačnosti" (errors, contradictions and ambiguities) inside the standard, with element orders that differ between its tables and its examples. Vysoká škola ekonomická v Praze (2023) recommended accepting work cited to the 2011 version during the changeover.

Surnames go in capitals: "ŠULEŘ, Oldřich". Here Czech guides disagree on a comma. Univerzita Karlova (2026) writes "(McQuail, 2002, s. 29)"; Plzeň writes "(Roche 2006a, s. 97–98)".

Slovakia: STN ISO 690:2022

Slovenská poľnohospodárska knižnica pri SPU v Nitre (2023) says STN ISO 690:2022 took effect in June 2022, replaced the May 2012 version in full, and was issued in English: "Norma nie je preložená do slovenčiny" (the standard is not translated into Slovak). At that university it is binding for final theses and a recommendation for journals. Up to five authors are all given, separated by semicolons, the surname "veľkými písmenami" (in capitals) and the given name in small letters.

How do Hungarian universities cite?

With footnotes in the humanities and author-date or numbers elsewhere, and MSZ ISO 690 as the national standard. The library of the University of Debrecen names MSZ ISO 690:1991 for the required content of a reference, then adds "Nem kell feltétlenül ezt követni" (you need not follow it): computing uses IEEE or ACM, and footnotes there are "nem szokás" (not the custom) (Debreceni Egyetem Egyetemi és Nemzeti Könyvtár, 2019).

Footnotes at ELTE

The Institute of Hungarian Literature and Cultural Studies at Eötvös Loránd University puts every reference in a footnote, family name in small capitals, title in italics (ELTE Magyar Irodalom- és Kultúratudományi Intézet, n.d.). Its abbreviations are Hungarian: "Uo." (ugyanott, the same place) for the note before, "I. m." (idézett mű, the work cited) for an earlier one, and "Uő." (the same author). A chapter follows an equals sign, not "in". Its first example:

Szegedy-Maszák Mihály, Márai Sándor, Akadémiai, Budapest, 1991, 90–91.

APA at Corvinus

Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem (2023) states that APA is expected, and asks for Hungarian or English conventions throughout ("mtsai" or "et al.", "szerk." or "ed."), never both.

How do diacritics and names work in these reference lists?

Every letter is kept as the source prints it, and names keep the order their owners use.

Diacritics

Polish ł, ą, ę, ś and ż, the Czech háček in š, č, ř and ž, and Hungarian ő and ű are letters, not decoration: "Kuś" and "Kus" are different names to a catalogue. The Nitra library says data are taken from the source in its own language, and Univerzita Karlova (2026) keeps a name's accents even in capitals: "BĚLOHLÁVEK, František".

Hungarian family name first

A Hungarian name already puts the family name first, as in "Szegedy-Maszák Mihály", and ELTE gives each name "a belső címoldalon lévő sorrenddel" (in the order on the title page), so a foreign author keeps the given name first. In APA only a comma and an initial are added, "Szegedy-Maszák, M.", as Corvinus does with "Kornai, J."; inverting a second time gives the wrong name. Corvinus's own list slips once, keeping "Chikán Attila." at the head of an APA entry. ELTE adds that a noble or place prefix is not part of the family name: in Gyarmati Balassi Bálint, the family name is Balassi.

Footnotes or Harvard: how does each handle the same element?

Set side by side, from the Polish, Czech and Hungarian guides above:

Which EdCitation tools work for Polish, Czech and Hungarian references?

Neither Verify references nor Find sources depends on the style. For a Central European list, Verify references is the tool to use: it matches every entry to a publisher's or library record, a lookup a chatbot cannot perform, and in our run it confirmed four works by DOI, written in Polish, Czech-standard and Hungarian forms, and a Hungarian book by its ISBN. EdCitation never writes any part of a student's paper, and promises no grade. Both tools are free with no account.

Verify references on a Central European list

We gave Verify references eight real entries, each in its guide's own form. Each result is verified, doubtful (labelled "check this") or not found; an entry the tool was unable to check is reported as "could not check", never as missing.

• Four entries with DOIs, verified, each with "The DOI resolves to this record and the title matches": Szpunar in the Polish footnote form, with „Zeszyty Prasoznawcze” in Polish quotation marks; Mirga in ČSN ISO 690 form, "MIRGA, Tomáš"; Felsmann, Ferincz and Kárpáti in Corvinus's APA; and "Chikán Attila. (2020)", family name first.
• Three books, could not check, with "The ISBN is a valid number, but no catalogue searched here holds it. Check it in the national library's or the publisher's catalogue.": Brzeziński in Gdańsk's footnote form with ISBN 83-01-14041-0 (and again with the 13-digit ISBN), Kuś with ISBN 978-83-233-3549-8, and Šuleř with ISBN 978-80-251-2173-3. All three are real: the National Library of Poland lists the first two under those ISBNs, and Charles University's guide cites the third with its ISBN.
• One book, not found: Szegedy-Maszák's Márai Sándor, written without an ISBN, "No publisher's record or library catalogue entry matches this reference". The Hungarian Academy of Sciences library lists it under ISBN 963-05-5972-2, and with that ISBN added, in the same footnote form, it came back verified: "The ISBN leads to this book in a library catalogue, and its title matches." Search your national library before trusting "not found" on a Central European book.

Diacritics came through whole. A second run tried the harder forms:

• A dropped subtitle. Felsmann's entry without "– Egy empirikus vizsgálat tanulságai" verified, with "Its full title adds "Egy empirikus vizsgálat tanulságai", which your entry leaves out; check whether your style wants it." The same entry with every accent stripped verified too.
• Footnote shorthand. "Tamże, s. 54." and "R. Kuś, dz. cyt., s. 183." came back "could not check": "This note points back to an earlier one (cit., ibid.), so it is not a full reference. Check the full entry it refers to." Paste the bibliography, not the notes.

Pro's References from a file, $8 a month, takes the uploaded paper instead, checking every reference and pairing author-date citations with the list; we did not test it on a footnoted paper.

Find sources in Polish

Find sources, which covers about 300 million published works, returned 841 Crossref records for "dezinformacja w mediach społecznościowych" (disinformation on social media). The first three were on that subject: Ostrowska (2025) in Polityka i Społeczeństwo, Jaszczyński, Świerk and Olszowski (2025) in Media i Społeczeństwo, and Barański and Smereka (2024) in Kwartalnik Historii Nauki i Techniki. From the fourth on, results matched only "w mediach społecznościowych": brand capital, word formation. Names with ł and ś came back intact.

Cite a source: six styles, then your own edits

Cite a source offers six styles only: APA 7, MLA 9, Chicago 18 author-date, Harvard, IEEE and Vancouver. It produces no Polish footnote and no PN-ISO, ČSN or STN ISO 690 form. A Polish or Czech author-date paper can begin from the Harvard or APA version, then be changed by hand to the department's pattern. For Szpunar's DOI, Harvard gave "Szpunar, M. (2021) ‘O doniosłości niepewności i myśli słabej’, Zeszyty Prasoznawcze, 64(3), pp. 87–99. Available at: https://doi.org/10.4467/22996362pz.21.021.13886." Write "s." for "pp." if your guide asks. Its MLA and Chicago entries keep the title as the journal prints it, "O doniosłości niepewności i myśli słabej", as MLA advises for a title in another language (Modern Language Association, 2018).

Quick questions

What is the difference between tamże and dz. cyt.?

Tamże (ibidem) points to the work in the note directly before; dz. cyt. (op. cit.) points to a work cited earlier, after the author's name. Gdańsk's library asks for Polish or Latin forms throughout, not both.

Is PN-ISO 690:2012 still valid?

The Polish Committee for Standardisation's shop marks PN-ISO 690:2012 withdrawn on 31 October 2023 and lists no successor. Many Polish university guides still cite it, so follow your department's sheet.

Do Czech and Slovak references need surnames in capitals?

The Czech and Slovak library guides read here write the surname in capitals and the given name in small letters, as in "ŠULEŘ, Oldřich". The standard allows other layouts, so check your faculty's own template.

How do I write a Hungarian author's name in APA?

Keep the family name first, add a comma and shorten the given name to its initial: Szegedy-Maszák Mihály becomes "Szegedy-Maszák, M.". Keep every accent, and leave a noble prefix out of the family name.

Can EdCitation check a Polish reference list?

Yes, free: paste the bibliography into EdCitation's Verify references, which looks up each entry; in our test it verified Polish, Czech and Hungarian articles by DOI, and answered "could not check" for real Polish and Czech books its catalogues do not hold.

References

• Biblioteka Główna ZUT. (n.d.). Bibliografia załącznikowa według polskiej normy ISO 690:2012 [PDF]. Zachodniopomorski Uniwersytet Technologiczny w Szczecinie. https://bg.zut.edu.pl/fileadmin/pliki/users/418/pliki/Bibliografia_za%C5%82%C4%85cznikowa_wed%C5%82ug_polskiej_normy_ISO.pdf
• Biblioteka Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego. (n.d.). Przypisy bibliograficzne: podział i zasady ich sporządzania [Slides, PDF]. https://dat.bg.ug.edu.pl/bugnew/images/stories/pdf/przyp.bibliogr_2012.pdf
• Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem. (2023). Hivatkozások dokumentumtípusonként [PDF]. https://www.uni-corvinus.hu/contents/uploads/2023/04/hivatkoz%C3%A1sok-%20dokumentumtipusonkent.f1c.pdf
• Debreceni Egyetem Egyetemi és Nemzeti Könyvtár. (2019, April 2). Szerzői jogi kérdések és a hivatkozások készítésének módja [Course page]. Szakdolgozat-IK. https://old.elearning.unideb.hu/mod/page/view.php?id=86453
• ELTE Magyar Irodalom- és Kultúratudományi Intézet. (n.d.). Hivatkozási segédlet. Eötvös Loránd Tudományegyetem. https://mikti.elte.hu/hivatkozasisegedlet
• Firstová, Z. (n.d.-a). Citační norma ČSN ISO 690:2022: Bibliografické citace. Západočeská univerzita v Plzni. https://citace.zcu.cz/
• Firstová, Z. (n.d.-b). Odkazy v textu: metody citování. Západočeská univerzita v Plzni. https://citace.zcu.cz/metody-citovani.html
• Firstová, Z. (n.d.-c). Změny 2022. Západočeská univerzita v Plzni. https://citace.zcu.cz/zmeny2022.html
• Modern Language Association. (2018, April 29). Why does the MLA capitalize certain words in titles? MLA Style Center. https://style.mla.org/capitalization-of-titles/
• Polski Komitet Normalizacyjny. (n.d.). PN-ISO 690:2012: Informacja i dokumentacja, wytyczne opracowania przypisów bibliograficznych i powołań na zasoby informacji [Catalogue entry]. Sklep PKN. Retrieved September 26, 2026, from https://sklep.pkn.pl/pn-iso-690-2012p.html
• Slovenská poľnohospodárska knižnica pri SPU v Nitre. (2023, September 28). Norma STN ISO 690: 2022. https://www.slpk.uniag.sk/sk/norma-stn-iso-690-2022
• Univerzita Karlova. (2026, September 15). ČSN ISO 690. Všechno o citování, Fakulta sociálních věd. https://citace.fsv.cuni.cz/CITFSV-13.html
• Uniwersytet Jagielloński. (2020). Instrukcja stosowania przypisów harwardzkich w Instytucie Przedsiębiorczości UJ [PDF]. https://przedsiebiorczosc.uj.edu.pl/documents/137560027/146470510/Przypisy+harwardzkie+26.10.pdf/b9d515ed-cb92-4476-b90b-d063ae961dea
• Uniwersytet Jagielloński. (2021). Zasady sporządzania przypisów bibliograficznych (Version 5) [PDF]. Instytut Amerykanistyki i Studiów Polonijnych. https://iaisp.uj.edu.pl/documents/1479490/144085405/ZASADY+SPORZA%CC%A8DZANIA+PRZYPISO%CC%81W+BIBLIOGRAFICZNYCH+v.+5.pdf/79381f10-56f6-4315-ae64-ac74e7decdc1
• Vysoká škola ekonomická v Praze. (2023, March 1). Nová norma ČSN ISO 690:2022 citování a studentské práce. Knihovna VŠE. https://knihovna.vse.cz/aktuality/nova-norma-csn-iso-6902022-citovani/