Teutonic Knights
Page 39
Livonian Order
Louis IV
Louis the Great
Louis Jagiellon
Louis of Brandenburg
Louis of Thuringia
Louis von Erlichshausen
Louis von Leibenzelle
Louis von Wittelsbach
Louis de Silves
Lübeck
Ludolf König
Luther, Lutheran
Luther von Braunschweig
Magnates and Palatines
Magnus of Holstein
Mangold von Sternberg
Marburg
Marger
Marienburg
Marienwerder
Marco Polo
Marquard von Salzbach
Marshal
Martin von Golen
Martyrdom
Masovia
Master of the Robes
Matejko, Jan
Matthias Corvinus
Maximilian
Mecklenburg
Meinhard
Meissen
Memel (for Memel River see Nemunas)
Men-at-arms
Mercenaries
Merchants
Mestwin
Mewe
Michael Küchmeister
Military Orders
Militia
Mindaugas
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Mitau
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Mongols (see Tatars)
Moravia
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Music
Napoleon
Narew River
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Narva
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Nemunas River
Neumark
Neva River
Nicholas von Jeroschin
Nicholas Traba
Nicholas V
Nicopolis
Nobles
Novgorod
Nuremberg
Nurses
Oleśnicki
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Oesel
Ossa River
Osterode
Otto
Ottokar II
Paganism
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Paul II
Paul Watt
Paulus Vladimiri
Peasant uprisings
Peasantry
Peipus, Lake
Peter von Dusburg
Peter von Suchenwirt
Peter’s Pence
Philipp de Mézières
Piast dynasty
Piccolomini (Aeneas Silvius, Pius II)
Piracy
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Płock
Plowce
Pogesania
Poland
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Polish nobles, knights
Polotsk
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Pomerellia
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Poppo
Pregel River
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Samogitian Crusade
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Sigismund Augustus
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Teutonic Order
Theodoric, missionary
Theodoric of Samland
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Thirteen Years War
Thomas, Bishop
Thorn
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Tilsit
Timur
Tokhtamysh
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Wenceslas IV
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Werner von Orseln
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Wilderness
Wilhelm von Fürstenburg
Wilhelmine Germany
William of Modena
Winrich von Kniprode
Wizna
Wolter von Plettenberg
Women
Zantir
Žygimantas
1 See Bibliography.
2 Eric Christensen, The Northern Crusades (Penguin, London and New York, 1998). Christensen is not only a solid scholar, but his pithy comments are often very witty as well.
3 The reasons for this nomenclature are not particularly clear, although it may have something to do with the traditional insular unwillingness of Englishmen to take the time to tell Deutsch from Dutch. More likely there was a bit of modern intellectual snobbery involved – Teutonic was a more refined word than German, with its implications of fat old men sitting in a dark tavern, smoke spilling out of their long pipes, and tankards of beer on the tables.
4 Men-at-arms fought in units of ten mounted warriors under the direction of a knight. Since these men traditionally followed a knight’s flag, the unit was called a banner. Sometimes men-at-arms were equipped with heavy armour and rode a trained war-horse, but for scouting duties and raiding lighter equipment was more appropriate (and cheaper). In the Holy Land these men were called Turcopoles, and dressed for the hot climate – with light arms, less armour, and faster horses, like their Arab and Turkish
foes. Later the Teutonic Order’s men-at-arms were usually Germans, though, unlike the knights, they could be born in Prussia or Livonia. Advancement of a man-at-arms into the ranks of the knights was extremely rare. They ate and slept in their own barracks, but observed the same daily religious services as knights and priests.
5 As a symbol of his friendship the emperor issued the Golden Bull of Rimini in 1226, granting the order extensive lands and privileges in Prussia should the Teutonic Knights choose to accept the invitation from Duke Conrad of Masovia to send knights there.
6 Rus’ is the name Western historians use for medieval Russia, with its centre in Kiev but its authority widely scattered among the descendants of the early grand princes. This usage minimises confusion with the very different Russian state that formed in the sixteenth century, with its centre in Moscow.
7 By ‘Mongol’ scholars generally mean the empire of the grand khan, with its centre in Mongolia, from which the khanate’s wars against China, Persia and the Near East could be directed most effectively. By ‘Tatar’ we refer to the lesser khans living in the west, from Turkestan to Kazan. By ‘Golden Horde’ we mean the westernmost Tatars, with their centre at Sarai on the lower Volga. Some lived as far west as the Crimea. In practice, these names are used interchangeably.
8 Nora Berend, At the Gate of Christendom: Jews, Muslims and ‘Pagans’ in Medieval Hungary, c.1000 – c.1300 (Cambridge University Press, 2001); Norman Davies, God’s Playground: A History of Poland in two volumes (Columbia, New York, 1982).
9 Much scholarly ink has been spilled over the nature of Baltic paganism. Recent opinions range from Marija Gimbutas, The Balts (Thames & Hudson, London, 1963) and Algirdas Greimas, Of Gods and Men: Studies in Lithuanian Mythology (Indiana University Press, 1992), who see a complete pantheon of gods and spirits, to Endre Bojtár, Foreword to the Past: A Cultural History of the Baltic People (Central European University Press, Budapest, 2000), who argues that the deities and most of Baltic folklore are nineteenth-century inventions, similar, perhaps, to currently fashionable neo-paganism and the goddess cult. The oldest descriptions of pagan practices were collected in their original languages by Wilhelm Mannhardt, Letto-Prussische Götterlehre (Lettisch-Literärische Gesellschaft, Riga, 1863).
10 One can hardly take a firm stand on nothing, but nationalists of all types rarely hesitate to put their feet down wherever they believe a solid foundation should exist. And other than the experts in the less well-known languages of the region, past and present, who would know to what degree their accounts are reliable? Abundant records exist for later centuries, when Poles, Germans and papal legates were writing letters, reports and treaties, and chroniclers were composing works of surprising quality. In the nineteenth century well-trained historians began to compose competent histories of this era and to publish edited editions of primary sources. Alas, some political histories were little more than polemics, but in the late twentieth century scholars had begun to overcome some of their most obvious political biases, at least to the extent of recognising alternative interpretations of events.
11 Modern historians have sought to identify the Teutonic Knights as the spearhead of the medieval Drang nach Osten (the German push to the East); with imperial Germany’s expansionist plans; and with Nazism. In the Cold War period a crude hostility to all Slavs was attributed to the entire West. In reality this important medieval migration is better associated with the peaceful settlement of German knights and peasants in eastern lands (as in the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin) by invitation. Across Europe landowners and clergymen were opening forests and swamps to farming and herding; Polish peasants and gentry were on the move eastward; and Jews and German artisans and merchants were creating towns.
12 Conrad created his own military order, the Dobriners, which he hoped to control fully; it was later wiped out fighting in Volhynia. The Templars and Hospitallers accepted estates in Pomerellia and Poland, but their contributions to later military expeditions were too small to be significant.
13 Native nobles rarely had sufficient income to allow them to function full-time as warriors and administrators. Nor did the Teutonic Order want to disperse its potential incomes by creating a class of secular knights. The masters gave away few fiefs, and most of those were small grants in Culm, given to Polish knights. The masters appointed members of the Teutonic Order to train and lead the native troops. Known as advocates, these lived with their charges, so they were usually fluent in Prussian and understood their customs well.
14 Mindaugas did promise the Livonian master Samogitia, but he could do this easily, since the Samogitians did not recognise him as their ruler anyway.
15 The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia (trans. James A. Brundage, University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1961). This lively, intelligent account of the period 1180 – 1227 ranks as one of the better medieval chronicles. Apparently written for the benefit of William of Modena, the papal legate who arrived in Riga in 1225, it is more thorough and more reflective than all but a very few contemporary works.
16 There were no serfs in Livonia in these early days, though there were a few slaves – prisoners taken in raids upon pagan lands. Serfdom became widespread only in the fifteenth century.
17 A hide was the amount of land needed to support one family. This varied according to locality, from as little as 60 acres to as many as 240; most commonly it was 120 acres.
18 Chronicle of Novgorod, 1016 – 1471 (trans. Robert Michell and Nevil Forbes, Camden Society 3rd series XV, London, 1914). This is not the easiest text to read, but it conveys vividly the flavour of the Orthodox faith.
19 The Livonian Rhymed Chronicle (trans. Jerry C. Smith and William Urban, new and expanded second edition, Lithuanian Research and Studies Center, Chicago, 2001). A naïve, lively, informative narrative.
20 Quoted in David Nicolle, Lake Peipus 1242: The Battle on the Ice (Osprey, London, 1996).
21 As it turned out, only World War Two seems to have provided a solution – a very brutal one, involving as it did the forced removal of most of the German-speaking population of East and West Prussia, including most descendants of the original Prussian population.
22 After World War Two it was renamed Kaliningrad by its Soviet conquerors to honour a Stalinist party hack. Most evidence of the German past that survived the fighting was destroyed, thus eliminating the visual reminders that Emmanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) and Johann Gottfried Herder (1744 – 1803) had lived there, along with the monuments built by the Teutonic Knights and the dukes of Prussia.
23 Some historians have interpreted this document as a grant of all of Russia and Lithuania. This is unlikely – the Teutonic Order was ambitious, but it was also extremely realistic.
24 Christoph Maier, Preaching the Crusade: Mendicant Friars and the Cross in the thirteenth century (Cambridge University Press, 1994). Since bishops were often unable to support themselves in their Baltic dioceses, they travelled from one German bishopric to another, assisting fellow prelates in special celebrations, collecting pious donations, and preaching the crusade.
25 An excellent account is S.C. Rowell, Lithuania Ascending: A Pagan Empire within East-Central Europe (Cambridge University Press, 1994).
26 An exception is Harvard scholar Samuel Huntington, whose 1993 article ‘Clash of Civilizations’, in Foreign Affairs, has been widely discussed.
27 Modern men and women are by no means above scheming and backbiting, but few modern states disintegrate when hereditary leaders change their allegiance.
28 The Hungarians objected to having Sigismund as their ruler, too, but he used his brother’s Czech and German troops to repress the nobles’ repeated uprisings.
29 In 1429 Vytautas sought to be crowned king of Lithuania, an honour cleverly offered by Sigismund, but his ambition was frustrated by Jagiełło, who arranged for the crown and other regalia to be stolen. The aged Vytautas was riding incredible distances through winter weather to prevent the coronation from being cancelled when his horse sli
pped and he was fatally injured.
30 Timur did not follow up his victory. Instead, he turned on the Ottoman Turks, beginning a two-year campaign that culminated in smashing their army at Angora in 1402. This left him master of Central Asia, the Golden Horde, Persia, and parts of India and Asia Minor.
31 The French supported the Avignon pope, the English and many Germans the Roman pope, and the Council of Pisa provided a third candidate for universal recognition. The situation in Germany became somewhat clearer after the death of Ruprecht of the Rhine. Germans, despairing of King Wenceslas ever amounting to anything, began to discuss whether his brother, Sigismund of Hungary, would be an effective Holy Roman emperor. Sigismund linked his candidacy with efforts to resolve the problems of the Church.
32 Historians remember Wenceslas mainly for his drunkenness. Britons and Americans remember him for the Christmas carol dating from the marriage of his daughter to King Richard II, ‘Good King Wenceslas’. Czechs remember him for throwing the archbishop of Prague from Charles Bridge to drown.
33 French and Hungarian crusaders were massacred by the Turks because they had lacked battlefield discipline. It was an experience that made Sigismund of Hungary extremely cautious for the rest of his long career.
34 On behalf of the Prussian merchants and the Hanseatic League, the Teutonic Knights had destroyed a major pirate base at Visby, then held the island for several years against Danish efforts to retake it.
35 A fraternal/chivalrous order of knights in Culm. ‘Lizard’ meant dragon.
36 The Hussites can be considered early Protestants, since they emphasised communion in both kinds (bread and wine for the congregation) and hymns and sermons in the local language. But they were also Czech nationalists who resented the German domination of Bohemia. The Teutonic Knights supplied many knights to Sigismund’s efforts to crush them, but they were almost always beaten badly.
37 The churchmen, unhappy at papal reluctance to turn the Church into a more representative body, refused to dissolve the council when ordered to go home. Instead, they declared the pope deposed and elected an anti-pope. It took years to restore unity.