Vokiečių ordino karinė komunikacija Žemaitijos pajūriu 1519–1521 metais | The Movement of the Army of the Teutonic Order along the Žemaitijan Coastal Strip, 1519–1521

The „eternal peace” between Poland, Lithuania and the Teutonic Order, ratified on 10 May 1411, turned out to be an extremely impermanent agreement. The first symptoms of a crisis appeared already in September of the same year, when at a session held in Kujawy, a mixed court of arbitration decided that the Polish-Lithuanian side strives toward a revision of the Torun agreements. The Order reacted instantly by implementing a military draft action and striking up a cooperation with the King of Rome as well as the Hungarian King Sigismund of Luxemburg who from the very beginning contested the Torun truce. The author of the article analyzes minutely the diplomatic efforts of all sides of the conflict as well as the propaganda campaign of the Order and the simultaneous preparations to a new war which had led to the removal of Henry von Plauen from the post of the Grand Master. The Order’s return to the negotiation table, did not put an end to the threat of an armed conflict, as Poland had presented a maximum program of territorial claims, sygnalizing clearly that it is not interested in negotiations. Ultimately in July 1414, Ladislaus Jagiello and Alexander Witold had sent warning letters to Malbork, thereby initiating the so called hunger war. The events of 1411–1414 had shown that the Teutonic Order was at that becoming to an increasing extent the subject, and not the object of international policy.

Reviewed by: The Slippery Memory of Men’: The Place of Pomerania in the Medieval Kingdom of Poland by Paul Milliman Darius von Güttner-Sporzyński Milliman, Paul, ‘The Slippery Memory of Men’: The Place of Pomerania in the Medieval Kingdom of Poland (East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450–1450, 21), Leiden, Brill, 2013; hardback; pp. xv, 319; R.R.P. €123.00, US$171.00; ISBN 9789004182745. Paul Milliman’s choice of subject is a testimony to the increased interest in the medieval history of Central Europe and specifically in the history of Pomerania. The region, whose Latin-derived name refers to a location ‘along a sea’, encompasses almost the whole southern shore of the Baltic Sea, from Recknitz River near Stralsund in the west to the delta of Vistula River near Gdańsk in the east, and Chełmno Land in the south. Milliman’s focus is on the very eastern part of this territory often referred to as Pomerelia (Polish: Pomorze Gdańskie) or Eastern Pomerania and generally to Anglophone audiences as the Polish Corridor. My preferred term, for the sake of precision and simplicity, is Pomerelia. The book is the outcome of Milliman’s doctoral research into the history of a disputed territory, the formation of new identities, the establishment of new traditions supplanting old ones, and collective memory; issues studied by others in different geographical contexts. The choice of timeframe for this work coincides with the final stages of the Christianisation of Prussia by the Teutonic Order and the establishment of the Order’s headquarters in Marienburg (Polish: Malbork) in the wake of the Order’s takeover of Pomerelia in 1308. Milliman uses a variety of sources to provide the context for his examination of issues of memory and identity formation in the region, one which in name at least, ceased to be a frontier community with the formalisation of the conquest of Prussia. In the first three chapters of his book, Milliman charts the history of Pomerelia as a frontier, its place in the internal [End Page 194] politics of Poland and the role of the Teutonic Order in the Christianisation of the region and their subsequent takeover of the subjugated territories. He provides the political context of the origins of the dispute between Poland and the Teutonic Order and the competing claims by the Polish Crown and the Teutonic Order to the new territories of Pomerelia, a dispute that the Poles took to the Vatican for resolution. Two separate trials were held in Pomerelia, one in 1320 and 1339, and both were held before papal legates. Chapter 1 narrates Pomerelia’s emergence as a political entity separate from that of Western Pomerania and Prussia, and for a time independent of Poland. It is an interesting if complicated example of how local communities organise themselves when subjected to an overarching but distant supreme authority. Chapter 2 describes the complicated nature of Pomerelia’s succession and the Treaty of Kępno (1282) which allowed succession of the territory by the Polish King Przemysł II and his successor Władysław I Łokietek (the Short) and the emergence of the Teutonic Order as a key player in the region. Chapter 3 deals with the development of the conflict between the Polish Crown and the Order, when Poland demanded the restitution of Pomerelia and the leadership of the Order maintained its right to Pomerelia’s overlordship. Chapters 4 and 5 provide an examination of the key sources, the trial testimonies of 1320 and 1339. Milliman argues that their analysis demonstrates that the perceptions of those called to bear witness before the papal legates changed over the period of twenty years that had elapsed between the trials. While dealing with the evidence, Milliman integrates analysis of aspects of memory and identity into his discussion. He focuses on collective memory and memory formation as the enabler of the construction of identity; identity which defined and in turn was defined by one’s allegiance to one or other of the sovereign powers contesting the territory. The formation of collective memory expressing Pomerelia’s geopolitical place is examined on the basis of recollection, oblivion, interpretation, and distortion...

On November 28, 1561, with the so-called Pacta subjectionis, the Teutonic Order in Livonia (today's Estonia and Latvia) was submitted to King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland, and its master, Gotthard Kettler, became the first duke of Courland.After more than three centuries of its history in Livonia, spent fighting against Lithuanians and Orthodox Russians, the Teutonic Order had to face new circumstances, created at first by the Protestant Reformation and then by the war against Ivan IV of Moscow.This book is the result of some 20 years of research on the Teutonic Order in sixteenth-century Livonia that the author has conducted since the completion of his Ph.D. dissertation, published in 2002, on the relations between the city of Tallinn and the Order, namely, The Town and Its Lord: Reval and the Teutonic Order (In the Fifteenth Century).The present book is written in Estonian, a detail that could pose some obstacles to readers, but a German and perhaps also an English edition are envisaged.Ordu sgis does not just deal with the Order itself, as well as its structures and its military and political history, but also with Livonian society during the transition from the Middle Ages to the modern era.Its chronology ranges from the rule of Master Wolter von Plettenberg and his successful war against the Grand Principality of Moscow in 1501-1503 to the aftermath of the Order's secularisation in 1561.The book's first chapter considers the Teutonic Order as a corporation, focusing on the prosopography, careers, mentality, spirituality, and self-awareness of the brethren.The second chapter addresses the non-professed persons in its service, and it contains an interesting excursus on the role of women and a description of everyday life in a castle of the Order.The third chapter features an in-depth study of the Order's economy, incomes, and resources.The fourth chapter turns to the Reformation in Livonia as well as in the Teutonic Order and its local possessions.The fifth chapter describes the final years of the Order in Livonia, then the war against Moscow that begun in 1558, and finally the Order's dissolution.

The article investigates the issue of the development of a network of water mills in Świecie and Nowe Lands, the borders of which were approximately similar to the Świecie and Nowe castellanies existing in the 13th c. After the territory of Gdansk Pomerania was taken over by the Teutonic Order in 1308–1309, the newly established Teutonic administration units existed here: the Świecie Commandry and the Nowe District of the Tczew Aldermanship, which after the year 1466 were transformed into the Świecie and Nowe Starosty Districts. Due to the investment costs and the legal restrictions, water mills were built the fastest as part of large landed properties organised by local dukes and church institutions (Wloclawek bishops, the Cistercians of Oliwa and Pelplin and the Norbertines of Żukowo). After the year 1309, the Teutonic Order, building its administration here, aimed at introducing the legal solutions which it had developed and applied in the territory of Prussia proper. They consisted in almost full legal control in this respect. Th e right to build mills was classified as regalia, i.e. exclusive authorisations which it granted to other entities, usually by conferring in exchange for rent. During the Middle Ages, in Świecie and Nowe Lands, a relatively dense network of water mills, both in church villages and state villages (then Teutonic, and later royal) was built. They were also present in the knights’ estates, but they appeared there on a larger scale only at the end of the 15th and 16th c. Th e factor which influenced the formation of the water mill network, except the obvious relation to the development of agriculture, was the law – the mill regalia executed by the Teutonic Order. A significant change in that respect occurred after the year 1466, when the formerly existing restrictions on erecting mills in private estates disappeared.

W artykule przedstawiono problematyke i stan badan archeologicznych 18 malych ośrodkow miejskich funkcjonujących na Pomorzu Gdanskim w poźnym średniowieczu. Zaprezentowano wyniki prowadzonych tam badan archeologicznych oraz scharakteryzowano wybrane problemy, takie jak: ksztaltowanie sie i zagospodarowanie przestrzeni prywatnej oraz publicznej, produkcja rzemieślnicza oraz umocnienia miejskie.

More than a hundred years of fighting between the Teutonic Order and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania have left us with a considerable amount of narrative sources that allow researchers today to imagine the language of the Christians who fought against the pagans, and to understand their beliefs and propaganda measures. One little-studied question in this regard is how the Christian narrative tradition of the 14th century portrayed miracles and divine intervention during the struggle between the Teutonic Order and Lithuania. To address this question, the author of the article focuses on the chronicles of the Teutonic Order, which represented the idea of the Crusade to the Lithuanian lands, and therefore showed a strong need to emphasise the religious aspect of the whole military conflict. At the same time, however, she also draws on other surviving documents for comparison, including Lithuanian and Ruthenian narrative sources. The author argues that the accounts of miracles and divine intervention in sources from the Teutonic Order were influenced by the nature of the Order as a religious military corporation and the chroniclers’ need to explain the campaigns to Lithuania as a holy war. It was this need that led them to place a great emphasis on the depiction of divine intervention in the campaigns of the crusaders to help them.

Simple SummaryThe Vistula River in Central Europe is widely recognized for its high nature value and attracts attention of numerous researchers as an example of a dynamic river flowing in an extensively managed floodplain. In this study of diversity of small mammals along the Vistula valley, we analyzed the diet of tawny owl Strix aluco, a common predator considered an efficient collector of rodents and shrews. Altogether 19 species, including 12 rodents, 5 soricomorphs (shrews and relatives), 1 carnivore, and 1 bat species were recorded. High species richness of small mammals can be attributed to a mosaic of agricultural land and the remnants of riparian forest and meadows in the Vistula floodplain. Out of the four most numerous species, two (bank vole Clethrionomys glareolus and yellow-necked mouse Apodemus flavicollis) are typical forest inhabitants, and two (striped field mouse A. agrarius and common vole Microtus arvalis) are associated with urban and agricultural land. This study of small mammals indicates the important role of natural large river valleys in the maintenance of local biodiversity.The Vistula River is one of the largest European semi-natural rivers of high ecological value that functions as an ecological corridor. To assess the structure of small mammal communities along the Vistula River, an analysis of the diet of an opportunistic predator, the tawny owl Strix aluco, was used. A total of 6355 individuals of 19 species were found, including 5 soricomorph species, 12 rodents, 1 carnivore, and 1 bat species. Tawny owls most frequently caught Apodemus agrarius, Clethrionomys glareolus, Apodemus flavicollis, and Microtus arvalis. Rodents dominated small mammal communities (90%), followed by soricomorphs (8%), and the share of Chiroptera was significant (2%). Using Ward’s method in cluster analysis, three clusters of sites with similar mammal communities were identified. The cluster that included 17 study sites with the dominance of agriculture habitats was inhabited by diverse mammal communities with a high number of species. In the cluster composed of three suburban forest sites, mammal communities had the lowest diversity, although the high species richness and the highest shares of the forest species (A. flavicollis, C. glareolus, and Nyctalus noctula). Mammal communities in the cluster were composed of three urban sites were dominated by A. agrarius and M. arvalis. The study indicates the high species richness of small mammals in floodplains of the Vistula River and the adjacent areas in central Poland. The floodplain offers suitable habitats for species associated with forests, water bodies, agricultural land, and developed areas. The data collected confirms earlier model predictions about the presence of well-connected local populations of forest mammals along the Vistula River.

The chronology of construction and floor plan of the Teutonic Order’s castle in Barten (Barciany) in the light of medieval written sources The first wood-and-earth stronghold in Barten (Barciany) (its exact location is unknown) was constructed in 1325. In the late 1340s the stronghold was the seat of vogt, and in the early 1350s – a Teutonic Order’s procurator (pfleger) subject to the authority of the Brandenburg commanders. The construction of a brick castle in Barten was initiated in 1377. From the very beginning it was planned to be a regular four-sided stronghold with at least three wings of representative, residential and economic role. The intensive work on its construction was carried out during 1383 and 1384. The east wing – the main one – was finished by 1387, while the construction of the north wing was still in progress and lasted probably until 1395, undoubtedly as a result of the promotion of Barten to the rank of the commander’s convent (in 1394-1395). Despite this, the north wing never reached the planned height, and the construction of the other two was not even begun in the Middle Ages. Perhaps also in the mid-1390s the building of outer bailey was launched on the east side of the castle (nothing is known about its appearance). From1396 the Barten castle once again became the seat of a Teutonic Order’s procurators, who, depending on the administrative reforms carried out at that time in this part of the Teutonic Order’s State, were subordinate to either Rhein or Brandenburg commanders. The round tower, the only one that exists today, was probably erected only after 1410.

The elaboration presents the issue of relations of the Cistercians from Żarnowiec with their vicinity, i.e. possessors of surrounding lands, as well as a role played in these matters by the Teutonic Order. In the Middle Ages, the estates of the Cistercians’ monastery in Żarnowiec constituted a dense complex of domains located in the northern part of Gdańsk Pomerania. The complex reached the coasts of the Baltic See. The relations of the monastery with surrounding knighthood concerned mainly issues of purchase, records and demarking of domains. In this context, neighbourly conflicts arose oft between the two parties. In the case of the Teutonic Order, its representatives – the commander in Gdańsk, the fish master (German: Fischmeister) in Puck, or finally the Grand Master – acted both as referees and parties in border conflicts with the monastery. Officials of the Teutonic Order confirmed purchase transactions made by nuns with surrounding knight hood, and the Grand Master himself decided about handing over a parish in Puck to the Cistercians, which became a reason of their conflicts with local parsons. In the case of quarrels with the Teutonic Order, the sisters searched usually for help at representatives of the Gdańsk authorities. The sisters’ relations with the abbot in Oliwa constituted another problem. In the first half of the fifteenth century, the prioress acted somewhat independently, which was manifested in her direct contacts with the Grand Master. However, it is not known if this situation mean the deliberate endeavours of the prioress and convent in Żarnowiec to become independent from the power of the abbey in Oliwa as far as the property questions are concerned, or it was the initiative and action of the Teutonic Order, which could strive for loosening the real connections of the monastery with the abbey in Oliwa, for example through handing over a parish in Puck to the sisters.

Windmills in the Żuławy Region during the First Half of the Fifteenth Century(Summary)Studies on the living conditions of the rural population and the organisation of agriculture in the Middle Ages have a long tradition. Some of the issues examined include mills in the State of the Teutonic Order. Other publications consider the specific nature of the Żuławy region under the Teutonic Order and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. This article focuses on reconstructing the significance of windmills for the mill economy in this area. The mills within the Teutonic State were supervised by a number of administrative units. The northern part of Gdańsk Żuławy (known in the Middle Ages as Stüblau (in Pol. Steblewskie or Żuławy Małe) was administered by the forestry office of the Danzig (Gdańsk) commandry, the strip of land between the Vistula and the River Mottlau (Motława) was governed by a Vogt whose seat was in Herrengrebin (Grabiny Zameczek) itself under the commandry of Marienburg (Malbork), while the southern part was supervised by the Vogt of Dirschau (Tczew). Gross Werder (Great Żuławy) was administered by the commandry of Marienburg, and Fischauer Werder (Fiszewskie Żuławy) – by the Komtur (commander) of Elbing (Elbląg) and Christburg (Dzierzgoń). The different principles of administering these regions resulted predominantly from the local water conditions and the need for the farmland’s constant drainage. One of the elements of the region’s specificity was the organisation of flourmilling, which owing to geographical conditions could not be based on a network of water mills, as was the case elsewhere. Water mills were therefore replaced by windmills, which became a prominent element of Żuławy’s milling industry in the Middle Ages, perhaps even in the first half of the fourteenth century, and continued to play this role in successive centuries. The data quoted clearly show that windmills were the foundation of the milling industry in the Scharpau (now: Szkarpawa) region and played a significant role in Stüblau, where the Order owned one water mill in Herrengrebin. It would seem that they were also of fundamental significance in the Vogtei of Leske (Laski) and the area under the Pfl eger of Lassowitz (Lasowice) and Montau (Mątowy). In the territory under the Vogt of Stuhm (Sztum) the mills fulfilled auxiliary functions. The mills in question subsequently functioned not only as flour mills, associated with farm production, but also helped drain farmland threatened by flooding. They continued to fulfil this role until the early 1900s, and their subsequent destruction and ensuing absence in the landscape were accelerated by the destruction of mounds by the fleeing Germans at the end of the war, as well as the profound transformations which affected all domains of social life in this area following World War II. Owing to the specific local conditions, mills were usually erected on the same sites as they had been in the Middle Ages; only the method of their construction changed (early modern novelties included the Dutch mills). In subsequent years, mills for land drainage were used on a larger scale alongside grist mills. Unfortunately, only two such mills have survived: a post mill in Schönbaum (Drewnica) and a Dutch mill in Palschau (Palczewo), which are testimony of the great diversity of the local material culture and organisation of the rural economy in past centuries.

The article considers the problem of the development of shields, the main element of medieval protective equipment, and an important military and heraldic symbol in Ukrainian medieval state of Rus’ and in Europe in general. The state of the research and the source base are outlined. The main trends in the development of the design and symbolic significance of shields in Europe during the Middle Ages are outlined. At the same time, emphasis was placed on sources concerning Rus’ lands and adjacent territories. The author draws attention to the need to compare archaeological, written and iconographic sources in one study. The study focuses on the most representative sources, especially those that can be to apply on material from the Rus’ lands. It is emphasized that the shield as a basic element of protective equipment during the Middle Ages, іn Rus’ lands largely developed in line with European trends. Which in turn makes it impossible to isolate local features about to beginning of the ХІІІ century. At the turn of the XII–XIII centuries in some regions of Eastern Europe, namely the Rus’-Baltic-Polish border, a relatively new type of shield is being formed, the so-called “protopaveza”. This in turn had a direct impact on the armaments of Rus’ and the Teutonic Order in the ХІІІ–ХІV centuries. The author analyzes the main interactions and borrowings of types of shields between different regions of Eastern Europe during the Middle Ages. It is noted that in the Ukrainian medieval state of Rus’, which was at the intersection of Eastern and Western military traditions, shields of both European types and the eastern “kalkan” could be used. However, given the available sources, it is safe to say that the European trend of development of this protective equipment had an advantage. The author came to the conclusion that the shields used in Rus’ and Europe in the X–XII centuries generally belonged to the same types. In particular, it is round, almond-shaped and triangular shields. The issue of shields of the XIII–XV centuries remains more complicated. During this period can be observed as the influence of Western Europe on Rus’, for example, the spread of the knight's “tarch”. And trends that began in Eastern Europe, namely the spread of pavises in the XIV–XV centuries.

The political and economic situation in the southeast Baltic region changed dramatically when two main powers, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Teutonic Order, emerged in the 13th century. These political structures tried to involve local communities in the social organisation of their newly established states. Archaeological material (pottery) is analysed in this article. It could help us understand the processes happening in what is now western Lithuania during the Medieval period. Local and Western pottery is assessed as evidence of contacts between the Crusaders and the local people. These contacts are interpreted as part of the cultural interaction process between the two different communities. Key words: Medieval archaeology, cultural interaction, Teutonic Order, pottery, western Lithuania. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/ 10.15181/ab.v25i0.1836

The Lithuanian Trinitarian formula includes within it the word God. It is supposed that Lithuanians received this parenthesis from the Teutonic Order as early as the Baptism of King Mindaugas. The author of this present study has focused his attention on German liturgical texts used in the Baltic region in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Analysis of these documents indicates that the parenthesis God was included in the Trinitarian formula in almost every German liturgical book, and this suggests that such a formula may well have been used among the Baltic Germans before the Reformation. The author supports the thesis of those scholars who suggest that Lithuanians in the Grand Duchy as well inherited the use of the word God in their formula from the Teutonic Order.

The article highlights the processes of formation of a complex of monuments of international law – the most ancient of the treaties of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Russia and Zhemaitia, which were concluded during the period when the lands of modern Ukraine became part of the GDL, which gradually began to play an important role since then in contemporary European international relations. It is noted that during the Middle Ages, the law of international treaties developed significantly. Gradually, the agreements began to be applied more and more often and over time began to occupy one of the important places in the system of international law of that time, in particular, in the practice of international relations of the Ukrainian People’s Republic of Ukraine with other states and quasi-state entities. A certain part of them was recorded in writing, thanks to which modern researchers now have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the content of these monuments of law. The article provides a source-based analysis of the Lithuanian-Russian-Polish treaty of 1352, two treaties of 1366 – between the Grand Duke of Lithuania Olgerd, his brothers Keistut, Yavnut and Lubart and their sons, on the one hand, and the Polish king Casimir III the Great together with his vassals - on the other hand, and the special agreement with Lubart, which supplemented the first one. Attention is also drawn to the Lithuanian-Russian-Moscow treaty of 1368 – a peace agreement that ended the first stage of the Lithuanian-Russian-Moscow war of 1368–1372. July 1372. The Treaty of Ljubutsk is a peace treaty that ended the Lithuanian-Russian-Moscow War of 1368–1372. The prerequisites, content and significance of the treaty on the conclusion of the Union of Krebs in 1385 are highlighted. The content of the treaty of Smolensk prince Yuri Svyatoslavovych on the alliance with the Polish, Lithuanian, Russian, etc. king Vladyslav (Jogaila, Yagello) and Grand Duke (viceroy) for Lithuania Skirgaila (September 16, 1386) was analysed, which established alliance relations between the parties and guaranteed the provision of comprehensive assistance to the king. It is emphasized that an important place among the international treaties of the Great Patriotic War of this period is occupied by the Treaty of Ostriv of August 4, 1392 – the treaty that put an end to two wars - the Lithuanian-Russian civil war of 1389–1392 and the war for the Galician-Volhynian inheritance. The Salynas (Sallinwerder) Treaty between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Teutonic Order of October 12, 1398 was also considered. The conclusion that the range of texts of the GDL treaties of the specified period, which have survived to our time in the originals or chronicle lists, is quite limited. Contracts could be not only bilateral, but also multilateral. They had a personal character; the heads of all the most influential states and quasi-state entities of the region (Poland, the Teutonic Order, Muscovy) acted as counterparties to the Lithuanian princes when concluding treaties. All the considered agreements, to a greater or lesser extent, influenced the further state-legal development of the Ukrainian lands that were part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Rus and Samogitia. Some of them led to changes in the form of the state, others became the basis for changes in the legal regulation of civil relations, led to the emergence of new norms of military law and, of course, all these sources significantly contributed to the development of legal regulation of international relations in the region.

Ondrej Richard Halaga, a Slovak historian, conducted extensive research on the economic relations between Eastern Slovak cities and the Hanseatic League during the latter half of the 20th century. His research provides a thorough analysis of the integration of the Carpathian region into international trade and the history of its trade relations with Poland and the Teutonic Order. Halaga's works, despite their unique subject matter, are rarely mentioned in Hanseatic studies outside Slovakia, including in Russia. His works were largely unknown to Soviet historians and are rarely used by current Russian medievalists because Halaga was banned from publishing due to his political views. Additionally, due to his criticism of the Communist regime and following his emigration to Western Europe, other researchers could not cite his works, which prevented their use in Soviet-Russian historiography. This article employs biographical and historical-genetical methods to explore Halaga's significant contribution to the relations between East-Central Europe and the Hanseatic League. The focus is on the rich trade history of Košice, located in Eastern Slovakia. During the Middle Ages, Košice exchanged goods with Novgorod, Halych-Volhynia, and the Grand Duchy of Moscow. Halaga's work has re-evaluated the history of Košice and its regions, leading to a change in perspective. Through his research, the Slovak historian has demonstrated that Košice played a major role in Hanseatic and European trade, and should not be considered as part of an underdeveloped territory. It is anticipated that Ondrej Halaga's works will be incorporated into current Russian historiography.