Klaipėdos universitetas

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.

In the late 14th and early 15th centuries, the region of Žemaitija (Samogitia) was still contested between the Teutonic Knights and the Grand Dukes of Lithuania. Its conquest and conversion were the final objective of the Teutonic Order’s campaigns in the southern Baltic region. The article assesses the language and ideology of crusading and holy war concerning the conquest of Žemaitija, as reflected in selected correspondence from the period by the Teutonic Order. It begins with a historical overview of the problem, along with a brief outline of the donations of Žemaitija to the Teutonic Knights at the end of the 14th and the beginning of the 15th century. Following this, the paper outlines the use of specific themes from the crusading movement in the 14th century in Prussia, before examining the presence (or lack thereof) of these elements concerning Žemaitija. Other specific themes are identified and discussed concerning the ideological expression of the Teutonic Order’s mission and image in its external correspondence, one being the depiction of Žemaitija as the end of Christendom (daz ende der cristenheit). This article suggests that this was an attempt to fit the conquests into a broader framework: Žemaitija was depicted as the successor to the Order’s earlier wars against the Prussians. Finally, the article discusses the presence of this imagery in the visual culture of the Ordensland, particularly in Königsberg Cathedral and its surrounding pilgrimage churches.