The Image of the Baltic

The Image of the Baltic

a Festschrift for Nils Blomkvist

Professor Nils Blomkvist on the rostrum.

Photo: Anita Körner von Kern

Gotland University Press 10

Editors: Michael F. Scholz

Robert Bohn Carina Johansson

Publisher: Gotland University Press 2012

Address: Gotland University

S-62156 Visby

Web: www.hgo.se Phone: +46(0)498-29 99 00 ISSN: 1653-7424 ISBN: 978-91-86343-06-4 Editorial Committee: Åke Sandström and Lena Wikström

Cover design: Daniel Olsson and Lena Wikström.

Cover picture: ”Tvekamp af Elbogen”, in Visby,

during Medieval Week 2011, Carina Johansson

The Image of the Baltic

Preface ... 7

The Colours of the Middle ages

The Baltic on the mental map of the Old Russian annalist ...11

Livonia and the Holy See in 13

_{– Early 15}

_{Centuries: Centre and}

Periphery of Christendom ...23

Architetonische und künstlerische Verbindungen zwischen Visby

und Riga im 13 Jahrhundert ...41

Between Wolin and Truso: the Southern part of the Baltic Rim at

the time of Rise of the Polish State (an archaeological perspective) ...53

Models of Settlements Formation in Polatsk Region ...71

Images of History

Störtebeker. Die Karriere eines Geschichtsbildes ...85

Auf den Spuren der Ritter und Zaren: Reval im Blick russischer

Touristen unter Nikolaj I ...101

Der Beginn der Neuzeit in der Geschichte Lettlands: zu Problemen des

Dialogs mit der Vergangenheit in der lettischen Historiographie ... 111

Valda Kļava

The Face of the Enemy? The Image of the GDR in the Danish Media ...125

The Medieval in the Modern: The Cathedral and the Skyscraper in

Fritz Lang’s Metropolis ...145

Von Schweden über die Ostsee in das Heilige Römische Reich Deutscher

Nation. „Der Löwe aus Mitternacht” als Retter des evangelischen

Glaubens in Deutschland ...165

Gotland – the Pearl of the Baltic

Peter of Dacia and the Urban Revolution ...185

The Conception of an Egalitarian Gotlandic Peasant Society ...203

Frustration and Revenge? Gotland strikes back – during the long

15

_{Century, 1390’s–1525 ...229}

Multiple visions from a Baltic shoreline – Richard Berghs quest for

a school of Swedish painting in Vision, scene from Visby ...247

Das deutsche Konsulat in Visby im zweiten Weltkrieg. Ein Archivbericht ...255

Nils Blomkvist’s scholarly production ...271

Authors ...279

Over 16–18October 2008, a conference was arranged within the permanent Baltic Rim seminar series at Gotland University under the title, The Image of the Baltic – a Thousand-Years’ Perspective. The invitation to the event had made it clear that this was a special occasion, even a “celebration conference”. The motive for this was also stated – the time-honored leader of the Baltic Rim seminar,Professor Nils Blomkvist,had his 65th _{birthday during the summer}

holidays, and some of his colleagues had taken over the arrangements in order

to highlight this chronological landmark. Consequently, many of his old scholarly friends from the Baltic Rim fields of study – and some new ones – had gathered to discuss the role of images in the historical disciplines. The participants came from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Poland, Denmark and Germany, not to mention many Gotlanders.

Nils Blomkvist received his PhD at the University of Uppsala in 1979. His dissertation dealt with the genesis of the Swedish city of Kalmar in the 12th_–14th

centuries. The book aroused interest among students of the Hanse, and since 1980 Nils has been a member of the Hansische Geschichtsverein . His early production deals mainly with medieval urbanism and trade. Working as an archivist for ten years and almost as long as head of research at the National Board of Antiquities in Stockholm, he returned fully to Academia in the late 1990s with the intention of fulfilling a gradually maturing research idea that all of a sudden had become possible to carry out, namely the comparative study of the medieval process of Europeanization east and west of the Baltic.

With generous support from the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation he was able to form the multinational and interdisciplinary research project, “Culture Clash or Compromise?” (CCC), subtitled The Importance of Regional Survival Strategies in the Europeanization of the Baltic Rim. The project involved some twenty scholars – archaeologists, historians and human geographers – representing seven countries on the Baltic Rim. The CCC project was in working existence from 1996 to 2005 when it formally ended, although its final publication appeared as late as in 2009. Its rich results are presented in 11 volumes of compiled CCC papers. The project’s introduction and conclusion were however published as number 11 and 12 of the series Acta Visbyensia.

Apart from its scholarly residue the CCC project has been important in building up modern links between researchers east and west of the Baltic, and Nils has over the years become an international authority on medieval matters concerning the Baltic and its Rim. He has contributed to many specialist conferences,and in 2007 he was invited to the Oxford Round Table, for which occasion he wrote a paper on the longue durée development of the Baltic Rim until the 21st _{century. It}

was accepted for publication in Forum on Public Policy under the title, The Baltic from European Sea of Trouble to Global Interface.

As is seen in Nils’ list of scholarly productions, brought together by his wife Carin, he has published more than one hundred works on medieval topics, often focusing on processes of change in Scandinavia and the Baltic region as a whole. His major work is “The Discovery of the Baltic: The Reception of a Catholic World-System in the European North (1075–1225)”, published in 2005

by Brill’s of Leiden & Boston (782 pp), wherein many classical scholarly problems are revisited. And, a new approach to the period’s narrative sources brings to life Scandinavian, German, Russian, Finno–Ugrian and Balt attitudes and daily toils in the midst of a change of epic dimensions.

Besides his work as a researcher, Nils Blomkvist has also been a highly appreciated and valued teacher at Gotland University since its establishment in 1998. A good bit of his lecturing time has of course been devoted to various aspects of the Middle Ages, having developed courses such as “The long Middle Ages”, “The Golden Age of Gotland” and “The Birth of Europe”. As with all

teachers working in smaller universities,Nils has however also taught in fields outside of his speciality and has developed a particular interest in interdisciplinary courses. His teaching has covered most historical periods, and he has supervised the writing of many theses at all student levels while carrying out his share of the university’s administrative burdens.

Now a selection of the papers that were presented at that occasion have been converted into a Festschrift , including Nils Blomkvist’s own Högtidsföreläsning (“festive lecture”), Peter of Dacia and the Urban Revolution, which he gave at the closure of the conference. In 2010 Nils finally retired from his professorship in medieval history at Gotland University. This anthology, together with the conference that was its origin, is his colleagues’ way of honouring him at the moment when he leaves us to manage on our own.

Finally, we want to address a special thanks to the society DBW (De Badande Vännerna) and the Gotland University for their engagement and the financial support that made the conference and this book possible.

Erika Sandström, Carina Johansson, Michael F. Scholz, Gotland University Robert Bohn, Universität zu Flensburg

The Colours of the

Middle ages

The Baltic on the mental map

of the Old Russian annalist

Elena Melnikova

The Old Russian Primary Chronicle written in the 1110s opens with a survey of the habitable world (called by the Greeks the oikoumene).1 _{The text belongs to}

the type of the so-called Table of nations deriving from the Biblical enumeration of the descendents of Noa’s three sons in the Book of Genesis.2 _{Already in the early}

Christian writings the Biblical Table of nations was combined with the antique division of the habitable world in three parts. In this construction Asia became Shem’s lot, Africa – Ham’s lot, and Europe – Japheth’s lot.3 _{The early Christian writers enlarged}

a highly limited number of nations listed in the Bible by including peoples familiar to them and unknown to the compilers of the Genesis.4 _{The amplification of the Table}

of Nations became a wide-spread practice in medieval geography.5

The compiler of the Primary Chronicle was no exception. In the title of his chronicle he posed three questions: “Where has the Russian land originated from? Who was the first ruler in Kiev? How has the Russian land become [what it is]?”.6 _{In answering them he attributed extraordinary importance to the inclusion}

of peoples of Ancient Rus into the space of the Christian world and turned to this theme three times.

1 Dmitrij S. Likhachev with additions by Mikhail B. Sverlov under the general supervision by Vera P. Adrianova–Peretz (eds.), Povest’ vremennych let (S.-Peterburg, 1996), pp. 7–8 (further – PVL). English translation: Samuel H. Cross, Olgerd P. Sherbowitz–Wetzor (transl.), The Russian Primary Chronicle. Laurentian

text (Cambridge, Mass., 1953), p. 52 (further – PC).

2 Gen. IX,18–Х,32. Wagner Siegfried, Die Stammtafel des Menschengeschlechtes (Saarbrücken, 1947); Simons Jan, “The ‘Table of Nations’ (Gen. 10): Its General Structure and Meaning”, Ondtestamentische Studien 10 (1954), S. 155–184.

3 This attribution appeared as early as the fourth century in Quaestiones hebraicae

in Genesim of St. Jerome (340/342–429): Eusebii Hieronymi Liber Hebraicarum

Quaestionum in Genesim, in: Jacques- Paul Migne (ed.), Patrologiae cursus completus, Ser. Latina 23 (Paris, 1865), col. 988–1005.

4 The first additions were made already by Eusebius of Caesaria and St. Jerome. The most influential in medieval Western Europe was the Table of nations in Isidor’s of Seville

Etymologies L. IX.II: Wallace Martin Lindsay (ed.), Isidori Hispalensis Etymologiae, sive originum libri XX (Oxford, 1911), and in Byzantium it spread through the works of Hyppolitus

of Rome: Adolf Bauer (ed.), Hyppolytus. Werke 4. Die Chronik (Berlin, 1955), § 47–49. 5 Thus, the Old Icelandic treatise Fra þui huar huerr Noa sona bygði heiminn existing in two

versions adds to the list of the Jafethides the names of Scandinavian countries Suiþioð,

Danmorc, Noregi together with Suiþioð in micla and ‘Kylfinga lande þat kollum ver Garða riki’: Melnikova Elena A., Drevneskandinavskie geographicheskie sochinenija. Teksty, perevod, kommentarij (Moscow, 1986), p. 133–134.

6 Here and further I cite Cross’s and Scherbowitz–Wetzor’s translation of the Primary

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First, he places his Table of Nations in the very beginning of his compilation contrary to his Byzantine prototypes where this topic was dealt with in chronologically suitable place, i.e. after the mention of the Flood.7 _Second,

he describes the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks providing a more detailed description of Eastern Europe.8 _{Third, while telling about the voyage}

of apostle Andrew to Eastern Europe, he stresses Andrew’s itinerary similar to the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks.9 _{This persistent interest in}

geographical matters is tightly connected with annalist’s efforts to represent Eastern Slavs as an integral part of the Christian world. He does it in many different ways10 _{and supports the spiritual integration of Eastern Slavs into}

the family of Christian nations by their common origin from Japheth and their sharing the common space.

The Old Russian

_{Table of Nations}

The lists of Asian, African and South-European lands in the Table of Nations in the Primary Chronicle are borrowed from the Byzantine chronicles of George the Monk and John of Malala.11 _{They are supplemented with the description of}

Eastern and Northern Europe unknown to Byzantine authors. In these sections the Old Russian annalist based on his own knowledge and presented his own perception of this part of the world.

The text can be divided in three sections: A – description of the Byzantine world borrowed from George the Monk and John of Malala, B – the enumeration of Eastern European rivers, C – the description of Europe. It runs as follows:12

A. To the lot of Japheth fell the northern and the western sections, including Media, Albania, Armenia (both little and great),

Cappadocia, Paphlagonia, Galatia, Colchis, Bosporus, Maeotis, Dervis, Sarmatia, Tauria,13 _{Scythia, Thrace, Macedonia, Dalmatia,}

Molossia, Thessaly, Locris, Pellene (which is also called the Peloponnese), Arcadia, Epirus, Illyria, the Slavs,14 _{Lychnitis and}

Adriaca, from which the Adriatic Sea is named. He received also

7 PVL, pp. 7–8; PC, p. 52. 8 PVL, pp. 8–9; PC, p. 53. 9 PVL, p. 9; PC, pp. 53–54.

10 Thus, he tells that long before the Christianization apostle Andrew came to the Kievan hills to proclaim the glorious Christian future of the would-to-be city. Later the annalist states that the first Christian teacher of the Slavs, Methodius, is told to be the pupil of apostle Paul, thus Christianity of Slavic peoples was apostolic (in fact, Methodius lived in the ninth century; the Slavs who were baptized by St. Methodius were Moravians; Eastern Slavs came to Christianity only in the end of the tenth century).

11 Carolus de Boor (ed.), Georgii Monachi Chronicon. Ed. anni 1904 correctiorem curavit Peter Wirth (München, 1978), p. 55–56; Ioannes Thurn (ed.), Ioannis Malalae

Chronographia I.6 (Berolini, 2000); English translation: Elisabeth Jeffreys, Michael

Jeffreys, Roger Scott (transl.), The Chronicle of John Malala (Melbourne, 1986), p. 5. 12 The original text of the compiler of the Primary Chronicle is printed in italics.

13 “Bosporus, Maeotis, Dervis, Sarmatia, Tauria” are rendered in the translation as land names though in the original they are ethnic names “Bosporii, Meoti, Derevi, Sarmati, Tauriani” (PC, p. 7).

the islands of Britain, Sicily, Euboea, Rhodes, Chios, Lesbos, Cythera, Zacynthus, Cephallenia, Ithaca, and Corcyra, as well as a portion of the land of Asia called Ionia, and the river Tigris flowing between the Medes and Babylon

B. as far as the Pontus to the north the Danube, the Dniester, and the Caucasinian15 _{Mountains, which are called Hungarian, and}

thence even to the Dnieper and other rivers, the Desna, the Pripeť, the Dvina, the Volkhov, the Volga, which flows eastward into the portion of Shem.

C. 1. In the share of Japheth there dwell Rus’, Chud’, and all the nations: Merya, Muroma, Ves’, Mordva, Chud’ beyond the portages, Perm’, Pechera, Yam’, Ugra, Litva, Zimegola, Kors’, Let’gola, Ljub’. And the Lyakhs, and the Prussians, and Chud’ dwell on the [shores of the] Varangian Sea.

2. On [the shores of] that same sea there dwell the Varangians eastward as far as the portion of Shem. They likewise dwell on [the shores of] that same sea to the west as far as the land of the English and the French.

3. The following nations belong also to the race of Japheth: the Varangians, the Swedes,16 _{the Norwegians, the Gotlanders, the Rus’,}

the English, the Spaniards, the Italians, the Romans, the Germans, the French, the Venetians, the Genoese, and others. They dwell from the west to the south and adjoin the Hamitic tribe.17

The annalist’s originality in depiction of Europe shows up first of all in

presentation of regions unknown to his predecessors. But it also reveals itself in methods of constructing his own part of the Table of Nations different from that in his Byzantine sources.

First, Byzantine authors use traditional names for the thirds of the oikoumene: Asia, Africa (Lybia), Europe. The Old Russian annalist never mentions these and introduces his own designations: “East” (vostokъ), “West” (zapad), “Noon” or “Noon-lands” (poludenje, poludennye strany), “Midnight” or “Midnight-lands” (polunoshchje, polnoshchnye strany). All these terms belong to the common Slavic vocabulary and reflect the archaic solar system of orientation according to cardinal points.18

Second, the list derived from Byzantine chronicles consists of names of lands that partially existed only in antiquity (Babylon, Assyria, Colchis, Bosporus, Maeotis,

15 The name Caucasinian (the Caucasus) is a misspelling for Carpathian Mountains. 16 The Old Russian Svei corresponds to Old Icelandic Svíar, the population of Central

Sweden.

17 PVL, pp. 7–8; PC, p. 51–52.

18 The word vostokъ is connected with the idea of sunrise, zapadъ – with the sunset, the noon is the central point in the movement of the sun when it is in its zenith and the midnight marks its opposite point (Melnikova Elena A., “Prostransvennaja orientatsija v ‘Povesti vremennykh let’, Drevnejshije gosudarstva Vostochnoj Evropy. 2005 god.

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Scythia) and partially were contemporary (Dalmatia, Armenia). It is only very seldom that ethnic names, like Sarmatians or Taurians, occur. The Old Russian part of the Table consists on the contrary of river names and ethnic names. The two exceptions, Agnian’ska land (England) and Voloshska land (Holland?), mark the limits of habitation of peoples ascribed to the Varangians and do not belong to the list proper.

Third, Byzantine historians who relied on the late antique tradition used the ‘regional’ principle of enumeration, e.g., they started the description of Asia

in the far East (India) and moved westward listing lands in Middle East, Asia Minor, and Mesopotamia successively. The compiler of the Primary Chronicle follows this pattern in describing the Asian and African thirds as well as the southern part of Europe. The original list is based however on a quite different principle.

The description of Eastern Europe starts with an enumeration of rivers beginning with the Danube:

… the Danube, the Dniester, and the Caucasinian Mountains, which are called Hungarian, and thence even to the Dnieper and other rivers, the Desna, the Pripeť, the Dvina, the Volkhov, the Volga…

This list is notable in several aspects. The most remarkable about it is its very inclusion in the text as well as its position in the beginning of the description of a region. If ever mentioned in medieval geographical treatises, and in this case these are the four rivers flowing from the Paradise (the Geon – the Indus, the Physon – the Nile, the Tigris and the Euphrates), rivers are named at the end of the description of each third together with islands. The Old Russian annalist follows this structure while copying his Byzantine sources but he backs out of this rule when he comes to Eastern Europe.

The list of rivers prefaces the characteristic of Eastern Europe as if the compiler of the Primary Chronicle cast a glance from great height on the territory he is going to describe and provide a general survey of it (section B).

It is highly unusual for a medieval geographer to pay no attention to the territorial, tribal or political division of Eastern Europe. What he sees on his mental map is the rivers that constitute the basic system of communications uniting Eastern Europe into one whole and connecting it with Western Europe and the East. That is the Danube that together with the Black Sea (the Pontus) forms the border between the Byzantine world and the annalist’s own space; the Dniester that secured connections within South-Western Rus’ and linked it with the Black Sea; the Dnieper that together with its largest left and right tributaries, the Desna and the Pripjat’, formed the core road of the Old Russian state and united the Southern and Central Rus’; the Western Dvina and the Volkhov that connected the Dnieper basin with the Baltic and finally the Volga that provided access to the East. The system of river routes thus organizes and

structures the space of the annalist. It also determines the itinerary paradigm of description of those parts of Europe that missed in Byzantine sources.

Section C consists of three parts each with its own introduction: “In the share of Japheth there live…”, “On the shores of the same sea there dwell…”, and “the following nations belong also to the race of Japheth…”.

The first part includes 17 ethnic names belonging to Fennic and Baltic peoples that live in the northern part of Old Russian state and on the eastern and southern shores of the Baltic. All other peoples of Eastern Europe, first of all Slavic tribes, are not mentioned at all, though the annalist knows them very well and describes their customs and territories later. The second part defines the habitation of Varangians, and the third part enumerates peoples living on the

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northern shores of the Baltic and further to the west and south up to the Apennine peninsular in the Mediterranean.

The mental map of the Old Russian annalist thus is defined by the system of river-and-sea communications in Europe. This ‘itinerary’ pattern has no parallels in either Byzantine learned literature or West-European geography. The itinerary organization of the habitable world was inherent only, as far as medieval Europe is concerned, to the Old Scandinavian culture. In it the world is divided into quarters. Each of them concentrates along one of the routes corresponding to four cardinal points: Norðvegr, Vestrvegr, Suðrvegr, and Austrvegr.19

If the Norðvegr and Suðrvegr were real roads to the north along the coast of the Atlantic (< Norway) and to the south (to Central Europe and Apennine peninsular), the Vestrvegr and Austrvegr followed the directions of the cardinal points only in their beginnings. Starting in the western part of the Baltic the first one led to the west along the North Sea coast whereas the second one led to the east along the southern coast of the Baltic, but then they turned south. The Vestrvegr spread as far as Spain and the western part of the Mediterranean and that allowed the Western quarter to include England, France, and Spain. Therefore the movement along the Vestrvegr was viewed as the movement farther to the west though the real direction was southward: thus, on his voyage to Hierusalem, Sigurd Magnusson moved west to England, then ‘farther west to France’ and still

19 Jackson Tatjana, ‘On the Old Norse System of Spatial Orientation’, Saga-Book of the

Viking Society XXV. Pt. 1 (London, 1998), pp. 72–82.

farther west to Spain.20 _{The Austrvegr having reached Eastern Baltic spread up}

east and south to the middle Volga region in the ninth and tenth centuries and to Byzantium since the tenth century.

The Fennic peoples enumerated in C. 1 of the Old Russian Table of Nations occupied territories of the Northern part of Eastern Europe from the confluence of the Oka and the Volga in the east to the Finnish Gulf in the west (Map 2). They lived in the interfluve of the Oka and Volga (Mordva, Muroma), in the Jaroslavl’ region on the Volga (Merya), near the White lake (Ves’, Chud’ beyond-the-portages) and on the shores of the Finnish Gulf (Yam’, Chud’). According to archaeological materials, this was the zone of the Baltic–Volga transcontinental route that started to be operated by Scandinavians already in the eighth century and flourished until the last quarter of the tenth century when it gave way to the Dnieper route (‘the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks’).21 _Scandinavian

antiquities concentrate in the crucial points of the route: in the Volkov region (eighth and ninth centuries), the Jaroslavl’ region (late ninth and tenth centuries), the eastern part of the interfluve of the Oka and the Volga (tenth century). A little to the south, at the confluence of the Kama and the Volga, in Bulgar, most of Viking trade voyages ended.

The annalist proceeds with the list of Baltic peoples inhabiting the South-Eastern coast of the Baltic from modern Latvia (Ljub’ and Let’gola) to

Poland (Lyakhs). This was the route that originally got the name Austrvegr in Scandinavia.22 _{But later, as runic inscriptions testify, the name was extended}

to the prolongation of Baltic system of communications eastward – the

Baltic–Volga route. The location of peoples named in C.1, thus, delineates the Austrvegr of the ninth and tenth centuries.

The passage C.3 names the peoples of Western and South-Western Europe from England to Venice. These are, however, the peoples that inhabited only coastal territories. That might point to a foreign source of information of the Old Russian annalist, as Eastern Slavs never reached these territories, though by the end of the eleventh century Ancient Rus had many contacts with Germany, France, and England.23 _{Before the eleventh century the information about the nations living}

along the Vestrvegr and their location could hardly appear in Ancient Rus without competent mediators. The only intermediaries well acquainted both with west and east24 _{were Scandinavian Vikings who connected different parts of Europe}

since the ninth century. It is thus probable that the Old Russian annalist rendered

20 Sigurðar saga Jórsalafara, 4–5: Finnur Jónsson (ed.), Fagrskinna. Nóregs konunga tal (København, 1902–1903), p. 328–329 (= Samfund til udgivelse af gammel nordisk

litteratur. B. XXX); Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson (ed.), Snorri Sturluson. Heimskringla (Reykjavík, 1951), p. 5 (= Íslenzk Fornrit. B. XXVIII).

21 Dubov Igor’ V., Velikij Volzhskij put’ (Leningrad, 1989).

22 As applied to South-Eastern Baltic, it is attested already in skaldic verses of the tenth century (Jackson Tatjana N., “‘Vostochnyj put’ islandskikh korolevskikh sag”, Istorija

SSSR 1976/5 (1976), pp. 164–170).

23 It is enough to point to matrimonial connections of Jaroslav the Wise.

24 Cf.: “Ketilfastr raised this stone after Asgautr, his father. He was in the west and east” (runic inscription U 504 of the first half of the eleventh century from Ubby, Uppland, Sweden):

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the information that his predecessors had picked up from Varangians and their descendents, and he might contaminate it with contemporary information. In Old Scandinavian Weltbild the center from which the vegar start is the Baltic. They diverge in four directions from Western Baltic, the Danish islands and Jutland. In the Old Russian mental map the space has its focal point also in the Baltic, the Varangian Sea. The first part of the description of Europe (C. 1) ends in the South-West of the Baltic (the last nations mentioned are the Prussians and the Poles) whereas the third part (C. 3) starts with the collective designation of Scandinavian nations (the Varangians) and specific ethnonyms (Swedes, Norwegians, Gotlanders) and proceeds to Angles, etc. Thus, the Baltic is depicted as an intermediate region between the eastern and western routes. Its centrality is stressed by representing Varangians as a connecting link between both routes and by placing their description in the middle of the Old Russian Table of nations (C. 2).

On [the shores of] that same sea there dwell the Varangians eastward as far as the portion of Shem. They likewise dwell [on the shores of] this sea to the west as far as the lands of the English and the French.

At the time of the compilation of the Primary Chronicle this statement was absolutely anachronistic and contradicted to the situation of the late eleventh and twelfth centuries. Since the mid-eleventh century Varangians, mostly merchants, came and went after a rather short stay and only very few of them settled in Rus. There are no traces of a wide Scandinavian dispersal at that time. It is only in the ninth and tenth centuries that Scandinavian settlements spread from the Baltic to the Volga–Oka confluence, or to be more precise, Scandinavians constituted a substantial component part of the inhabitants at the settlements in that vast region. The territory in the east outlined by the compiler of the Primary Chronicle as inhibited by Varangians corresponds to the Baltic–Volga route operated by them long before the eleventh century. The same chronological boundaries are true for the depiction of the spread of Scandinavians to the west in the Primary Chronicle. England and France could be viewed as territories of their colonization only when speaking about the situation of the ninth and tenth centuries.

The Baltic is supposed by the Old Russian annalist to be located in the north, so the movement to the Baltic is described as northward (‘…the <Western> Dvina… flows northward and empties into the Varangian Sea’).25 _{In the narrative parts of}

the Primary Chronicle, the northern part of the world includes also territories of North-Eastern peoples, like the Jugra.26

Another specific feature of this perception of the two routes by the Old Russian annalist is that the Austrvegr and the Vestrvegr are viewed as two different

25 PVL, P. 9, PC, p. 53.

itineraries and they do not connect in the South. The same is characteristic of Scandinavian picture of the world. According to the Primary chronicle, the two roads lead to different thirds of the Earth: the eastern branch ends in the “lot of Shem” and the western one adjoins the Hamitic nations.

Thus, the mental map of the compiler of the Primary chronicle represented in the Table of nations is structured by the system of river communications in Eastern Europe and sea routes in Western Europe. The Baltic is regarded as the centre of this system, the starting point from which two branches take their beginnings, one to the east, and another to the west. This perception of Europe might go back to the early period of Scandinavian activities in Eastern Europe before the Dnieper route intercepted the importance of the Volga route.

The description of the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks

theenumeration of places of settlement of different East Slavic tribes with explanations of the origins of their tribal names. It is usually referred to as the description of the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks following the annalist’s words, but in fact it is a much wider characteristic of river system in Eastern Europe and its connections with the Vestrvegr.

1. ”When the Polyanians lived by themselves among the hills, a route existed from the Varangians to the Greeks, and from Greeks along the Dnieper, and up the Dnieper there is a portage to the Lovať, and along the Lovať, the great lake Il’men‘ is reached. The river Volkhov flows out of this lake and enters the great lake Nevo, and the mouth of this lake opens into the Varangian Sea. Over this sea one may go to Rome, and from Rome one may come over the same sea to Tsar‘grad, and from Tsar’grad one may come to the Pontus Sea, into which the river Dnieper flows.

2. The Dnieper rises in the Okovskij forest, and flows southward, and the Dvina rises in this same forest, but flows northward and empties into the Varangian Sea. The Volga flows from this same forest eastward and discharges through seventy mouths into the Khvalisskoje Sea.

3. By this route along the Volga it is possible to reach from Rus’ the Bulgars and the Khvalisy, and attain the region of Shem going eastward, and along the Dvina it is possible to reach the Varangians, and from the Varangians to Rome, and from Rome to the race of Ham. But the Dnieper flows through a mouth into the Pontus Sea which is called the Russian Sea, [on the shores] of which St. Andrew, Peter‘s brother taught, as it is told [further].”27

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This passage consists of three parts of which only the first one is directly devoted to the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks. In describing it, the annalist concentrates on its Eastern European section while its Western part is marked only by most prominent places, the Varangian Sea, Rome, Tsar’grad (Constantinople), and the Pontus (the Black Sea).

It directly precedes the story about apostle Andrew’s voyage and might have been inserted in the Chronicle to provide a fuller account of his itinerary than the narration proper allowed. At the same time this description does not concentrate on it and contains much more information than was needed for this purpose (e.g.,

the mention of the Volga route). It is likely that this passage either existed as a separate text before the compilation of the Primary Chronicle, and was inserted by its author to present a contemporary picture of the world, or else it was written

by the annalist in the process of creating the Primary Chronicle to stress the unity of the world.

The second passage contains just mentions of crucial points of apostle Andrew’s itinerary:

When Andrew was teaching in Sinope and came to Kherson(as has been recounted elsewhere), he observed that the mouth of the Dnieper was near by. Conceiving a desire to go to Rome, he thus journeyed to the mouth of the Dnieper. Thence he ascended the river, and by chance he halted beneath the hills upon the shore. Upon arising in the morning, he observed to the disciples who were with him, “See ye these hills? So shall the favor of God shine upon them that on this spot a great city shall arise, and God shall erect many churches therein.” He drew near the hills, and having blessed them, he set up a cross… and continued his journey up the Dnieper.

He then reached the Slovenians at the point where Novgorod is now situated… And he went to Varangians and came to Rome… Andrew, after his stay in Rome, came to Sinope.28

The annalist marks the same crucial points on the way of apostle Andrew as in the preceding description: the Varangians, Rome, the Black Sea.

The picture of the world in these two passages is strikingly different from that of the Table of nations.

First of all, in both texts the western and the eastern branches connect in the Black Sea. Apostle Andrew starts at Synop, a large town on the southern shore of the Black Sea, travels through Eastern Europe, crosses the Varangian Sea, doubles Western Europe and returns to Synop via the Mediterranean. The Road from the Varangians to the Greeks starts in Byzantium (“from Greeks this route proceeds along the Dnieper”), leads to the Varangian Sea, then around Europe and ends at Tsar’grad (Constantinople),

though the annalist adds that “from Tsar’grad one may come to the Pontus Sea, into which the river Dnieper flows”. Contrary to the Table of nations, it is a circumeuropean route.

The eastern section of the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks is

represented exclusively by the Dnieper route with its prolongation to the Baltic by the Volkhov – lake Ladoga – the Neva system that earlier formed the North-Western part of the Baltic–Volga route. The Dnieper route is described in details including mentions of portages.

The Volga route, on the contrary, is only briefly referred to and is not connected with the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks. It is described as a separate route to the East. “By this route along the Volga it is possible to reach from Rus’ the Bulgars and the Khvalisy, and attain the region of Shem going eastward”. The Baltic–Volga route here transforms into an inner Russian communication line: it leads to the Caspian Sea now not from the Baltic but ‘from Rus’. The role of the Varangian Sea is different in these texts too. Having been presented as the center structuring the habitable space in the Table of nations, it still keeps the role of the key road junction in the North that concentrates the river-routes system of Eastern Europe. But contrary to the Table of nations, it ceased to be the only intersection of communications. There appears a second and no less important one – that is the Black sea where the Eastern (via the Dnieper) and the Western (round Western Europe) routes join. Byzantium

became the second, and might be the first in importance, attraction centre of the

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Old Russian world. This picture reflects the situation that started to form in the tenth century but became dominant only in the beginning of the eleventh century.

Conclusions

The perception of the Baltic in the Old Russian Primary Chronicle derives from two traditions different in time.

The oldest tradition represented in the Table of nations dates back to the ninth and tenth centuries and reflects the system of communications of Eastern Europe at the time when the Baltic–Volga route was at its climax. In the picture of the habitable world that formed at that time the Baltic occupied central position because it concentrated the routes to the East and West and served as the key road junction. The Varangians who are portrayed living to the West and East of the Baltic are viewed as intermediaries between both parts of the world. This mental map has close parallels in Old Norse culture and might have been introduced by Scandinavian elite of Ancient Rus.

The description of the Road from the Varangians to the Greeks depicts quite a different system of communications that took shape a century or two later. At that time the Volga route lost its importance while tight connections with Byzantium made the Dnieper route dominating. The new situation changed the priorities in constructing the mental map. The Baltic still remained an important link between Rus and Northern and Western Europe. But at the same time there appeared a second and no less significant centre of communications – the Black Sea.

Livonia and the Holy See in 13

– Early 15

Centuries: Centre and Periphery of Christendom

Eva Eihmane

Since the start of the Baltic Crusades the Papacy had been involved in the development of the territory, which subsequently was known as Livonia, and left a certain impact on the processes there. In different periods the Papal impact varied in some aspects.

For the purpose of this study three to an extent overlapping periods can be discerned of slightly different impact of the Papacy in Livonia: 1) the launching of the Crusades, 2) the subjugation of the local populations, and 3) the subsequent development in the 14th_–15th _{centuries that were marked by internal discords.}

The present paper will exploit the link between the Holy See as the centre of Christendom and Livonia as its periphery as a convenient thread to follow through the parallels in the development of the Baltic Eastern coast and the broader Western Christendom. The focus will heavily lie on the latter phase of the Papal involvement as, apart from being better documented and allowing more detailed analysis, it provides eloquent sources, which demonstrate very familiar human vices and weaknesses that give food for thought about the course of history of mentalities.

1. The launching of the crusades

Papal leadership is one of the necessary components for a military campaign to be considered a crusade.1 _{Thus it is through the Papal support that the conquest}

of the would-be Livonia took place in the form of crusades.

The numerous Papal bulls declaring a crusade against the Livonian heathen2

1 Here we follow the position of pluralists, such as Eric Christiansen, William Urban and Jonathan Riley–Smith who define crusades as holy wars thought to be directly authorised by Christ through a Pope, fought against those who were perceived to be the external or internal foes of Christendom, for a cause related to Christendom as a whole with the participants giving special vows and receiving spiritual privilegies. (Riley–Smith Jonathan (ed.), Atlas of the Crusades (New York, Oxford, 1991), pp. 23; Riley–Smith Jonathan, ‘The Crusading Movement and Historians’, Riley–Smith Jonathan (ed.), The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades (Oxford, 2001), pp. 8. 2 In 1196 the first crusading bull against the Baltic pagans was issued, followed by

numerous others in the subsequent years. During the seven-year long pontificate of Alexander IV (1254–1261) alone at least 13 bulls for crusades to Livonia and Prussia were issued (Šterns Indriķis, Latvijas vēsture, 1180–1290: krustakari (The History of Latvia, 1180–1290: Crusades)(Rīga, 2002), pp. 368, 370, 283).

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and placing it in the same status as the crusades to the Holy Land,3 _{allowed the}

actual leaders of the campaign to attract warriors from the Christian countries through religious motives and spiritual rewards. But how much the initiative for the respective crusade came from the Holy See?

It does not require deep analysis to be forced to admit that the Pope’s ability to get truthful information about Livonia and affect the situation there was restricted. Consequently, we have to agree with scholars, such as Barbara Bombi and Anti Selart, who have come to the conclusion that the Popes reacted to local initiatives rather than actively led the crusades.4

Indeed, chronicler Henry of Livonia clearly shows Papal crusading bulls for Livonia coming in response to local petitions. For instance, it was in reaction to the request from the first Bishop Meinhard, who saw the peaceful mission hopelessly stuck, that Celestine III, granted “remission of all sins to all those who would take the cross and go to restore that newly founded church”.5 _{Likewise, it}

was in reply to the request of the second Bishop Berthold who, disappointed in the aggressive reception in his new diocese “bewailed [..] the ruin of the church of Livonia” that the Pope “granted remission of sins to all those who should take the cross and arm themselves against the perfidious Livonians”6 _{According to the}

chronicler it actually required eloquent persuasion from Bishop Albertfor the Pope to grant to Livonia the status of the Land of St. Mary and re-iterate his support to the Baltic crusade at the 4th _{Lateran Council in 1215.}7

3 Since 1170s the Popes placed the crusades on the Northern frontier of Christendom in the same category as the crusades to the Holy Land. (Jensen Carsten Selch, ‘Urban Life and the Crusades in Northern Germany and the Baltic Lands in the Early Thirteenth Century’, Murray Alan V. (ed.), Crusade and Conversion on the Baltic frontier, 1150–1500 (Aldershot, Burlington, 2001), pp. 83); The Bull ”Non parum animus noster” issued either in 1171 or 1175 called on the Scandinavian Christians to join the war against Estonians and the other pagans that caused trouble to Christians, granting the potential participants the same spiritual regards as received by the crusaders to the Holy Land. (Christiansen 1980 p. 56; Šterns 2002 p. 360).

4 Barbara Bombi, for instance, considers that Innocent III (1198–1216) lacked a

consistent plan for the conversion of pagans and reacted to local initiatives, initially not wanting the mission to the Baltic to go beyong preaching and turn into a crusade and it was only after 1204 that his policy took a turn in favour of a crusade to the would-be Livonia (Bombi Barbara, ‘Innocent III and the preadicatio to the Heathens in Livonia (1198–1204)’, Lehtonen Tuomas M.S., Jensen Kurt Villads, Malkki Janne, Ritari Katja (eds.), Medieval History Writing and Crusading Ideology (Helsinki, 2005), pp. 232– 237); Anti Selart writes that the Baltic Crusades were led from the Scandinavian and North-German power centres rather than from Rome (Selart Anti, Livland und die Rus im 13 Jahrhundert (Koln, Weimar, Bohlau, 2007), pp. 51, 53, 54.

5 The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia (hereinafter: Henry of Livonia), I, 12. English edition used: Brundage James A. (ed. and trans.), The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia (Madison, 1961), pp.30; Latin edition used: Georgius Heinricus Pertz (ed.), Heinrici Chronicon Lyvoniae (Hannoverae, 1874), pp.5 (remissionem quipped omnium peccatorum indulsit omnibus qui ad resuscitandam illam primitivam ecclesiam accepta cruse transeant). 6 Henry of Livonia II, 3; English edition pp. 32; Latin edition pp. 6 ([..] clam navesadiit [..]

Lyvoniensis ecclesie ruinam [..]. Igitur domnus papa cunctis signum crucis accipentibus et contra Lyvones se armantibus remissionem indulget peccatorum).

In view of the size and diversity of Christendom under his charge, how else could the Pope have learned about the developments and needs at the frontier of the Christian world than from directly interested and/or involved persons? This was true throughout the medieval times and to an extent is perhaps still true today. Thus the policy of the Holy See was inevitably pro-active, the Papal initiatives coming in reaction to the received complaints and requests.

Although naturally the Holy Land could not but be regarded by the Papacy as being more important than Livonia and the Popes had other priorities and more pressing concerns than those of a remote Northern frontier of Christendom, the Holy See did demonstrate genuine interest in the new Christian land. The spiritual head of the Christendom by definition supported the conversion of pagans and the expansion of the Christian world.

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2. The subjugation of local populations

It was through the Papal involvement that the conquest of Livonia, taking the form of crusades, at least theoretically was targeted at the conversion of the local peoples. As the spiritual head of Christendom, the Pope tried to ensure that the course of the crusades follows Christian ideals and the converts receive just treatment and spiritual care.

From the pontificate of Innocent III (1198–1216) until than of Alexander IV (1254–1261) the Holy See strove towards the ideal of establishing a theocratic administration in Livonia, whereby the spiritual and political power would be in the hands of bishops and the converts, directly subordinated to the Pope, would enjoy political freedom–the freedom of the children of God.8 _{Thus the}

bull issued by Honorious III (1216–1227) on 3rd _{January 1225 took all converts}

in Livonia and Prussia under the protection of the Holy See against oppression from secular lords and declared them subordinated only to Christ and the Roman Catholic Church.9 _{In 1227 Pope Gregory (1227–1241) IX re-confirmed}

the bull of Honorious III, re-asserting that converts shall enjoy the freedom of the children of God and stand under the protection of the Holy See.10 _{Accordingly, in}

December 1230 Papal vice legate in Livonia Balduin of Alna concluded a treaty with the ruler of Western Kurland (Western part of Livonia) on the conversion of his subjects and their direct subordination to the Pope.11 _{A similar treaty was}

concluded with the Eastern part of Kurland in 1231.12

The Popes in their efforts to ensure maximum freedom to the converts and prevent their oppression were trying to swim against the tide of secular interests and human weaknesses. Thus Innocent III and his successor Honorius III, struggling with the increasingly evident reality that was far from religious ideals and starting to act as a mediator and judge in the internal Livonian discords, repeatedly admonished Swordbrothers in relation to the complaints received about them, instructing ecclesiastic authorities with clerical penalties to keep them from the oppression of converts.13 _{In 1225 the}

Papal legate Wilhelm of Modena travelled through the lands of the converted Livs to preach Gospel and to explain the converts their rights and urge the secular powers to treat them fairly and in accordance with the religious ideals and “not to impose any harsh, unbearable burden upon the shoulders of

8 Christiansen Eric, The Northern Crusades: The Baltic and the Catholic Frontier, 1100–1525 (London, 1980), pp. 119; Švābe Arveds,’Senā Kursa’, Straumes un avoti (‘The Old Kursa (Kurland)’ in collection of articles Streams and Sources) , I vol., (Rīga, 1938),

pp. 70.

9 Šterns 2002 p. 232; Švābe Arveds (ed.), Senās Latvijas vēstures avoti (Collection „History Sources of Ancient Latvia”, hereinafter: SLVA), II vol., (Rīga, 1940), No. 110 10 SLVA, No. 150; Šterns 2002 p. 366

11 SLVA, Nr. 162; Šterns 2002 p. 231 12 SLVA, Nr. 163; Šterns 2002 p. 232

the converts, but rather the sweet and light yoke of the Lord”.14 _{Gregory IX}

continuing the same policy wrote that “men signed with the mark of Christ must not be worse off than they were as limbs of the devil”.15

The Papal orders (except for those concerning purely clerical issues, which remain outside the scope of the present paper) for the most part remained a theory only. The Pope was heavily limited in his capacity to receive adequate information and enforce the implementation of his orders. Livonian powers fought against the restriction of their material interests. Thus the messengers of the potential converts of Kurland were detained from going to Rome where they were supposed to confirm their agreements with the Holy See; the Swordbrothers forayed in their territories and destroyed the texts of the treaties.16 _{A streamlet of complaints set its}

course towards the Papal Court, gradually to grow into a mighty stream.

Although the Papacy failed to reach its ideals, the Papal efforts to intervene and act as a mediator and impose spiritual penalties on the perpetrators did to an extent restrain the excessive impunity and greed of the Livonian lords. However, this was less and less the case in the subsequent period with the Papacy

becoming increasingly weaker and supremacy in Livonia falling into the hands of powerful and arrogant Teutonic Order.

3. Papal role in the internal Livonian power struggles in the

14

_–15

_centuries

a) The struggling Livonian parties as customers in the Papal market of favours In the course of time the fight against the heathen receded into the past and in the increasing stream of complaints flowing to the Holy See the focus shifted from the oppression of converts to the aggravating internal Livonian power struggles, especially the ceaseless conflicts between the Livonian bishops on one part and the Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order on the other.With brief respites this struggle went on for almost two centuries as the disputing Livonian parties tried to resolve their mutual conflicts through the mediation of the Holy See.

The Pope’s poor information about the actual situation in Livonia made his policy easy to manipulate with and inevitably resulted in the efforts from both parties to lobby their cause at the Holy See. Papal verdicts naturally favoured the party which managed to present its cause as the just one. Moreover, in the 14th_–15th

centuries the Holy See was especially notorious for its increasing corruption and weakness that culminated in the Great Schism. These two aspects–the corruption of the Papacy and the possibility to manipulate with Papal will–

14 Henry of Livonia, XXIX.3; English edition pp. 231; Latin edition pp. 208 ( nec Theutonici gravaminis alicuius iugum importabile neophytorum humeris imponereut, sed iugum Domini Levi).

15 Quoted from: Christiansen 1980 p. 125; Bunge von F.G et.al (eds.), Liv-, esth und kurländisches Urkundesbuch nebst Regesten (cited as LUB), Bd. 1 (Reval, 1853), Nos. 2202–2004.

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encouraged the struggling Livonian parties to resort to diplomatic skills, deceit and bribes, the latter tool, as we have a reason to suspect, occasionally being the most eloquent argument.

The Papal mediation in the Livonian power struggles caused a flow of increasingly intense correspondence between the centre and periphery of Christendom. It is thanks to this link that the bulk of the most eloquent sources of the respective period were written, through which posterity has an insight into the political intricacies in late medieval Livonia. To lobby their cause permanently the struggling parties stationed their representatives at the Papal Court.

The letters between the representative of the Teutonic Order, called Generalprocurator, on the one part and the Grandmaster and the Livonian Master on the other, which represent the Order’s inner correspondence and as such present the actual views within the Order and provide a reliable insight into the tendencies at the Papal Court, constitute an especially interesting group of sources that the present paper heavily relies on. These documents paint a vivid picture of the vices that ravaged at the Holy See, revealing it as a market of favours, where Papal attention and verdicts were purchased by bribes and deceit. These sources allow us to follow the way these tendencies trickling into the Livonian power circles.

The Teutonic Order eagerly plunged into the Papal market of favours and

skilfully operated with the available tools. The Generalprocurators in their reports constantly emphasised the need to have supporters at the Holy See from among cardinals, other court officials and even Pope’s personal servants in order for their cause to have a chance of success. It was taken for granted by all parties that such well-wishers cannot be maintained without regular gifts. The Grandmaster in numerous letters instructed the Generalprocurator to spare no money for that or other particularly important causes, while Generalprocurators constantly asked for more money and complained about the shortage of funds, insisting that larger amounts were required successfully to pursue the Order’s interests and warning that the lack of money and lesser bribes than those given by the rivals could do great harm to the Order. Giving of gifts intensified when an important matter had to be pushed through, while well-wishers were also constantly materially motivated to maintain their constant benevolence towards the Order and be ready to support it in the time of need.

An early source that gives an insight into the way the Teutonic Order purchased favours at the Papal Court is Generalprocurator Conrad Gruel’s report to

Grandmaster dated April 1314, which was a period of acute controversies between the Archbishop of Riga and the Teutonic Order. The source lists amounts of money given to particular ecclesiastics, the Pope included.17

Towards the end of the 14th _{century the flow of relevant correspondence became}

increasingly intense, culminating at the beginning of the 15th _{century. Whether the}

lobbying at the Papal Court intensified proportionally or else this development is

solely a reflection of growing literacy and a result of improved record-keeping, remains an open question. However, the increasing notoriety of the Papal Court and the fact that at this time the struggle among the Livonian powers focused on vital matters, notably the incorporation of Riga Archbishopric into the Teutonic Order, suggests that the mounting amount of evidence of the Livonian parties, especially Teutonic Order, lobbying their cause with unfair methods might indeed at least partially reflect the actual intensification of this tendency.

Thus in 1392 the Generalprocurator complained to the Grandmaster about the slow advance of the matters of the Teutonic Order at the Holy See and suggested that the Order should get additional secret “friends and well-wishers” from

among cardinals and other high-ranking courtiers, yet one cannot enjoy their benevolence without an “assertion of honour” (erunge). “Regretfully that is how things are at the Papal Court”, he sighed, “those who have and who give, they get and win”.18

In early 15th _{century the matters of the Order at the Holy See were in the}

hands of particularly outspoken and unscrupulous Generalprocurators Johann Tiergart (1419–1428) and especially his successor, the later notorious Caspar Wandofen (1428–1432),19 _{in 1428–1429 aided by representative of the Livonian}

branch of the Order Johann Sobbe,20 _{who presented themselves as most ardent}

and unscrupulous supporters of bribery, deceit and even violence. Through their relatively abundant correspondence, with purchasing of favours being its dominating topic, the respective period is comparatively well documented. It is still an open question though to what extent the tendencies, striking in these sources, can be ascribed to broader circles and a longer period of time.

Thus in December 1423, when the Teutonic Order tried to counter the suspension of Pope Boniface IX’s bull, by which the Riga Dome Chapter had been

incorporated into the Teutonic Order, as well as to achieve the appointment of its candidate as the bishop of Ősel–Wiek, Johann Tiergartdesperately begged the Grandmaster for funding as he had to provide the traditional Christmas gifts in money and kind to the cardinal-protector and other court officials. “If I do not give them gifts according to the old tradition, I am afraid I won’t get much support and help from them either. I know these people well,” he warned.21

Caspar Wandofen was especially insistent in his requests for money for bribes, not forgetting also his own well being. Amidst insistent requests for increased

18 Wer do hat und gibt, der behelt und gewinnet (LUB, Bd.3 (Reval 1857), No. 1321). 19 See an insight into the life of Caspar Wandofen–from his rapid rise to equally rapid fall

through a scandalous affair with a disreputable woman and his sudden and mysterious death–in Urban William, ‘The Diplomacy of the Teutonic Knights at the Curia’, Journal of Baltic Studies IX (1978), pp. 124–127.

20 For a brief insight into the career of Johann Sobbe see: Klauss Milicers, ‘Vācu Ordeņa Livonijas atzara brāļi universitātēs’, Latvijas Vēstures institūta žurnāls 2 (1992), pp. 19.–22. (Translated by Kaspars Kļaviņš from: K. Militzer, Brüder aus dem livländischen Zweig des Deutschen Ordens an den Universitäten).

21 ..wend gebe ich nicht den obscreben unsirs ordens protectori, advocato, procuratori etc. noch alder vorschrebener gewonheid, so besorgen ich mich wenig trostes und hulffe fon in. Ich kenne die lewte wol ( LUB, Bd. 7 (Riga, Moskau, 1881), No. 56).

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funding he openly praised the power of money because anything could be achieved with it. “That’s the way the world is: who gives more, is right”, he declared.22 _{Wandofen believed that it harmed the Teutonic Order that–as he}

wrote–it relied too much on justice and gave too little.23 _{Johann Sobbe during}

his relatively short stay at the Papal Court developed the same impression of it. “Without money nobody can do anything in this court nowadays,“ he wrote.24

Far less evidence is available of the bribery at the Papal Court by the

opponents of the Teutonic Order in Livonia. Since the Pope could naturally be expected to favour the position of ecclesiastic authorities who usually were plaintiffs and turn against those who were regularly accused of the oppression of the church, the former had less motivation to resort to bribery. Thus there is a reason to assume that the Teutonic Order was more actively engaged in the corruption at the Papal Court than the other Livonian struggling parties. However, in face of the manipulability of the Papacy and the bribery by the Order, the Livonian ecclesiastic authorities, to have any chance of a favourable judgement in the market of favours, were forced to adopt the same practices. Raised in the same mental climate, some of them did not find it too difficult.

Thus in 1429, a member of the Riga Dome Chapter, Dietrich Nagel, in a letter

to the Riga Dome Chapter from Rome, where he was trying to release the Chapter from subjugation to the Order, complained about the lack of money, without which, as he wrote, nothing could be achieved. He also recommended the Chapter to consider whether it could afford the enormous costs required to settle the dispute in Rome.25

The Order’s arch-enemy Bishop of Ősel–Wiek Christian Kubant26 _{(1423–1431)}

was especially skilled in bribery, which for him seems to have been a natural procedure. What is indicative, he came from the close circles around the Pope and was experienced in the life at the Papal Court. His experience was smoothly transferred to his office in Livonia and vehemently used in the struggle against the Order. Thus in July 1429 Wandofen expressed fear that Kubant with gifts would thoroughly upset the Order’s prospects of a positive outcome, as he was renowned for never coming empty-handed to the Pope.27

Later the Grandmaster actually complained that Kubant with trickery, money and gifts had suppressed the truth and justice and spread lies about the Teutonic Order. Wandofen however took it for granted because he thought that Kubant had been more generous in gifts.28

22 Gelt das ist alhir der frund und der forderer dy sachen durchzubrengen, und wer do mer gebit, der hot ouch mee rechts (LUB, Bd. 8 (Riga, Moskau, 1884), No. 88, similarly in No. 328).

23 LUB, Bd. 8, No. 350.

24 ..sunder gelt en kan nymant in deme hove in desen tiiden wat ůtgerichten (LUB, Bd.8, No. 1).

25 LUB, Bd.8, No. 26.

26 Also Kuband and Kerstianus. 27 LUB, Bd.8, No. 35.

Thus the Livonian ecclesiastic authorities joined the Order in trafficking the attitudes ruling at the Holy See into Livonia.

b) The impact of the Papal mediation on Livonia

Morally the most damaging side-effect for Livonia of the contacts of its power circles with the Papal Court probably was that at least those persons directly

exposed these contacts seem to have been overcome by general disbelief in any chance for justice to prevail alone without money. Consequently the Livonian powers, especially the Teutonic Order, grew accustomed to the practice of solving their discords by means of bribes and adopted the attitude that with money

everything could be achieved and every wrong could be turned right. American historian William Urban has a point when he suggests that the Papal Court could have actually contributed to the worldliness and arrogance of the Order itself, writing that the belief that “one cannot achieve anything without friends and that friends cannot be made except with became a political philosophy among the Teutonic Knights, which contributed greatly to the cynicism, worldliness and corruption for which they became noted in the 15th _century.”29

The mental climate thus marked by corruption and purchasing of justice was a fruitful soil for impunity, unscrupulousness and off-hand application of unfair and brutal methods, encouraging the Livonian rivals, first and foremost the Teutonic Order, to go further than bribes and to resort to deceit or even violence. In broader terms, unrestrained and remorseless application of methods of force among Livonian actors was encouraged by the frequent precedents all around and the violence-saturated atmosphere of the age in general, violence that Norman Cantor, borrowing Jacob Burckhardt’s phrase, described as the violence of “terrible simplifiers”, “the violence that comes from disintegration of civilized order and the collapse of moral standards”.30

A striking example–the-so-called Union of Segewold –transpired already in 1316. The Livonian branch of the Teutonic Order, through exploitation of human passions, trickery, intimidation and physical threats brutally deprived the Riga Dome Chapter and Archbishop Friedrich (1304–1341) of their means of subsistence and forced some Archbishop’s vassals and members of the Riga Dome Chapter to conclude a union against the Archbishop during his lengthy stay in Avignon to compel him to withdraw his charges against the Order at the Papal Court and turn him from plaintiff into defendant.31 _{The rough demonstration}

of its physical superiority did not cause the Order any substantial harm apart from spiritual sanctions that it did not seem to fear much. Pope Johannes XXII (1316–1334) condemned this union and annulled it32 _{and in 1318 the leaders of}

29 Urban 1978 p. 124.

30 As opposed to “the violence stemming from primitivism, which had been common in the early middle ages” (Cantor Norman, Medieval History. The Life and Death of a Civilization, 2nd ed. (New York, 1969), pp. 516).

31 For detailed sequence of events around the Segewold Union see: J. Haller, Die Verschwörung von Segewold 1316 (Riga, 1908).

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the Order were summoned to the Holy See to answer the charges33 _{and that}

was all that the Pope could or wanted to do. Thanks to active lobbying and successful visit of the delegation of the Order at the Holy See, the success of which, most likely, was largely based on gifts, a dramatic change in favour of the Order occurred in Papal attitude in 1319 to the extent that the Pope instructed several prelates to protect the Order against offenders, even be they bishops or archbishops.34

The most notorious incident, however, was the brutal murder of the messengers of the Archbishop of Riga on their way to Rome in 1428.35 _{They were intercepted}

in Kurland and drowned under ice by reeve of Grobin Goswin von Ascheberg, who subsequently fled from Livonia. Generalprocurator Wandofen was annoyed about such unnecessary exposure and remarked that it would have been difficult to prove Goswin’s guilt if he himself had not admitted it by running away.36 _The

Order pursued the policy of pretending it was not involved at all and placed all blame on von Ascheberg alone, presenting it as his personal revenge.37

While the arbitration commission, which on the Order’s initiative and with its participation reviewed the matter to prevent the investigation of the incident at the Papal Court, openly condemned the murder and declared “manhunt” on von Ascheberg and his assistants,38 _{the public scapegoat secretly met approval and}

support within the Order. Wandofen’s and Sobbe’s letters, the former to hide their support, encoding von Goswin’s name as “the one, called G. from Livonia” indicated that he had for some time stayed with them in Rome and received from them financial assistance.39 _{This correspondence also casts doubt on W.}

Urban’s suggestion that it had been “the hurried change of administration” that had disrupted the implementation of the instruction of the Livonian Master to Wandolfen’s predecessor to arrest the culprits.40 _{Ascheberg’s services were}

clearly appreciated within the Order. Eventually his absolution was achieved.41

Thus neither the direct murderer was punished nor did the Order that stood behind him come to any substantial harm for this outrageous abuse.

The sense of impunity encouraged unscrupulous members of the Order again and again to resort to force without any restraint. Thus Wandofen vehemently advocated deceit and violence without even considering diplomatic tools. For instance, fully approving the murder of the archbishop’s messengers, though frustrated by the insufficient efforts to cover it up, he advised similar measures against Bishop Kubant, but using a more difficult to trace tool of murder, such as poison. The Order should subsequently deny its involvement as it would be impossible to prove anything.42

33 LUB, Bd.2, No. 661. 34 LUB, Bd. 2, No. 669. 35 Urban 1978 p. 126. 36 LUB, Bd.8, No. 36. 37 LUB, Bd.7, Nos. 718, 723, 733. 38 LUB, Bd.7, Nos. 718, 733. 39 LUB, Bd.7, No. 799; Bd. 8, No. 1. 40 Urban 1978 p. 127.

41 LUB, Bd.7, No. 69; Hildebrand H., ‚Einleitung’, LUB, Bd.7, pp. XIX. 42 LUB, Bd.8, No.36.

Wandofen’s frivolous remark that he would rather deal with the consequences of ten murders that compete with one living man, such as Kubant,43 _indicate

the efficiency of unscrupulous plotting and the ease with which with gifts any offence could be whitewashed at the Pala Court. His resourceful mind, at times even rejecting bribery as a too slow and inefficient way, always had more or less mean and deceitful suggestions ready. He repeatedly and insistently recommended the interception of messengers of their opponents.44 _{The most}

elaborate plan in this regard was his advice to arrange a pirate attack on the ship that took Bishop Kubant to Livonia and rob him of the unfavourable (for the Order) Papal bulls that he was carrying.45 _{Sobbe, who leaves an}

impression of a less refined person and seems to have outrivaled Wandofen in unscrupulousness, soon became disappointed in the relatively slow path of bribery and recommended the Livonian Master to abandon the efforts to achieve success in Rome and instead to take justice in their land in their own

43 LUB, Bd. 8, Nr. 69.

44 E.g., LUB, Bd.8, Nos. 175, 203, 317. 45 LUB, Bd.8, No. 358.