The Northern Crusades

Description

The ‘Northern Crusades’, inspired by the Pope’s call for a Holy War, are less celebrated than those in the Middle East, but they were also more successful: vast new territories became and remain Christian, such as Finland, Estonia and Prussia. Newly revised in the light of the recent developments in Baltic and Northern medieval research, this authoritative overview provides a balanced and compelling account of a tumultuous era.List of Maps
Acknowledgments
Chronological Table
Northern Rulers
Spelling of Names
Introduction

1. North-East Europe on the Eve of the Crusades
Land and Sea
Peoples
Interactions

2. The Wendish Crusade in Theory and Practice, 1147-1185
The Crusade of 1147
Supporters and Chroniclers
The Slav Wars of Henry the Lion and Valdemar the Great

3. The Armed Monks: Ideology and Efficiency
Varieties of Monastic Knighthood, 1128-1237
The Monastic War-Machine, 1225-1309

4. The Conquest of the East Baltic Lands, 1200-1292
Livonia
Prussia
Estonia
Finland

5. The Theocratic Experiment, 1200-1273
Popes and Leagues
The Battle for the Convert
The War on the Schismatics

6. The Lithuanian Crusade, 1283-1410
The Roads to Collision, 1203-1309
The Morality and Recruitment of the Crusade
Wars and Politics, 1304-1409
Strategy and Tactics

7. The Crusade Against Novgorod, 1295-1378
The Debatable Lands
The Making of a Russo-Swedish Frontier, 1295-1326
The Crusades of King Magnus

8. The Crusading States of North-East Europe
Systems of Government
Conditions of Men
Civilizations

9. The Withering of the Crusade, 1409-1525
Tannenberg and After, 1409-14
Confrontations at Constance, 1414-18
The Survival and Extinction of the Order in Prussia, 1418-1525
Livonia and the Russians, 1400-1562

Conclusion
Further Reading
References to Sources
Index

“The verve and vigour of Eric Christiansen’s study illuminates developments vital in the early history of Eastern Europe and brings to life a story that had epic dimensions”
—Maurice Keen

“For a one-volume history of the Northern Crusades, the reader has but one choice; this is it”
—William Urban in the American Historical Review

“A fine study of the Baltic conquest”
—Hans Eberhard Meyer in the English Historical Reivew

“Independent, erudite, lucid and witty … a narrative that never flags”
—Christpher Tyerman

“A fascinating and elegant book”
—Geoffrey Wheatcroft in the London Review of Books

ERIC CHRISTIANSEN, a fellow of New College, Oxford, works mainly on Northern history in the Middle Ages. He has lectured in London, Copenhagen and Florida, and is the author of The Origins of Military Power in Spain. He lives in Oxford.GB