What is good for the Russian, death for the Teutonic. Russia has had many troubled neighbors in history. But the Teutonic Order stands apart, the proximity of the Russians with which became fatal for the crusaders.
The order was called upon to convert the Eastern European Lands to the Catholic faith. True, the Pope did not take into account the "Russian factor". In Russian historiography, the Teutonic Order is presented almost as the main enemy of the Russian Land. In fact, for the Russian princes, the Teutonic lands have always seemed to be easy prey. Many Russian princes willingly went on campaigns against the crusaders. Sometimes for the sake of purely mercantile goals - to rob, take hostages …
We started first …
The first military clash between the Russians and the Teutons took place in 1212. The united fifteen thousand Novgorod-Polotsk army, led by the Novgorod prince Mstislav Udal, visited the strongholds of the Crusaders located in Livonia. To begin with, the Germans got off with a slight fright: they concluded a separate peace with the Polotsk principality and the Novgorodians agreed to an armistice.
… and continued
After only five years, all the same Novgorodians, reinforced by Estonian troops, again moved to the West, to the lands of the Teutons. Henry of Latvia wrote in the Chronicle of Livonia: "In 1217, the Novgorodians gathered a large Russian army, with him was also the King of Pskov Vladimir and his townspeople, and they sent a call all over Estonia to the Estonians to besiege the Teutons."
Promotional video:
Soon the united Russian army gathers near the walls of the residence of the Master of the Livonian Order in the Wenden castle. Almost at the same time, in 1219, Northern Estonia was captured by Danish troops, and on the site of the Estonian settlement of Lindanise, the "Danish city" - "Taani Linn" - Revel was founded, which later became Tallinn.
Dad is angry
In 1228, an order-bull of Pope Gregory IX was sent to the cities of Lubeck, Riga, Gotland, Dinamyund and Swedish Lipkoping, in which it was strictly required to stop all trade with Russian lands. In fact, this was the first attempt by the West to organize an economic blockade of the Russians. However, not all merchants listened to the Pope. Riga and Gotland signed an agreement with Mstislav Davydovich Smolensky "on mutual favor" and trade.
The first ice battle
In 1234, Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich with his fourteen-year-old son Alexander at the head of an army from Pereyaslavl, Novgorod and Pskov regiments defeats the Teutonic knights near Yuryev, in a battle on the Emajõgi (Embah) river. Approaching Yuryev, the Russian troops overturned the Teutons on the move, driving heavy knights onto the river ice: “And God help Prince Yaroslav from Novgorodians, and bish both to the river, and to the river, and to that pad of the best German people: and as if the Germans were on the river on Omovzha, and that one broke off (ice - comp.), there are many of them, and some ulcers drove into Yuriev, and others into Bear's Head. After a heavy ice defeat, the Master of the Order of Volkwin von Winterstetten makes peace with Yaroslav Vsevolodovich, which was observed for four years.
"And bowing to the nemtsi prince, Yaroslav took peace with them in all his truth."
Yuriev undertook to pay tribute to Novgorod - in the future, this very obligation will serve as a pretext for Ivan the Terrible to start the Livonian War.
"Old world" is better than a good quarrel
In the spring of 1262, Alexander Nevsky and Mindovg concluded an agreement on an alliance and a joint campaign against the Livonian Order. The first to come to Wenden, the capital of the order, were the troops of Mindaugas, led by Troinat. Alexander Nevsky at this time was solving issues in the Horde, and the squad under the leadership of his brother Yaroslav came only a month later. Without taking Wenden, Mindaugas went to Lithuania, and the Russians plundered the lands of Dorpat. Almost immediately, German ambassadors leave Riga, Lubeck and the island of Gotland, bringing the Russians a peace treaty and proposals to restore trade. In Novgorod, they sign the "Old World", according to which the Germans renounce all their conquests in the northern Russian lands and promise to break the blockade of the Baltic coast and not touch the Russian merchants.
The last battle of this world
In February 1268, in the Danish possessions in Estonia, near the city of Rakovora (Rakvere), a terrible battle of the Novgorodians and Pskovs with the Danes and Teutons took place, in terms of its scale and significance far exceeding the Battle of the Ice. As the chronicler wrote: "Neither our fathers nor our grandfathers have seen such a cruel battle."
The central blow of the iron knightly wedge, the "great pig", was taken by the Novgorodians, led by the mayor Mikhail.
Mikhail himself and many of his soldiers died, but did not retreat, and the outcome of the battle was decided by the flank attack of the regiments of Prince Dmitry Alexandrovich, the son of Alexander Nevsky, who put the crusaders to flight and drove them seven miles to Rakovor. The losses on both sides were very great for the XIII century, and amounted to several thousand people. However, the Pskov prince Dovmont was able to raid all over Livonia after such a hard battle.
In 1269, the order undertook a retaliatory campaign, but it seems that an evil fate hung over the Germans: the 10-day siege of Pskov ended with the retreat of the knights with the approach of the Novgorod army led by Prince Yuri and the conclusion of a peace treaty.
It was after the Rakovorsky defeat, and not the battle on Lake Peipsi, that the Livonian Order could no longer seriously threaten the powerful principalities in north-west Russia.
Drang nach osten
In the first half of the 20th century, a powerful force appeared in Europe, trying to restore the Teutonic Order. Alfred Rosenberg, the NSDP ideologue and author of several key concepts of Nazi ideology, worked hard to weave Teutonic motives into the overall concept of Hitlerite Germany. Rosenberg also came in handy for the "Onslaught to the East" plan that had matured in Germany for many years, which arose partly under the impression of the grandiose defeats of the Teutons and something like a "historical complex". Is it worth mentioning how the next invasion of the "Teutonic", this time motorized, "wedges" deep into Russia ended?