A. Selart: Livonia, Rus' and the Baltic Crusades

Titel
Livonia, Rus' and the Baltic Crusades in the Thirteenth Century.


Autor(en)
Selart, Anti
Reihe
East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450–1450
Erschienen
Anzahl Seiten
400 S.
Preis
€ 140,00
Rezensiert für H-Soz-Kult von
Marius Ščavinskas, Klaipėda University, Lithuania

Anti Selart, a famous researcher of the medieval history of Livonia, presents his monograph on the relationship between Livonia and Russia in the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century based on a book previously published in German.1 This is a rather supplemented and expanded variant of that book. The book consists of a foreword; introduction; two thematic sections, which are divided into seven chapters, with the latter of these divided into smaller sub-chapters; a conclusion; as well as additional parts, which present tables with the names of Livonian bishops and masters, the genealogies of Russian dukes, maps, the lists of references and literature, and indexes of names and geographical places. The greatest attention in the book is paid not to the relationship between Livonia and the whole of Russia, but between Livonia and northeastern duchies of Russia, such as Novgorod, Polock and Pskov.

Livonia was not a politically homogeneous entity at that time, since it consisted of the Bishop of Riga (later he became the archbishop), the Order of the Sword (later it became Livonian Order, an independent branch of the Teutonic Knights), Livonian bishops, the domains of vassals of the Danish kings in Northern Estonia, as well as the domains of the rest of the vassals. With such a wide spectrum of political powers, it is not surprising that the author directed his research towards the discovery of the dynamics of the relationship between the centers of local powers and the duchies of northeastern Russia in the 13th and the first half of the 14th century. Moreover, as the author states in the introduction, there has been quite a lot of scholarship with the aim of revealing the relationships between Latin Europe and Orthodox Russia, while the analysis of the relationships on the local or micro level, due to the complex location of the political powers on the Eastern coast of the Baltic Sea and the northeastern parts of Russia, is meaningful in the sense that it clearly demonstrates what the real dynamics of these relationships were.

Even more so, as the author rightly remarks, the macro-level of the relationship between Latin Europe and Russia has become “overgrown” by different, most often politicized concepts, which formed a distorted image of these relationships per se. This image has been used and is still being used by Russian historiography, describing the “aggression” of Western Europe against Russia (primarily inspired by the Pope of Rome). Therefore, the author reasonably raises the question, as the Pope of Rome, other European leaders and Livonia itself launched crusades against Orthodox Russia in the 13th and the first half of the 14th century, if there were real aspirations to subordinate the Russian Church to the primacy of the Pope of Rome, and if the image of Orthodox Russia, encountered in the medieval Latin sources, had a purely negative meaning, bestowing upon the Latin-Orthodox relationship the sense of religious antagonism a priori. On the contrary, the research done by Selart demonstrates that each real or alleged case of antagonism should be investigated separately and some endeavors should be made to envision the meaning and essence hidden between the lines of the sources. Having in mind the rather varied spectrum of the Livonian and Russian political powers in the 13th and the first half of the 14th century, such a method of the analysis of the relationships allows one to provide a negative answer to the above mentioned questions.

In the second and third chapters of the first part Anti Selart analyzes the contemporaneous political and trade relationships between Livonia and the northeastern duchies of Russia. In his research the author reasonably gives grounds to refute the alleged idea about the beginning of the Crusades to Russia even at the end of the 12th century, present in the historiography (especially in the Russian one). Indeed, the author does not try to specifically analyze what is to be called a Crusade in the 11th century and in the beginning of the 13th century. This would allow to provide better arguments about the usage or non-usage of one kind of war – Crusades – in the relationships between Livonia and Russia. However, the author does show that acts of war were encouraged by ecclesiastical political powers and the Popes only gave sanctions to these wars (but not always). In the case of Livonia it becomes evident that military conflicts with Russia did not attain the status of the Crusades. The battles of Narva and on the Ice, escalated in the Russian historiography, actually were not “predatory” Crusades of the Pope and/or Livonia against Novgorod. It also becomes evident that at different times different political powers in Livonia were supported by various political actors in Novgorod, Polock and Pskov. On the other hand, Russian duchies were supported by Livonian political powers in their fights against each other. Such a distribution of the powers during the times of the war or supporting different alliances has had an impact on the unequal evaluation of the Russians, as schismatics, in Latin sources. This is discussed further in the fourth chapter.

In other chapters, there is an attempt to find out if, after Albert Suerbeer had taken the throne of the Bishop of Riga and was performing the duties of the Pope's Legate in the Baltic region, there were any kinds of Crusades launched towards Russia, or if there was any plan or endeavor to execute them in order to submit the Russian Church under the primacy of the Pope, after the Mongolians had already conquered Russia. It is important to note that around the middle of the 13th century a new player appeared in the region. It was the ruler of Lithuania Mindaugas, who soon received baptism and was crowned the king of Lithuania. His baptism and his coronation were conducted under the supervision of the Magister of Livonia, not the Bishop of Riga Nicholas. The following dynamics show that Lithuanian rulers (e.g. Traidenis, later – Vytenis) became the political allies of the Riga archbishops. After Pskov was conquered by him, he also became the alley of the archbishop of Riga in his fight against the Livonian Order. Meanwhile, after Polock (the territory of which comprised the northeastern part of present day Lithuania) was occupied by Duke Gerdenis of Nalsen, who competed with other dukes of Nalsen, supported by Lithuanian rulers, Polock temporarily became the alley of the Livonian Order, thus, in opposition to Riga. The author, while discussing these and later conflicts in the first half of the 14th century, where the Great Duke of Lithuania Gediminas was involved, makes a statement about the absence of a religious context, therefore the wars with northeastern duchies of Russia were a part of the war between Livonia and Lithuania.

The seventh and final chapter of the monograph is of a special importance. In it the author states that the image of the “enemy” of the Latin Europe began to be formed after Russia was conquered by Mongolians, when Russian dukes, submitting to the will of the Mongols, participated in some military expeditions against Hungary and Poland (towards Lithuania too, by the way). Since Lithuania had conquered a part of the Russian lands, in Latin sources a negative image of Russian Schismatics arose, who allegedly helped the pagans to fight against Christians, while a negative image of pagans (infideles) appeared alongside them. It is evident, as has been stated by Selart, that such evaluations were dependent on political events, their context, the political “dependence” of the Russians, but not on the religious context.

Thus, the author makes a conclusion that the image of Livonia as an image of the “threat to Russia”, presented in Livonian historiography, was highly exaggerated. Such an approach of the author can be only approved.

Note:
1 Anti Selart, Livland und die Rus’ im 13. Jahrhundert (Quellen und Studien zur baltischen Geschichte 21), Köln 2007.

Redaktion
Veröffentlicht am
Redaktionell betreut durch
Klassifikation
Mehr zum Buch
Inhalte und Rezensionen
Verfügbarkeit
Weitere Informationen
Sprache der Publikation
Sprache der Rezension