Prussian Socialism Episode 20: The Teutonic Knights and Germanic Holy War [featuring Warren Balogh]
Everyone knows about the Crusades in the Holy Land. But what about the Crusades in the Baltic? For 300 years, the Teutonic Order waged war across the Baltic, Poland and even Russia to bring Christianity to the last Pagan peoples in Europe.
The Order was founded in Acre in 1190. After a brief stay in Transylvania, it found its calling in the swampy forests on the north-eastern edge of civilization. Under its Grandmaster Hermann von Salza, the Order established a military mini-state devoted to holy war. Trudging though snow and frost, its heavily armed knights and swarms of crossbowmen raided villages, built castles, and brought Christianity to the heathen.
Germans, Poles, Russians, and everyone else have often depicted the Northern Crusades as violent—yet glorious—race-wars. On the other hand, many modern historians have downplayed this interpretation. Who is right? Were the Teutonic Knights evil predators, noble holy-warriors, or something else entirely? Gregory Conte and Warren Balogh explore this dark and nearly forgotten chapter of European history.
Books Discussed:
Teutonic Knight by David Nicolle (Osprey Publishing)
Crusader Castles of the Teutonic Knights by Steven Turnbull (vols 1 and 2, Osprey Publishing)
William Urban. The Teutonic Knights a Military History (a dry but straight forward overview)
Eric Christianson. The Northern Crusades (a rather tedious academic study)
Hans Delbrück. Medieval Warfare
Dambriunas and Schmalstieg. Beginner’s Lithuanian (a solid introduction for anyone interested in this important Indo-European language… or anyone looking lead NATO-auxiliary troops in the coming war with Russia, lol)
Comprehensive, German-language histories:
Albert Ewald. Die Eroberung Preußens durch die Deutschen
Karl Lohmeyer. Die Geschichte Ost- und Westpreußens
Intro song: From Sergei Prokofiev’s Battle on the Ice
Outro song: Preußens Gloria
I find it interesting that the Lithuanians were so hard to convert and that it took so long. Makes sense though. They are a deeply religious and stubborn people. They gave the Soviets fits over it. See the hill of crosses. I also appreciated the distinction between them and the Slavs.
In all my reading the only thing I’ve read about the Teutonic Order comes from the preface of Georg Grossjohann’s “Five Years, Four Fronts: A German Officer’s WW2 Combat Memoir”. He says: I was born and raised in East Prussia, the ancient land of the pagan Pruzzens, whose inhabitants were finally converted to Christianity centuries ago by the Teutonic Order. Beginning in about 1000 A.D., our ancestors had, with varying degrees of forcefulness, rejected all attempts to bring them into the Roman fold. They maintained their own culture, language, property, and, most of all, their freedom. This lasted until about… Read more »
Idea for next show if we’re not continuing history of the Teutonic Knights, how HOI4 stuff on the First and Second Vienna Award and the First and Second ljubljana award?
Never stop doing medieval content. It is the best content.
Keep in mind that it was the Reformation which began the process of stripping everything Roman, Germanic and Pagan European from the Church and bringing the Church back to its Biblical Jewish roots. I believe that this is why Fascist movements in Protestant countries drew from Pagan inspiration (SS, SA, Scandinavian and Dutch NS etc.) whereas Fascist movements in Catholic and Orthodox countries drew from Medieval Christian inspiration (Falange, Iron Guard etc.)
Originally the advantage of the Indo-European form of Warfare was that because the Indo-Europeans were the first to domesticate the Wild Horse of the Steppe from which all the Horses of Earth are descended with the exception of Zebras, the Bronze Age Indo-Europeans were the first Cavalry and dominated the Non-Indoeuropean Infantry. (Ironically, Europeans were also the first to domesticate Zebras) The original cavalry were Charioteers, like all the Indo-European Gods. As horses were breed larger, Horse Archers and Lancers replaced Chariots. The Steppe was dry which allowed the use of the compound bow which is held together by resin… Read more »
Talking about Asiatics, even the NSDAP was looking for the original Aryan homelands in Asia, primarily in Tibet. The NSDAP was correct but they were looking at the wrong part of Asia. The main Patrilineal genetic line of Europeans are the R1a and R1b Haplogroups of Eastern and Western Europeans, whose Patrilineal genetic lineage comes from the R1 Haplogroup of the Late Sone Age/Early Bronze Age Eurasian Steppes, whose Patrilineal genetic lineage in turn comes from the R Haplogroup of Middle Stone Age Siberia. Therefore the White Race can trace its Male lineage directly back to the Stone Age Mammoth… Read more »
What makes the 900s in Europe even more interesting is that while the Magyar Hungarians were raiding throughout Europe mounted on Horses, the Scandinavians were simultaneously raiding all along the coasts and riverbanks of Europe mounted on Longships. For anyone interested to see what the current descendants of the Ugric Peoples from which the Magyars originated from are like today, the ones that didn’t migrate from the Urals to Hungary, there’s an interesting documentary on YouTube: https://youtu.be/ECsubZDT46M
What amazes me is that there was still a European Nation which worshiped the European Gods as late as 1387! The Lithuanians, a small Nation not only managed to rival the Mongols and Tatars but conquer all of Belarus and Ukraine while defending themselves against the Crusaders. That they maintained their Folk Religion in a world of Christians and Muslims is even more amazing! It’s no wonder that the Lithuanian Nobility went on to become the Polish Lithuanian Winged Hussars who were the only Cavalry division never to lose a single engagement in all recorded history. It would have been… Read more »
A great episode! It seems to me that the Crusaders were the direct descendants of the Dark Age Vikings, who in turn were the direct descendants of the Germanic and Celtic Tribal invasions of the Iron Age and the Indo-European War Bands of the Bronze Age. The Crusaders not only Reconquered Iberia but then gave birth to the Conquistadors of America which inspired the Colonization of the world by Europeans, just as the Cossack war bands reconquered the Eurasian Steppe, Siberia and Alaska. The original Holy Warriors would have been those Berserk Bear Warriors blessed by Wotan or the Indo-European… Read more »
another great show – keep it up guys!
Ghengis Khan had red hair….The OG Hapa
What the heck is this, I thought we were going to talk about the Hanseatic League?
Another great show. Prussian Socialism might be my favorite podcast.
Oh, and akshually, Warren, the furthest eastward extent of ancient Germanic peoples has to be the Crimean Goths.
Are you uploading files to rrs-feed still? It’s really the only way I’m able listen to the shows.
It’s on the feed. I’ve been getting the episodes
I use podbean. Only the first 10 episodes are available. Other trs-podcasts works fine on podbean
Use the odysee rss
https://odysee.com/$/rss/@gregoryconte:2
Oh great! Thank you!
They should have kept the Aryan pagan religion.
Very unfortunate, but from what I know, there is a huge resurgence of Romuva with in Lithuania.
I read the book “warwolf: peasants chronicle of the 30 yrs war” and the main resistance symbol was the wolfsangel but they would do one vertical and one horizontal and at the end of the war they built a church and put the symbol in the doorway in stone. And im almost positive this is the church Hitler attended when he was a child.
Deus Vult!!!
Greg the Pope actually did support William the Conquerers Invasion of England (it wasn’t just for the fringes of Christiandom that Holy War was used). But that was because the Anglo-Saxons practiced their own version of Christianity which was different than Roman Catholicism, probably blended in more Pagan elements.
The Albigensian Crusade had Papal backing as well, and that was right in southern France.
Against the Cathars
DID SOMEBODY SAY HOLY WAR
Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto,
Sicut erat in principio,
Et nunc, et semper,
Et in sæcula sæculorum.
Amen.
The crusades nowadays especially post 9/11 has been used more as another white guilt narrative of savage stupid white Christians attacking enlightened innocent tolerant Muslims of color. It’s not to say the Islamic world was indeed an impressive civilization and culture because you can easily light switch brain into counter jihad territory.
This is a very interesting topic that I’m excited to learn more about. Part of me has disdain for the purging and erasure of native European religion and history, but another part of me admires the strength and conviction of the Crusaders and the order/unity that they established across the continent.
Exactly how I feel, plus German chauvinism
Awesome! This is phenomenal content and I always look forward to Greg and Warren coming together and doing some European history!