Óttar
03-30-2010, 06:56 PM
THE HISTORY OF THE TEUTONIC ORDER OF
SAINT MARYS HOSPITAL IN JERUSALEM
The Teutonic Order, as a new institution was confirmed by the German Crusader leader, Duke Frederick of Swabia, on November 19th, in the year 1190 and with the capture of Acre, the founders of the hospital were given a permanent site in the city. Pope Clement III confirmed this body as the "fratrum Theutonicorum ecclesiae S. Mariae Hiersolymitanae" by the Bull Quotiens postulatur of February 6, 1191 and, within a few years, the Order had developed as a Religious Military institution comparable to the Hospitallers and Templars, although initially subordinate to the Master of the Hospital. This subordination was confirmed in the Bull Dilecti filii of Pope Gregory IX of January 12, 1240 addressed to the "fratres hospitalis S. Mariae Theutonicorum in Accon". The distinct German character of this new Hospitaller Order and the protection given to it by the Emperor and German rulers, enabled it to gradually assert a de facto independence from the Order of Saint John. The first Imperial grant came from Otto IV who gave the Order his protection on May 10, 1213 and this was followed almost immediately by a further confirmation by Frederick II on September 5, 1214. These Imperial confirmations each treated the Teutonic knights as independent from the Hospitallers. By the middle of the fourteenth century this independence was acknowledged by the Holy See.
Some forty knights were received into the new Order at its foundation by the King of Jerusalem and Frederick of Swabia, who selected their first Master in the name of the Pope and Emperor. The knights of the new confraternity had to be of German birth (although this rule was occasionally relaxed), a unique requirement among the Crusader Orders founded in the Holy Land. They were drawn predominately from the noble or knightly class, although this latter obligation was not formally incorporated into the rule until much later. Their blue mantle, charged with a black cross, was worn over a white tunic, a uniform recognized by the Patriarch of Jerusalem and confirmed by the Pope in 1211. The waves of German knights and pilgrims who followed the Third Crusade brought considerable wealth to the new German Hospital as well as recruits. This enabled the knights to acquire the Lordship of Joscelin and, soon thereafter they built the castle of Montfort (lost in 1271), the rival of the great hospitaller fortress of Krak des Chevaliers. Never as numerous in the Holy Land as either the Hospitaller or Templar Orders, the Teutonic knights were nonetheless a formidable power.
Master Heinrich von Walpot (died 1200), who led the knights in their first decade came from the Rhineland. He begun by drawing up the Order's statutes, ready by 1199, which were confirmed by Innocent III in the Bull Sacrosancta romana of February 19, 1199. These divided the knights into two classes, knights and priests, the former being obliged to take the triple monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as well as promise to aid the sick and fight the Infidel. Unlike the knights, who from the early thirteenth century had to prove "ancient nobility", the priests were relieved of this obligation and their function was to celebrate the Mass and other religious offices, to administer the sacraments to the knights and the sick in their hospitals and follow them as almoners into war. Priests brothers could not become Masters, Commanders or even Vice-Commanders in either Lithuania or Prussia, but could become Commanders in Germany. Later these two ranks were augmented by a third class, of serving brothers (Sergeants, or Graumäntler), who wore a similar mantle but in gray rather than blue and charged with only three branches of the Cross to indicate that they were not full members of the confraternity.
The knights lived communally, sleeping in dormitories on simple beds, eating together in a refectory, the fare modest and no more than was sufficient. Their clothes and armor were likewise simple but practical and their daily duties included training for battle, maintaining their equipment and working with their horses. The dignity of Master - the style of Grand Master came later - was elective for life, as in the Order of Saint John, and like all the great officers was limited to the professed knights. The Master's deputy, the (Grand) Commander, to whom the priests were subject, governed the Order in the absence of his superior. The (Grand) Marshal, likewise immediately subordinate to the Master, was in command of the knights and ordinary troops and was responsible for insuring they were properly equipped. The (Grand) Hospitaller was in charge of the sick and the poor, the Drapier was responsible for buildings and clothing, the Treasurer administered the property. Each of these latter offices were generally held for shorter terms, rotating annually. As the Order expanded across Europe, it became necessary to appoint Provincial Masters for Germany, then Prussia and later Livonia with an hierarchic structure paralleling the great offices.
Walpot's successor, Otto von Kerpen, came from Bremen and the third Master, Herman Bart, from Holstein, illustrating the broad distribution of the early knights. The most important early Master was the fourth, Herman von Salza (1209-1239), from near Meissen who, through his own efforts as a diplomatist, considerably enhanced the prestige of the Order. His intercessions in the conflicts between Pope and Emperor earned him the favor of both, augmenting the knights expanding wealth and possessions. During his Magistery the Order received no less than thirty-two Papal confirmations or grants of privileges and a further thirteen Imperial confirmations. By the middle of Salza's Magistery the Orders properties extended from Slovenia (then Styria), through Saxony (Thuringia), Hesse, Franconia, Bavaria and the Tyrol, with houses in Prague and Vienna. There were also outposts in the outer reaches of the Byzantine Empire, notably Greece and what is now Romania. At his death the Orders estates extended as far as the Netherlands in the north west of the Empire, south west to France, Switzerland, further south in Spain and Sicily, and east to Prussia. Salza received a gold cross from the King of Jerusalem as the mark of his Mastership, following the distinguished conduct of the knights at the siege of Damietta in 1219. By an Imperial act of January 23, 1214, the Grand Master and his successors were granted membership of the Imperial Court; as possessors of immediate fiefs they enjoyed a seat in the Imperial Diet with the Princely rank from 1226/27. Immediate Princely rank was subsequently conferred on the Master of Germany and, after the loss of Prussia, to the Master of Livonia.
The Order's presence across mediaeval Europe enabled it to play a significant role in local political events. Despite the limitation of membership to the German nobility, the spread of German rule into Italy, notably in Sicily under Henry VI and Frederick II Barbarossa, led to the establishment of the Order's convents in places far distant from Germany. Sicily had been ruled by Saracens until the arrival of the Norman conquerors under the Hauteville family but the collapse of this dynasty led to their replacement by the German Hohenstaufens. The first Teutonic hospital, of Saint Thomas, was confirmed by the Emperor Henry VI in 1197 and, in the same year, the Emperor and Empress granted the knights their request for possession of the Church of Santa Trinitŕ in Palermo. Examination of grants of Sicilian properties to the three great crusader Orders in the period 1190-1220 indicates that the Teutonic knights were greater beneficiaries of imperial favor than either the Templars or Hospitallers. Furthermore, when Frederick II attained his majority he secured them the support of Pope Honorius III, who granted them numerous privileges confirming their equality with the other two great Crusader bodies.
The Teutonic knights had first established themselves in eastern Europe in 1211 after King Andrew of Hungary invited the knights to establish an outpost on the border of Transylvania. The warlike Cumans, who were also plaguing the Byzantine Empire to the south, were a constant threat and the Hungarians hoped that the knights would provide a buttress agains their attacks. King Andrew granted them considerable autonomy over the lands they captured with a mission to Christianize the inhabitants, but their demands for effective independence proved unacceptable and they were ordered to leave in 1225.
In 1217 Pope Honorius III proclaimed a crusade against the Prussian pagans. Duke Conrad of Massovia had been invaded by these barbarians and, in 1225, desperate for assistance, asked the Teutonic knights to come to his aid. He promised the Master possession of Culm and Dobrzin which Salza accepted with the provision that the knights could retain any Prussian territories that the Order captured. The Emperor's grant of Princely rank in 1226/27 in the "Golden Bull" of Rimini offered the knights sovereignty of any lands they captured as immediate fiefs of the Empire. The campaign to drive out the pagan tribes from prussia only lasted fifty years, the consolidation of their power in north-eastern Europe lasted one hundred and sixty years before the Polish-Lithuanian began to push the knights backwards. This Crusading enterprise succeeded only at a terrible cost, above all to the native populations but also the lives of thousands of knights and soldiers.
The amalgamation with the knights of the Sword (or knights of Christ as they were sometimes called) in 1237 proved of considerable value. The Knights of the Sword were a smaller but poweful military brotherhood based in Livonia. They had originally been subject to the authority of the Archbishop of Riga but, with the capture of Livonia and Estonia which they ruled as sovereign states, they were effectively independent. The disastrous defeat they suffered at the Batlle of Sauler on September 22, 1236, when they lost about one third of their knights including their Master, left them in an uncertain situation. The solution, union with the Teutonic Order, insured their survival and, henceforth, they had the status of a semi-autonomous province. The new Master of Livonia, a senior Teutonic Commander, now became a provincial Master in the Teutonic Order and the knights of the combined body adopted the Teutonic insignia.
The earliest Livonian knights had come mostly from south Germany. But, after joining with the Teutonic Order, the Livonian knights increasingly came from areas in which the Teutonic knights had a substantial presence, principally Westphalia. Virtually no knights were recruited from the local populations and most of the knights serving in the East spent only a few years there before returning to the Order's houses in Germany, Prussia or, until the loss of Acre, Palestine. It was not until the middle of the fourteenth century that it became customary to appoint the Master of Livonia for life as the Order's rule was more settled and service there less burdensome.
Salza died during these campaigns and was buried at Barletta, in Apulia; his shortlived successor, Conrad Landgraf von Thuringen, had commanded the knights in Prussia and died three months after sustaining terrible wounds at the battle of Whalstadt (April 9, 1241) after just one year in office. The fifth Master's rule was likewise shortlived but, his successor, Heinrich von Hohenlohe (1244-1253), enjoyed a very successful reign, receiving confirmation in 1245 of possession of Livonia, Courland and Samogitia from the Emperor. Under Hohenlohe's Magistery the knights granted a series of privileges regulating the government and ownership of property in Prussia. He also established the Order's house and future headquarters at Mergentheim (Marienthal) in Franconia, a property which he and his brother had given to the Order in 1219. By letters patent of August 20, 1250, Saint Louis IX of France granted four gold fleurs de lys to be worn one at each extremity of the Magistral Cross.
Under the eighth Master, Popon von Osterna (1253-1262), the Order further established its rule in Prussia, forcing the submission of the ruler of Sambia. The process of transferring peasant populations from Germany to Prussia now accelerated, while the Order established a feudal structure of smaller estates owing fealty to the knights. Under his successor, Annon von Sangershausen (1262-1274), the Order's privileges were confirmed by the Emperor Rudolf (of Habsburg) while the knights were authorized by the Pope to retain their hereditary estates after profession. This was an important privilege and insured the recruitment of landed knights who could not alienate their estates because of family obligations. They were also permitted to engage directly in trading activities, previously forbidden by their vows of poverty, by a further privilege of 1263 which insured their monopoly of the valuable Prussian grain trade. By the death of the tenth Master, Hartman von Heldrungen (in 1283) the Order was securely established in Prussia with the vast majority of their subjects converted to Christianity. As they advanced eastwards, however, building fortresses to insure the maintenance of their rule, the need for local manpower became an increasingly onerous burden for the largely agrarian civilian population who needed all the hands they could find to maintain their farms. Thus the conscription of young men as construction workers and foot soldiers - who generally incurred the greatest casualties in war - led to frequent rebellions against the rule of the knights which sometimes erupted into major conflagrations. Those of the knights subjects who were captured by the Lithuanians could expect permanent enslavement or, if time was short and circumstances prevented them being carried off, summary execution. Indeed, the penalties awaiting the prisoners taken by the Lithuanians could be horrific, as human sacrifice and slow death by torture were not infrequent practices.
Enslavement of pagan prisoners by the knights was likewise seen as perfectly acceptable, non-Christians not being considered to have the same rights as Christians. A description by an Austrian poet, Peter Suchenwirt, quoted by Ekdahl, well illustrates these horrifying events, not so dissimilar, perhaps, to recent events in Bosnia Herzegovina: "Women and children were taken captive; What a jolly medley could be seen: Many a woman could be seen, Two children tied to her body, One behind and one in front; On a horse without spurs Barefoot had they ridden here; The heathens were made to suffer: Many were captured and in every case, Were their hands tied together They were led off, all tied up - Just like hunting dogs". One can only wonder at the astonishing use of the word "jolly"! These slaves were then used to supplement the local labor force but, usefully did not require payment and so were often preferred to the Prussian natives who needed to be paid or granted land. By enslaving the Lithuanian prisoners as much needed manual laborers, there ceased to be any incentive to convert them as, once they became Christians, they could no longer be abusesd in this fashion. Hence, as Dr Ekdahl has suggested, as the local populations converted and, following the Christianization of Lithuania, prisoners of war could no longer be enslaved, the Order found it harder to conscript soldiers into its armies without detroying the livelihood of the landed peasantry who, through taxes, provided them with much of their revenues...
More Info at: http://www.imperialteutonicorder.com/
These guys are still around, can you believe it? Banned by Hitler in 1938?! I would've thought Hitler would've gotten a stiffy for these guys!
SAINT MARYS HOSPITAL IN JERUSALEM
The Teutonic Order, as a new institution was confirmed by the German Crusader leader, Duke Frederick of Swabia, on November 19th, in the year 1190 and with the capture of Acre, the founders of the hospital were given a permanent site in the city. Pope Clement III confirmed this body as the "fratrum Theutonicorum ecclesiae S. Mariae Hiersolymitanae" by the Bull Quotiens postulatur of February 6, 1191 and, within a few years, the Order had developed as a Religious Military institution comparable to the Hospitallers and Templars, although initially subordinate to the Master of the Hospital. This subordination was confirmed in the Bull Dilecti filii of Pope Gregory IX of January 12, 1240 addressed to the "fratres hospitalis S. Mariae Theutonicorum in Accon". The distinct German character of this new Hospitaller Order and the protection given to it by the Emperor and German rulers, enabled it to gradually assert a de facto independence from the Order of Saint John. The first Imperial grant came from Otto IV who gave the Order his protection on May 10, 1213 and this was followed almost immediately by a further confirmation by Frederick II on September 5, 1214. These Imperial confirmations each treated the Teutonic knights as independent from the Hospitallers. By the middle of the fourteenth century this independence was acknowledged by the Holy See.
Some forty knights were received into the new Order at its foundation by the King of Jerusalem and Frederick of Swabia, who selected their first Master in the name of the Pope and Emperor. The knights of the new confraternity had to be of German birth (although this rule was occasionally relaxed), a unique requirement among the Crusader Orders founded in the Holy Land. They were drawn predominately from the noble or knightly class, although this latter obligation was not formally incorporated into the rule until much later. Their blue mantle, charged with a black cross, was worn over a white tunic, a uniform recognized by the Patriarch of Jerusalem and confirmed by the Pope in 1211. The waves of German knights and pilgrims who followed the Third Crusade brought considerable wealth to the new German Hospital as well as recruits. This enabled the knights to acquire the Lordship of Joscelin and, soon thereafter they built the castle of Montfort (lost in 1271), the rival of the great hospitaller fortress of Krak des Chevaliers. Never as numerous in the Holy Land as either the Hospitaller or Templar Orders, the Teutonic knights were nonetheless a formidable power.
Master Heinrich von Walpot (died 1200), who led the knights in their first decade came from the Rhineland. He begun by drawing up the Order's statutes, ready by 1199, which were confirmed by Innocent III in the Bull Sacrosancta romana of February 19, 1199. These divided the knights into two classes, knights and priests, the former being obliged to take the triple monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience as well as promise to aid the sick and fight the Infidel. Unlike the knights, who from the early thirteenth century had to prove "ancient nobility", the priests were relieved of this obligation and their function was to celebrate the Mass and other religious offices, to administer the sacraments to the knights and the sick in their hospitals and follow them as almoners into war. Priests brothers could not become Masters, Commanders or even Vice-Commanders in either Lithuania or Prussia, but could become Commanders in Germany. Later these two ranks were augmented by a third class, of serving brothers (Sergeants, or Graumäntler), who wore a similar mantle but in gray rather than blue and charged with only three branches of the Cross to indicate that they were not full members of the confraternity.
The knights lived communally, sleeping in dormitories on simple beds, eating together in a refectory, the fare modest and no more than was sufficient. Their clothes and armor were likewise simple but practical and their daily duties included training for battle, maintaining their equipment and working with their horses. The dignity of Master - the style of Grand Master came later - was elective for life, as in the Order of Saint John, and like all the great officers was limited to the professed knights. The Master's deputy, the (Grand) Commander, to whom the priests were subject, governed the Order in the absence of his superior. The (Grand) Marshal, likewise immediately subordinate to the Master, was in command of the knights and ordinary troops and was responsible for insuring they were properly equipped. The (Grand) Hospitaller was in charge of the sick and the poor, the Drapier was responsible for buildings and clothing, the Treasurer administered the property. Each of these latter offices were generally held for shorter terms, rotating annually. As the Order expanded across Europe, it became necessary to appoint Provincial Masters for Germany, then Prussia and later Livonia with an hierarchic structure paralleling the great offices.
Walpot's successor, Otto von Kerpen, came from Bremen and the third Master, Herman Bart, from Holstein, illustrating the broad distribution of the early knights. The most important early Master was the fourth, Herman von Salza (1209-1239), from near Meissen who, through his own efforts as a diplomatist, considerably enhanced the prestige of the Order. His intercessions in the conflicts between Pope and Emperor earned him the favor of both, augmenting the knights expanding wealth and possessions. During his Magistery the Order received no less than thirty-two Papal confirmations or grants of privileges and a further thirteen Imperial confirmations. By the middle of Salza's Magistery the Orders properties extended from Slovenia (then Styria), through Saxony (Thuringia), Hesse, Franconia, Bavaria and the Tyrol, with houses in Prague and Vienna. There were also outposts in the outer reaches of the Byzantine Empire, notably Greece and what is now Romania. At his death the Orders estates extended as far as the Netherlands in the north west of the Empire, south west to France, Switzerland, further south in Spain and Sicily, and east to Prussia. Salza received a gold cross from the King of Jerusalem as the mark of his Mastership, following the distinguished conduct of the knights at the siege of Damietta in 1219. By an Imperial act of January 23, 1214, the Grand Master and his successors were granted membership of the Imperial Court; as possessors of immediate fiefs they enjoyed a seat in the Imperial Diet with the Princely rank from 1226/27. Immediate Princely rank was subsequently conferred on the Master of Germany and, after the loss of Prussia, to the Master of Livonia.
The Order's presence across mediaeval Europe enabled it to play a significant role in local political events. Despite the limitation of membership to the German nobility, the spread of German rule into Italy, notably in Sicily under Henry VI and Frederick II Barbarossa, led to the establishment of the Order's convents in places far distant from Germany. Sicily had been ruled by Saracens until the arrival of the Norman conquerors under the Hauteville family but the collapse of this dynasty led to their replacement by the German Hohenstaufens. The first Teutonic hospital, of Saint Thomas, was confirmed by the Emperor Henry VI in 1197 and, in the same year, the Emperor and Empress granted the knights their request for possession of the Church of Santa Trinitŕ in Palermo. Examination of grants of Sicilian properties to the three great crusader Orders in the period 1190-1220 indicates that the Teutonic knights were greater beneficiaries of imperial favor than either the Templars or Hospitallers. Furthermore, when Frederick II attained his majority he secured them the support of Pope Honorius III, who granted them numerous privileges confirming their equality with the other two great Crusader bodies.
The Teutonic knights had first established themselves in eastern Europe in 1211 after King Andrew of Hungary invited the knights to establish an outpost on the border of Transylvania. The warlike Cumans, who were also plaguing the Byzantine Empire to the south, were a constant threat and the Hungarians hoped that the knights would provide a buttress agains their attacks. King Andrew granted them considerable autonomy over the lands they captured with a mission to Christianize the inhabitants, but their demands for effective independence proved unacceptable and they were ordered to leave in 1225.
In 1217 Pope Honorius III proclaimed a crusade against the Prussian pagans. Duke Conrad of Massovia had been invaded by these barbarians and, in 1225, desperate for assistance, asked the Teutonic knights to come to his aid. He promised the Master possession of Culm and Dobrzin which Salza accepted with the provision that the knights could retain any Prussian territories that the Order captured. The Emperor's grant of Princely rank in 1226/27 in the "Golden Bull" of Rimini offered the knights sovereignty of any lands they captured as immediate fiefs of the Empire. The campaign to drive out the pagan tribes from prussia only lasted fifty years, the consolidation of their power in north-eastern Europe lasted one hundred and sixty years before the Polish-Lithuanian began to push the knights backwards. This Crusading enterprise succeeded only at a terrible cost, above all to the native populations but also the lives of thousands of knights and soldiers.
The amalgamation with the knights of the Sword (or knights of Christ as they were sometimes called) in 1237 proved of considerable value. The Knights of the Sword were a smaller but poweful military brotherhood based in Livonia. They had originally been subject to the authority of the Archbishop of Riga but, with the capture of Livonia and Estonia which they ruled as sovereign states, they were effectively independent. The disastrous defeat they suffered at the Batlle of Sauler on September 22, 1236, when they lost about one third of their knights including their Master, left them in an uncertain situation. The solution, union with the Teutonic Order, insured their survival and, henceforth, they had the status of a semi-autonomous province. The new Master of Livonia, a senior Teutonic Commander, now became a provincial Master in the Teutonic Order and the knights of the combined body adopted the Teutonic insignia.
The earliest Livonian knights had come mostly from south Germany. But, after joining with the Teutonic Order, the Livonian knights increasingly came from areas in which the Teutonic knights had a substantial presence, principally Westphalia. Virtually no knights were recruited from the local populations and most of the knights serving in the East spent only a few years there before returning to the Order's houses in Germany, Prussia or, until the loss of Acre, Palestine. It was not until the middle of the fourteenth century that it became customary to appoint the Master of Livonia for life as the Order's rule was more settled and service there less burdensome.
Salza died during these campaigns and was buried at Barletta, in Apulia; his shortlived successor, Conrad Landgraf von Thuringen, had commanded the knights in Prussia and died three months after sustaining terrible wounds at the battle of Whalstadt (April 9, 1241) after just one year in office. The fifth Master's rule was likewise shortlived but, his successor, Heinrich von Hohenlohe (1244-1253), enjoyed a very successful reign, receiving confirmation in 1245 of possession of Livonia, Courland and Samogitia from the Emperor. Under Hohenlohe's Magistery the knights granted a series of privileges regulating the government and ownership of property in Prussia. He also established the Order's house and future headquarters at Mergentheim (Marienthal) in Franconia, a property which he and his brother had given to the Order in 1219. By letters patent of August 20, 1250, Saint Louis IX of France granted four gold fleurs de lys to be worn one at each extremity of the Magistral Cross.
Under the eighth Master, Popon von Osterna (1253-1262), the Order further established its rule in Prussia, forcing the submission of the ruler of Sambia. The process of transferring peasant populations from Germany to Prussia now accelerated, while the Order established a feudal structure of smaller estates owing fealty to the knights. Under his successor, Annon von Sangershausen (1262-1274), the Order's privileges were confirmed by the Emperor Rudolf (of Habsburg) while the knights were authorized by the Pope to retain their hereditary estates after profession. This was an important privilege and insured the recruitment of landed knights who could not alienate their estates because of family obligations. They were also permitted to engage directly in trading activities, previously forbidden by their vows of poverty, by a further privilege of 1263 which insured their monopoly of the valuable Prussian grain trade. By the death of the tenth Master, Hartman von Heldrungen (in 1283) the Order was securely established in Prussia with the vast majority of their subjects converted to Christianity. As they advanced eastwards, however, building fortresses to insure the maintenance of their rule, the need for local manpower became an increasingly onerous burden for the largely agrarian civilian population who needed all the hands they could find to maintain their farms. Thus the conscription of young men as construction workers and foot soldiers - who generally incurred the greatest casualties in war - led to frequent rebellions against the rule of the knights which sometimes erupted into major conflagrations. Those of the knights subjects who were captured by the Lithuanians could expect permanent enslavement or, if time was short and circumstances prevented them being carried off, summary execution. Indeed, the penalties awaiting the prisoners taken by the Lithuanians could be horrific, as human sacrifice and slow death by torture were not infrequent practices.
Enslavement of pagan prisoners by the knights was likewise seen as perfectly acceptable, non-Christians not being considered to have the same rights as Christians. A description by an Austrian poet, Peter Suchenwirt, quoted by Ekdahl, well illustrates these horrifying events, not so dissimilar, perhaps, to recent events in Bosnia Herzegovina: "Women and children were taken captive; What a jolly medley could be seen: Many a woman could be seen, Two children tied to her body, One behind and one in front; On a horse without spurs Barefoot had they ridden here; The heathens were made to suffer: Many were captured and in every case, Were their hands tied together They were led off, all tied up - Just like hunting dogs". One can only wonder at the astonishing use of the word "jolly"! These slaves were then used to supplement the local labor force but, usefully did not require payment and so were often preferred to the Prussian natives who needed to be paid or granted land. By enslaving the Lithuanian prisoners as much needed manual laborers, there ceased to be any incentive to convert them as, once they became Christians, they could no longer be abusesd in this fashion. Hence, as Dr Ekdahl has suggested, as the local populations converted and, following the Christianization of Lithuania, prisoners of war could no longer be enslaved, the Order found it harder to conscript soldiers into its armies without detroying the livelihood of the landed peasantry who, through taxes, provided them with much of their revenues...
More Info at: http://www.imperialteutonicorder.com/
These guys are still around, can you believe it? Banned by Hitler in 1938?! I would've thought Hitler would've gotten a stiffy for these guys!