History of the Crusades

the Crusades Episode 2008, the Baltic Crusades, the Livonian Crusade Part 14, 12 to 1215.

Hello again.

Last week we saw some action on the Estonian front

with the Christians invading Estonia and conquering the town of

felon and the Estonians invading Christian territory and attempting to take the town of Triton.

The Estonians were unsuccessful in their attempts to take the Lavonian town

and were slaughtered mercilessly by the German Crusaders.

In a shrewd move Bishop Albert appointed Abbott Theodoric as the new Bishop of Estonia, and then appointed a celebrated visiting warrior from

Germany, Bernard Zulipa, as the new Abbot of the monastery located at the mouth of the Dalgova River.

When we left last week's episode, the Germans were planning a winter campaign, intending to strike deep into the heart of Estonia and secure it for Theodoric

so that he could start the conversion and subjugation of his new bishopric.

More than 4,000 German cavalry and foot soldiers set out in the winter of 1211 to 1212, using the frozen rivers as highways to much of the land

occupied by the various Estonian tribes. Now I say various Estonian tribes here because this is

an important point to remember. Estonia currently isn't a unified country with all Estonians under the control of a central authority.

No, Estonia is composed of a number of totally independent tribes, all speaking the same language

and operating in the same region, but with their own agendas and their own goals.

Conquering Estonia therefore would mean defeating every one of these separate tribes.

The German campaign started off really well, so well in fact that it set alarm bells ringing in the neighbouring Russian

Principality of Scorf. Some Estonians had appealed to Novgorod for aid

and a bunch of Russian fighters from Novgorod had duly made

their way into Estonia to fight the invading Germans.

...