History of the Crusades

the Crusades Episode 247, the Baltic Crusades, the Prussian Crusade, the Prussian Crusade Part 15, pagan victories. Hello again.

Last week we saw two very competent masters,

Master Conrad and Master Otto

lead the fight back by the order in Livonia, with the end result

being a resolution to both the Archbishop Albert problem and the Russian problem.

Although the pagan problem, in the form of the Lithuanians,

Samagaleans and Samagetsitians remains to be dealt with.

We covered five years of the Livonian Crusade in last week's episode, bringing the timeline to the end of the year 1268.

So today we will revisit the Prussian Crusade and bring it a little further along the timeline.

We left Prussia back in episode 245 towards the end of the year 1263. The second Prussian insurrection was in full swing,

with the uprising which followed the Order's defeat at the Battle of Durbin, spreading out from Samland and

Natangia to cover the entire Prussian region. Now, somewhat surprisingly, at this time, trade was still continuing

up and down the Vistula River. The order's priority was to protect this industry, so defences were placed along

strategic points on the banks of the river.

At the same time the defences at Tourn were strengthened.

Its defensive walls were totally reconstructed, although at this stage they were still made from logs

of wood packed with earth and not stone. The leader of the Prussians in Netangia, Herkis Monter, and the leader of the

Bharshan Prussians, a man called Devan, were by this stage in the uprising proving to be highly effective

military commanders and were controlling sizable armies which they were putting to good use against the Teutonic

order. If the second Prussian insurrection had been restricted to just the Teutonic Order and the insurrectionist

Prussians, then the outcome would have proven to be an interesting contest but outside influences

...