Miracles and divine intervention during the struggle between the Teutonic Order and Lithuania in Christian narratives from the 14th century - YANINA RYIER (Autor) (2023)
10.15181/ahuk.v44i0.2575
https://e-journals.ku.lt/journal/AHUK
Oryginalny artykuł naukowy
More than a hundred years of fighting between the Teutonic Order and the Grand Duchy ofLithuania have left us with a considerable amount of narrative sources that allow researchers to-day to imagine the language of the Christians who fought against the pagans, and to understandtheir beliefs and propaganda measures. One little-studied question in this regard is how the Chris-tian narrative tradition of the 14th century portrayed miracles and divine intervention during thestruggle between the Teutonic Order and Lithuania. To address this question, the author of the ar-ticle focuses on the chronicles of the Teutonic Order, which represented the idea of the Crusade tothe Lithuanian lands, and therefore showed a strong need to emphasise the religious aspect of thewhole military conflict. At the same time, however, she also draws on other surviving documentsfor comparison, including Lithuanian and Ruthenian narrative sources. The author argues that theaccounts of miracles and divine intervention in sources from the Teutonic Order were influenced bythe nature of the Order as a religious military corporation and the chroniclers’ need to explain thecampaigns to Lithuania as a holy war. It was this need that led them to place a great emphasis onthe depiction of divine intervention in the campaigns of the crusaders to help them.
Keywords: historia