Podcasts about baltic crusades

Big claims have been made for the impact of the Baltic Crusades on Russia's relationship with the West. This episode looks at whether they stand up to scrutiny.

Northwest of Rus live the Baltic peoples. After centuries of relative isolation, they are attracting unwanted attention from their neighbours.

When we think of crusades, images of the Knights Templar riding into battle against their Islamic foes in the Holy Land spring to mind. But there was another medieval crusade against non-believers, in this case pagans, held in Scandinavia in the same time period. How did the Church arrive at the conclusion that it had no choice but to forcibly convert these Baltic heathens? Some monarchs were anxious to convert for the political advantage it gave them, but others like the Swedish Queen Sigrid the Haughty preferred a slap in the face to Christianity.

In a programme first broadcast in 2016, Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Baltic Crusades, the name given to a series of overlapping attempts to convert the pagans of North East Europe to Christianity at the point of the sword. From the 12th Century, Papal Bulls endorsed those who fought on the side of the Church, the best known now being the Teutonic Order which, thwarted in Jerusalem, founded a state on the edge of the Baltic, in Prussia. Some of the peoples in the region disappeared, either killed or assimilated, and the consequences for European history were profound. With Aleks Pluskowski Associate Professor of Archaeology at the University of Reading Nora Berend Fellow of St Catharine's College and Reader in European History at the Faculty of History at the University of Cambridge and Martin Palmer Director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and Culture Producer: Simon Tillotson

The Lithuanian Conflict XXVI - The End

The Lithuanian Conflict XXV - The decline of the Teutonic Order

The Lithuanian Conflict XXIV - Many endings

The Lithuanian Conflict XXIII - Coronation crisis

The Lithuanian Conflict XXII - The Great Conference of 1427

The Lithuanian Conflict XXI - War and peace

The Lithuanian Conflict XX - Catching up on news from home

The Lithuanian Conflict XIX - The Council of Constance Part 3

The Lithuanian Conflict XVIII - The Council of Constance Part 2

The Lithuanian Conflict XVII - The Council of Constance Part 1

The Lithuanian Conflict XVI - The Hunger War

The Lithuanian Conflict XV - A new Grandmaster

The Lithuanian Conflict XIV - Michael and the Emperor

The Lithuanian Conflict XIII - Tales of intrigue and suspicion

The Lithuanian Conflict XII - The First Peace of Thorn

The Lithuanian Conflict XI - The siege of Marienburg

The Lithuanian Conflict X - To Marienburg

The Lithuanian Conflict IX - The Battle of Tannenberg Part 3

The Lithuanian Conflict VIII - The Battle of Tannenberg Part 2

The Lithuanian Conflict VII - The Battle of Tannenberg Part 1

The Lithuanian Conflict VI - A troubled peace

The Lithuanian Conflict V - Samogitia erupts

The Lithuanian Conflict IV - Tensions rise

The Lithuanian Conflict III - Trying times

The Lithuanian Conflict II - Rebellion and war

The Lithuanian Conflict I - The Gotland War

The Livonian Crusade LII - Internal strife

The Samogitian Crusade XXVI - Samogitian revolt

The Samogitian Crusade XXV - The end of the Samogitian Crusade

The Samogitian Crusade XXIV - The second siege of Vilnius

The Samogitian Crusade XXIII - Vytautus victorious

The Samogitian Crusade XXII - Grandmaster Conrad von Wallenrode

The Samogitian Crusade XXI - The crusade of Henry Bolingbroke

The Samogitian Crusade XX - Vytautus strikes back

The Samogitian Crusade - Samogitian defiance

The Samogitian Crusade XVIII - Poland and Lithuania

The Samogitian Crusade XVII - Jogaila v Vytautas

The Samogitian Crusade XVI - The Supreme Prince of Lithuania

The Samogitian Crusade XV - Jogaila

The Samogitian Crusade XIV - The Battle of Rudau

The Livonian Crusade LI - Border raids

The Samogitian Crusade XIII - The siege of Kaunas 1362

The Samogitian Crusade XII - A failed conversion

The Samogitian Crusade XI - Dobrin

The Samogitian Crusade X - Grandmaster Winrich von Kniprode

The Samogitian Crusade IX - The battle on the Strebe