4.27 Europe: a.d. 1301 to 1400  (Page 12/12)

Eastern europe

Southern baltic area

Northern Estonia was sold by Denmark to German nobles of the Teutonic Knights, who were already pretty well distributed throughout that area. About two centuries of eastward migration of Germans, with the founding of such cities as Wismar, Rostock, Stralsund, Greifswald, Cammin and Kolberg had resulted in the formation of the Hanseatic League in 1358. The bulk of the peasantry in the Baltic States retained their Finno-Ugrian character and there was not any actual military conquest except in Prussia. (Ref. 8 ) In this and the next century the northern seas swarmed with herring and the Hanseatic League (with some strong competition from the Dutch) tended to dominate the commerce. Herring has to be salted within 24 hours of the catch and so this was of ten done at sea with salt imported from the south. The same chemical allowed cabbage to be preserved through the winter and the Baltic lands had a frontier boom, sending timber and grain to the Low Countries. As in most of Europe, however, the Black Death came on the scene in 1350. (Ref. 211 , 137 , 279 )

Early in the century Poland withdrew from a previous short-term Bohemian association and in spite of pressure by the German Knights on the west and north and by Lithuania on the east, Vladislav united Poland into a coherent kingdom with a capital at Cracow. Casimir III, called the Great, continued as a fine administrator, indulging in some territorial exchanges and founding the University of Cracow. In both this and the next century, Poland's internal strife was perpetually between kings attempting unification and nobles trying to establish more of an oligarchy type of government. Externally Poland pushed alternately against the Teutonic Knights northward, trying to get to the Baltic, and southeast toward the Black Sea. As a result of a dynastic agreement in 1370, Louis of Hungary became the Polish king and reigned until his death about 1382. The Poles then accepted Louis' younger daughter, Jadwiga, and married her to Jagiello of Lithuania, at which time they separated from Hungary. Beginning in this century the Poles used their rivers for transportation of great rafts carrying wood to the Baltic Sea. Like other European medieval cities, Prague was a walled, self-contained unit, but occasionally it was necessary to move the walls to allow for growth. (Ref. 260 )

NOTE: Insert Map 74. Lithuania and Poland 13th-14th Centuries

Lithuania was the largest territorial state of 14th century Europe and Gedymin (1316- 1341) and Olgierd (1345-1377) of the Gedimimas family were the real founders of that nation. Blocked by the Germans on the Baltic, they took advantage of the weakness of the Russian principalities to extend control to the east and south by acquiring Polotsk, Minsk and the middle Dnieper region, with Vilno as the capital of the state. Several times Olgierd advanced to the very outskirts of Moscow and he extended his domains to the Black Sea, where he defeated the resident Tatars, re-establishing an extensive realm that had been occupied in prehistoric times by the Baltic Galindas. The Lithuanians were people that had originated in the upper Dnieper basin and mixed with Lappons, who had been pushed south by the Baltic Finns. At the end of the century Lithuania was ruled by Jagiello, a pagan. When he married the Polish princess Jadwiga, as noted above, she converted him to Christianity and he then took the name Valdislav II. This marriage united Poland and Lithuania into a giant Slavic kingdom in 1385. The Polish-Lithuanian link was always loose, however, for several reasons not the least of which was that Poland was Catholic and Lithuania was chiefly Orthodox. In addition, they tended to pull in opposite directions, with the Poles chiefly concerned with the inroad of the Germans while the Lithuanians expanded along the Black Sea, hoping to exploit the decline of the Golden Horde. The latter were still tough enough, nevertheless, to defeat the Lithuanians in 1399 and close off their Black Sea outlet. (Ref. 49 , 119 , 61 , 137 ) (See map, page 726, also)

Russia (see map in russia section in 19th century)

Russia did not exist as a nation at this time. The western-most territory was dependent to Lithuania; the north had a variety of independent city-states, including from north to south the Principates of Novgorod, Moscow and Ryazan. The east, including all the territory north of the Caspian, some east of the Caspian, all north of the Black Sea in a diagonal line running northeast - all this was the Khanate of the Golden Horde with its Mongol-Turk marauder occupants. It was noted in the last chapter that in all probability the plague was brought to the Euro-Asian steppes from the southeast of Asia, then by the Mongols to the Crimea, from whence it spread to all of Europe. In 1347 the city of Caffa (now Feodosiya) was under siege by the Tartars when they suddenly began dying off with plague. The living Mongols catapulted their dead companions into the city and as the Christian defenders started home, nearly all died at sea. It was the survivors that started the epidemic in Italy that soon spread to the entire continent. (Ref. 8 , 137 , 125 )

Novgorod was an important city of the Hanseatic League with a population in this century of about 400,000, a high rate of literacy and a thriving economy. In the Ukraine the old Scythian population, mixed with Slav and some Mongol blood, reverted to a nomadic life and became the Christian Cossacks, forming somewhat of a buffer against the Tartars. The general population shift, however, was northward. In 1318 the Yarlik (charter) given by the Golden Horde to a north Russian subaltern, passed on to Prince Yuri of Moscow and then to Ivan of Moscow, who also brought the Church Metropolitan to that city. The Russians of the era were very pious, monasteries were numerous and the Patriarch Alexis was virtually the ruler of the Russian people from 1354 to 1370 as the church was the life and culture of all. In mid-century Ivan II of Moscow refused to pay tax to the Mongols and the latter retaliated by raiding and massacring some 24,000 people and burning the city of Moscow. After this, however, the Mongol hold on Russia gradually weakened and in the great battle of Kulikovo, Dmitri Donskoi (meaning "of the Don"), then ruler of Moscovy, defeated the Tartar army in 1380 for the first time. Lithuanian armies, which were supposed to help the Mongols, did not arrive on time and probably related to this defeat is the fact that in the same year the Golden Horde was conquered by the White Horde from the east, which then migrated into its territories, although in the West all were still known by the former name. The Mongol-Turks were still not completely destroyed, however, and lived to attack Moscow again. (Ref. 131 , 119 )

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