Albrecht of brandenburg, Grandmaster of the Teutonic Knights becomes a protestant duke of Prussia
This week we will talk about the end of the rule of the Teutonic Knights in Prussia. Instead of a land ruled by a chivalric order answering to the pope, Prussia became a secular state, ruled by a protestant prince and run by a newly created class of land-owners, the famous Prussian Junkers whose impact on German history stretched well into the 20th century.
But the conversion of the last Grand Master and his submission to the Polish crown wasn’t the end of the order. In fact the order still exists to this day, though on a fundamentally different form, which is another fascinating history we will explore in this episode.
The podcast that does what it says on the tin: a narrative history of the German people that starts in the year 919 AD and hopes to get all the way to 1991. Episodes are 25-35 min long and drop on Thursday mornings. As Gregory of Tours (539-594) said: “A great many things keep happening, some good, some bad” .
The show is now entering its 8th season. So far we have covered:
The Ottonian Emperors (Ep. 1- 21)
– Henry the Fowler (Ep. 1)
– Otto I (Ep. 2-8)
– Otto II (Ep.9-11)
– Otto II (Ep. 11-14)
– Henry II (ep. 15-17)
– Germany in the Year 1000 (ep. 18-21)
The Salian Emperors and the Investiture Controversy (Ep. 22-42)
– Konrad II (Ep. 22- 25)
– Henry III (Ep. 26-29)
– Henry IV & Canossa (Ep. 30-39)
– Henry V and the Concordat of Worms (Ep. 40-42)
Barbarossa and the early Hohenstaufen (Ep. 43-69)
– Lothar III (Ep. 43-46)
– Konrad III (Ep. 47-49)
– Frederick Barbarossa (Ep. 50-69)
Frederick II and the later Hohenstaufen (Ep. 70-94)
-Henry VI (Ep. 70-72)
– Philipp of Swabia (Ep. 73-74)
– Otto IV (Ep. 74-75)
– Frederick II (Ep. 75-90)
– Epilogue (ep. 91-94)
Eastern Expansion (Ep. 95-108)
The Hanseatic League (Ep. 109-127)
The Teutonic Knights (Ep. 128-137)
The Interregnum and the early Habsburgs (Ep. 138 ff
This week we will talk about the end of the rule of the Teutonic Knights in Prussia. Instead of a land ruled by a chivalric order answering to the pope, Prussia became a secular state, ruled by a protestant prince and run by a newly created class of land-owners, the famous Prussian Junkers whose impact on German history stretched well into the 20th century.
But the conversion of the last Grand Master and his submission to the Polish crown wasn’t the end of the order. In fact the order still exists to this day, though on a fundamentally different form, which is another fascinating history we will explore in this episode.
Episode Website with transcript, maps and lots more: Episode 137– Conversion • History of the Germans Podcast
The music for the show is Flute Sonata in E-flat major, H.545 by Carl Phillip Emmanuel Bach (or some claim it as BWV 1031 Johann Sebastian Bach) performed and arranged by Michel Rondeau under Common Creative Licence 3.0.
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To make it easier for you to share the podcast, I have created separate playlists for some of the seasons that are set up as individual podcasts. they have the exact same episodes as in the History of the Germans, but they may be a helpful device for those who want to concentrate on only one season.
So far I have:
Salian Emperors and Investiture Controversy
Fredrick Barbarossa and Early Hohenstaufen
The Holy Roman Empire 1250-1356
TRANSCRIPT
Hello and welcome to the History of the Germans: Episode 137 – The Conversion
This week we will talk about the end of the rule of the Teutonic Knights in Prussia. Instead of a land ruled by a chivalric order answering to the pope, Prussia became a secular state, ruled by a protestant prince and run by a newly created class of land-owners, the famous Prussian Junkers whose impact on German history stretched well into the 20th century.
But the conversion of the last Grand Master and his submission to the Polish crown wasn’t the end of the order. In fact the order still exists to this day, though on a fundamentally different form, which is another fascinating history we will explore in this episode.
But before we start a big thank you to our supporters who have signed up on patreon.com/history of the Germans and or have made a generous one-time contribution at historyofthegermans.com/support. And this week I want to acknowledge James H. S., Oliver K., cole P., Flouritz and Dominique who have already signed up!.
Last week we left the scene in 1466 when grand master Ludwig von Erlichshausen signed the second peace of Thorn bringing an end to devastating 13 years war. At the end of the conflict Prussia was divided into two parts. Royal Prussia that comprised the old Polish duchy of Pomerelia and Western Prussia and then the order’s state of east Prussia with its capital at Koenigsberg, modern day Kaliningrad. Royal Prussia, as the name indicates was ruled by the king of Poland whilst East Prussia was all that was left of the order’s territory in Prussia.
Eastern Prussia was by far the poorer part. The great centers of Gdansk, Elblag and Torun were lost to the order and with it the trade along the Vistula River that connected the rich agricultural lands and mineral wealth of central Europe to the Baltic.
The agricultural surplus such as it was was exported either via Koenigsberg, or the busy harbors of Gdansk and Elblag. Apart from grain and wood, the other main export was the oldest product of the region, amber on which the order still retained a de-facto monopoly.
The Second peace of Thorn did not only result in a material change in territory, but also in a change in status. Up to 1466 the order in Prussia managed to stay fairly independent. Based on the Golden Bull of Rimini and the papal letter from 1234 the grand master was both an imperial prince and an immediate vassal of the pope. They had also some sort of link to the Polish crown as Konrad of Masovia had given them the Kulmer land on terms that the order argued was full independence and Polish chroniclers claim included some for of vassalage. It is likely that the order liked to keep things vague, because having multiple masters meant they had none.
In 1466 Ludwig von Erlichshausen was forced to swear an oath of allegiance to the king of Poland and he had to further promise that from now on at least half of the new recruits into the order were Poles. This latter provision ended up being unenforceable due to the resistance within the order and the reluctance of the Polish nobility to join. And on the former, the vassalage to the polish crown, each grand master following Ludwig von Erlichshausen tried to wriggle out of.
The war had also brought significant social change to east Prussia. As we said before, the state of the order had tried to hold on to most of the land and castles for itself and restricted the creation of a local aristocracy. And that was particularly the case in east Prussia where the nobles such as they existed were either descendants of the leadership of the Old Prussian tribes or former settlers who made good. During the 13 years war a new nobility appeared in Prussia. These were the mercenary commanders the grand master had been unable to pay. So instead of gold coin, they were given land, either land of the order or land taken from the local nobility that had sided with the Prussian League. Some of the more famous names amongst the East Prussian nobility like the von Dohna, von Eulenburg, von Schlieben, von Lehndorff came into Prussia during this period. These new landowners weren’t tied to the order and its ancient ways of working. In particular they had no qualms pushing the formerly fee peasants into a dependency to the local lord that was on the verge of turning into actual serfdom. Given how weak the grand master had become, there was little he could do to stop them.
And the order itself began to fracture. The Komturs, the senior officers and the heads of the castle convents began to treat their estates as if they were their own. They refused to pass on their profits to the headquarters in Koenigsberg. One of them zeven became a pirate who menaced Hanse shipping and could only be stopped when the Garnd master raised an army and stormed his castle at Memel. Those who did not act so blatantly still demanded to be treated like magnates within the state and get a seat in the Landrat, the representation of the estates of Prussia alongside the bishops, cities and nobles.
The grand master’s income was limited to the manors linked directly to Koenigsberg. Which meant any major investment, war or action of any kind required the consent of the various estates represented in the Landrat.
And then there was the bishopric of Ermland. The bishops of Ermland always had a more independent position than the other three bishoprics and as we heard last week had become neutral in the latter stages of the 13 years war which was another nail in the coffin of the order’s struggle. In the peace of Thorn, the bishop too had accepted vassalage to the King of Poland. But his diocese was made part of Royal Prussia rather than east Prussia. The problem with that was that Ermland sits right in the middle of East Prussia.
So unsurprisingly the conflict between the order and Poland resumes with Ermland. When the bishopric becomes vacant in 1467 the chapter elects Nikolaus von Thungen as bishop. King Kasimir of Poland does not like von Thungen, rejects his appointment and puts someone else in place. At which point the pope gets involved and insists on von Thungen. Von Thungen cannot get to Ermland and has to take refuge in Riga, from where he tries to build an alliance in support for his claim. He finds a sponsor in the form of the king of Hungary who pays for an army that captures some of Ermland on the bishop’s behalf. In 1477 the grand master feels that things have moved on sufficiently that he joins the fight. And since he was now at war with Poland anyway, he rescinds his vassalage to the King of Poland. At which point the Poles come down with a sizeable army. The usual burning and pillaging ensue though the Poles fail to take any of the major cities. However, the grand master’s resources are quickly exhausted, and the king of Hungary withdraws his support. So, another war ends with a defeat for the order. Ermland returns under Polish control and the grand master is made to bend the knee again.
The whole ramshackle structure limps on for another 20 years until the Grand Master Johann von Tiefen suggests a way out. So far, the members of the order and its grand masters had been recruited mainly from the lower nobility of the empire. There were the occasional grand masters from the princely houses but all of them had joined the order as simple knights and had worked their way through the ranks. The downside of this process was that none of the magnates of the empire had a personal relationship with the order. And given the lack of resources the order now needed powerful sponsors. The proposed way to acquire one of these sponsors was to offer the role of grand master to a second son of a great magnate who would then provide money and men to help the order.
The person they settled on was Friedrich von Sachsen, youngest son of the duke of Saxony. Friedrich had been destined for a career in the church and had studied in Siena, Bologna and Leipzig. He ticked all the boxes. In 1497 he was admitted to the order and immediately elevated to grand master.
Friedrich von Sachsen set down to restructure the state. Part of the agreement he had made the leaders of the order to sign before joining was that they would materially increase the financial support to the center. Once elevated he pushed through further reforms, very much on the model of the territorial principality he had grown up in. He reintroduced regular visitations to the various castles and towns where he inspected the discipline of the brothers and held court, solving disputes between the people and the order. He restructured the army and established a professional bureaucracy. Basically, he operated like a 15th century territorial prince. He even held festivities in Koenigsberg palace for the local nobility with music and – shock horror – in the presence of ladies.
As for the main political objective he made some progress. As the senior officers of the order had hoped, Friedrich gathered support in the empire for a secession from the Polish crown. The emperor Maximilian encouraged him to refuse the oath of vassalage to the king of Poland. On e he had declared his intention, Prussia had to expect retaliation from Poland any minute. Though that did not happen, or at least not on the scale feared, Friedrich felt unsafe in Koenigsberg and relocated back home to Rochlitz in Saxony, leaving a governor in his place.
Despite this rather disappointing result, the order continued in his policy and sought another high aristocrat as grand Master when Friedrich died in 1510. This one was a certain Albrecht, who happens to be the very first member of the House of Hohenzollern making an appearance as a story protagonist on this podcast. And little shows how far the order has fallen that they could not even affords a second son, but only one of the 10 sons of margrave Friedrich von Brandenburg Ansbach, an over indebted incompetent ruler of the small county of Ansbach, who himself was only the second son of the elector of Brandenburg, the one with the actual power.
That being said, Albrecht von Brandenburg will leave an indelible mark on the history of the Teutonic order.
He picks up where his predecessor had left off. Like him, he had settled with the leadership of the order on some ground rules. Even more support for the central authority, willingness to accept reforms and granting him the lifestyle of a lord rather than a master of a chivalric order. One request close to his heart was that he should be relieved from the oath of chastity, celibacy he was ok with, just not chastity. As they say, getting a good CEO one has to make some sacrifices. Though it seems his new brothers too had developed a laxer attitude towards the rules of St. Benedict.
The transition to a territorial state continued. Albrecht relied mainly on close associates like the bishop of Pomesania and civil bureaucrats to run the administration and refused to appoint replacements for the senior officers of the order who had retired or died.
The other main political project he continued was the attempt to get out from under the Polish vassalage. So he went on a public relations campaign in the empire arguing that east Prussia, or all of Prussia in his mind, was part of the Teutsche Lande, the German Lands. And he had some success. The Reichstag in Augsburg in 1512 declared the second peace of Thorn invalid. The Polish king then went to the pope, who ordered Albrecht to do as he was ordered and swear allegiance to his uncle, king Sigismund of Poland. In 1515 emperor Charles V changed his mind and withdrew his support. Albrecht found a new supporter though, grand duke Vasili III of Moscow who had been at war with Poland Lithuania for a while. What that was worth is unclear because when Albrecht kicked off hostilities in 1519, not a lot of Muscovy soldiers were seen in his army. This war lasted just 18 months and though Albrecht was in fact ill equipped for such an endeavour, the |Polish army that inevitably showed up failed to take any of the major strongholds, and in particular failed in its siege of Koenigsberg. Abrecht rustled up some Danish mercenaries from Livonia when the Livonian master refused to aid him who were expensive but effective, pushing the Poles back to the Vistula…and then the money ran out, the Danes went home and thanks to mediation by the emperor and the pope the two sides agreed a 4 year truce.
It is now 1522 and Albrecht von Brandenburg travels to the empire to find out why nobody came up to help him and whether they would be coming when the truce runs out in 1525. But everywhere he went, he hit a brick wall. Even his brother in Christ the German Master of the Teutonic Order outright refused to spend any more money on futile, expensive wars in Prussia. Most of the German princes took their lead from that and withheld support safe for their best wishes.
But he did meet someone who was offering a solution. Whilst Albrecht was busy fighting the Poles, a professor at the university of Wittenberg had printed a list of 95 theses and distributed them widely, including having them posted on the door of All Saints church. That professor you obviously know was Martin Luther.
Luther’s demands for reform had spread rapidly. In 1521 he had defended them before the Reichstag in Worms which had made them a topic of discussion all over Europe. Already in that same year one of Albrecht’s associates had proposed to consult with Luther about possible ways to reform the order. But that attempt failed as the elector of Saxony, who protected Luther on the Wartburg was unwilling to act as middleman.
In June 1523 Luther is back in Wittenberg receiving visitors, and Albrecht sends his associate in a secret mission to discuss possible changes in the structure of the order. In November Albrecht himself goes to Wittenberg and meets with Luther and Melanchthon. The reformers are blunt. Quote “Monks are nothing but wizards and associates of the devil who have fooled the world with their bogus tricks and artifice” end quote. He has some more choice words about monasticism that I will refrain from mentioning here, but let’s just say, only a ex-monk can be so harsh on his former vocation. And if monks should leave the monasteries to become useful members of society, that is what chivalric brothers should do too. Their proposal: Make yourself the duke of a secular state and cast the order into the dustbin of history.
And, as is Luther’s habit, he follows the meeting up by writing a public proclamation suggesting that the quote “lords of the Teutonic Order, give up false chastity and seek the true chastity of the marriage bed”. End quote
Albrecht meanwhile returns to Prussia where he finds many of his close associates thrilled by Luther’s proposals. So are the estates of Prussia, the cities and nobles who would much rather have a secular duke as overlord than a corporation of monkish warriors. Some of the bishops had picked up the protestant faith as well, whilst preachers have come to Prussia proclaiming the time for fundamental change had come.
Whilst all this is going on, the timeline of the truce has been running down. Albrecht explores one more time whether there is anyone willing to give him the funds to continue the fight, but has to conclude that this is no longer a viable option.
He meets up with king Sigismund who suggests that Albrecht dissolves the order and becomes a duke and vassal to the Polish king.
With options running out, Grand Master Albrecht von Brandenburg signs on the dotted line, puts his hand in the hands of the Polish Monarch and rises again as duke Albrecht of Prussia. That was on April 10, 1525.
It is only 2 months later that Albrecht then formally declares for the Lutheran faith.
Are these things connected? The historian Jurgen Sarnowski argues that these two events, the creation of ducal Prussia and the conversion to Protestantism had been independent events. The emperor Charles V, Pope Clement VII and King Sigismund supported the creation of the duchy and dissolution of the order in the belief that a duke Albrecht would remain a faithful son of the church. If so, it was quite naïve. Luther’s pamphlet and Albrecht’s visit to Wittenberg cannot have gone unnoticed and many observers in Germany had already voiced concerns that the grand master was at least tilting towards the Reformation.
This first conversion of a spiritual principality not only changed the status of the Grand Master. It also had a huge impact on the remaining Knight Brothers. Some were unwilling to accept the Reformation and left for the order’s convents in Germany that had stayed faithful to the Pope. But the majority were happy to leave their convents, marry and make babies. And they did not leave empty handed. Many of the possessions of the order were handed over to the knights brothers as private property. The former knight brothers were now nobles or as the east Prussians were often called, Junker. They followed in the footsteps of the mercenary Junkers who had come into land 50 years earlier and established large estates with dependent peasants tilling the land.
A lasting peace, the secularisation of the bishoprics and other monastic lands and the establishment of a tax gathering bureaucracy provided Albrecht finally with the funds to rebuild his battered state. And he did that fairly successfully. He invested in particular in education, founded schools in the major cities and the university of Koenigsberg, the future alma mater of Immanuel Kant. He reigned a solid 43 years as duke and passed away in 1568 from the plague. He was succeeded by his son, Albrecht Friedrich who was deposed due to severe mental illness. Then the duchy went through a number of regents from the Hohenzollern family until they almost all died out and Prussia became part of the states of the elector of Brandenburg one of whose descendants crowned himself and his wife as king in Prussia in Koenigsberg in 1701. King in Prussia because Prussia was still under Polish overlordship.
We will no doubt spend a lot of time talking about Prussia on this podcast, so we can leave this story here.
But as for the Teutonic order, this was not the end.
When Albrecht unveiled his shock announcement that he was to convert to the Lutheran faith, the other two masters, the Livonian master and the German master were aghast. Both were men in their seventies and deeply loyal to the papacy. Now they saw the man they had regarded as the leader of their order become a secular prince and immediately excommunicated.
The Livland Master, Wolter von Plettenberg saw himself as a bulwark against the expanding orthodox grand duchy of Moscow. But Livonia wasn’t Prussia. In Livonia there had aways been other powers present, the cities of Riga, Dorpat and Narva the bishops and the local aristocracy. The cities as members of the Hanse saw their brethren in Luebeck, Hamburg and Danzig pick up Lutheranism and followed suit. Plettenberg had to allow Protestant preachers into the land and even inside the order the new religion gained support. Under his successors the order kept shifting more and more away from Catholicism. When Muscovy under Ivan the terrible invaded the order sought help from abroad, mostly from protestant Denmark and Sweden. This help did not come for free and the state of the order crumbled quickly. The last Livonian Master, Gotthard Kettler swore allegiance to King Sigismund II of Poland in 1561, dissolved the order in Livonia and became duke of Courland. As in Prussia the lands of the order were distributed amongst the brothers who became part of the already sizeable German-speaking aristocracy that dominated these lands until the Bolshevik revolution.
The German branch of the order did hold out longer. They too had to balance the religious differences. In the interest of keeping the organisation going brothers were allowed to convert to Lutheranism if they so chose. In the 17th century they also admitted Calvinists which turned the order into a multi-confessional community. There was however a major problem. The Lutheran and Calvinist brothers wanted the property they had been administering, or more precisely, enjoying, to pass to their descendants. And in that they often found support from protestant territorial princes, who they served as officers or administrators. As the children of former warrior monks inherited these estates, the property of the order quickly eroded.
Only in Southern Germany was the order able to retain or even expand its territory. The German Master moved his seat to Mergentheim in 1527 where he established one of these statelets the Holy Roman empire had hundreds of. In 1590 the order elected Maximilian of Habsburg as its German and now also grand master. From 1641 onwards all grand masters were members of the Habsburg family as a sinecure for younger sons. And when I say younger, I mean younger. The youngest was just 13 years old when he entered the order and became instantly elected as a successor to Hermann von Salza.
As for the members of the order, an element of the martial tradition remained. Members were required to serve at least three years in the wars against the Ottoman empire as officers.
When Napoleon did away with all these little statelets to create more efficient entities to furnish him with soldiers, the last remaining properties of the Teutonic Knights, including Mergentheim were secularised.
But still the order continued to exist. The Habsburgs kept supporting it, making it a honorary chivalric order. Its activities, sponsored by the honourees reverted back to its roots, hospitals and schools. When the Habsburg monarchy fell in 1918, the order had its final crisis. They had lost their sponsor and as far as the public were concerned they were just a part of the now defunct monarchy. The last Habsburg Grand master resigned and in 1929 the pope gave the order a new rule. Under this new rule only priest and nuns were full members of the order and they should solely focus on religious tasks, in particular caring for the sick and the elderly and in education. The order has its headquarter in Vienna and has about 200 priests and 100 nuns today.
And that brings the story of the Teutonic Knights to its end.
I recognise that this part of history plays a huge role in the national narratives of Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and even Russia and Romania. A role much more significant than it played in the German National story, even in the 19th century. That did not mean we did not develop the usual mix of fact and fiction that described the order as a bit tough round the edges but ultimately a bringer of civilisation to a savage land. And the Nazis picked up some of the iconography building Ordensburgen as school buildings for the Nazi elite, whilst suppressing the actual order. And for those Germans who trace their roots to Danzig or East Prussia these stories have certainly great importance.
Given these sensitivities I was even more focused on painting an accurate and balanced picture of events in these episodes than usual. I tried to stick close to primary sources and recent scholarship. Should I have made mistakes, and I almost certainly have made many, I apologise. It was not out of malice but lack of attention. And as we are on the topic a quick shout out to all of you who posted interesting and informative comments on the Facebook posts I put out on these topics. And in particular a big thanks to listener Mariusc G. for his kind message the other day.
So, what will be next? The next series will pick up where we left off nearly a year ago, the death of emperor Frederick II. We will go through the chaos of the so-called interregnum before we alight in the reign of the Luxemburg emperors starting with Henry VII. Forgive me if it will take a me a few weeks to get started. As usual I need to get my bearings before we dive in… I hope you will come along for that adventure.
Bibliography
William Urban: The Teutonic Knights – A Military History
Eric Christiansen: The Nordic Crusades, Penguin Books, 1997
Klaus Militzer: Die Geschichte des deutsche Ordens, 2.Aufl, 2012
Jurgen Sarnowsky: der Deutsche Orden, 2.Aufl, 2012
Adam Zamosyski: Poland – A History