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Institut Historique Allemand) Band 43 (2016) Rasa Mažeika/Loïc Chollet: Familiar Marvels? French and German Crusaders and Chroniclers Confront Baltic Pagan Religions

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Institut Historique Allemand) Band 43 (2016) Rasa Mažeika/Loïc Chollet: Familiar Marvels? French and German Crusaders and Chroniclers Confront Baltic Pagan Religions Francia. Forschungen zur Westeuropäischen Geschichte Herausgegeben vom Deutschen Historischen Institut Paris (Institut historique allemand) Band 43 (2016) Rasa Mažeika/Loïc Chollet: Familiar Marvels? French and German Crusaders and Chroniclers Confront Baltic Pagan Religions Copyright Das Digitalisat wird Ihnen von perspectivia.net, der Online-Publikationsplattform der Max Weber Stiftung – Deutsche Geisteswissenschaftliche Institute im Ausland, zur Verfügung gestellt. Bitte beachten Sie, dass das Digitalisat urheberrechtlich geschützt ist. Erlaubt ist aber das Lesen, das Ausdrucken des Textes, das Herunterladen, das Speichern der Daten auf einem eigenen Datenträger soweit die vorgenannten Handlungen ausschließlich zu privaten und nicht-kommerziellen Zwecken erfolgen. Eine darüber hinausgehende unerlaubte Verwendung, Reproduktion oder Weitergabe einzelner Inhalte oder Bilder können sowohl zivil- als auch strafrechtlich verfolgt werden. Rasa Mažeika – Loïc Chollet FAMILIAR MARVELS? French and German Crusaders and Chroniclers Confront Baltic Pagan Religions* To those of us who study a predominantly monotheistic culture such as late medieval Europe, polytheistic pagans can seem the ultimate Other, and such an approach has yielded some fruitful historiographical insights into the Crusades against the pagans of the Baltic area1. Nevertheless, it is our contention in this paper that modern con- structions of »otherness« may not be transferable to some of the medieval authors who wrote about these wars. In this we are encouraged by recent work in other areas of history which warns against »rigid notions of otherness« in constructing a para- digm for the surprisingly nuanced discourse of medieval authors writing about other cultures2. When we compare the perception of Baltic pagan religion in some Old French sources and in three Latin chronicles, all written by participants in or apologists for the Baltic Crusades, we see that the clerical authors writing in Latin, like the aristo- cratic ones writing in French, had little condemnation for paganism ipso facto. These chroniclers of course believed that Christianity should replace paganism, but show little of the expected horror even at pagan human sacrifice. The pagan gods may be demons, but this places them within an ordered and familiar view of the world. The chroniclers seek to make sense of the pagan religion, to place it and its practitioners into some familiar category. Pagan enemies are represented not as alien creatures but rather as specific individuals (real or imagined), who may be respected adversaries with specific exotic customs which can even occasionally serve as exemplars for Christians. In these accounts, pagans may be stupid or cunning, cowardly or brave, noble or treacherous, but they are always recognizably human and their religion is a mistake or a demon-induced delusion (such as Christians could also suffer) – or just an exotic detail. * Loïc Chollet wrote the discussion of French sources and Rasa Mažeika the discussion of the chronicles of the military orders. 1 Edith Feistner, Vom Kampf gegen das Andere: Pruzzen, Litauer und Mongolen in lateinischen und deutschen Texten des Mittelalters, in: Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum und deutsche Li- teratur 132 (2003), p. 281–294; ead., Michael Neecke, Gisela Vollman-Profe, Krieg im Visier. Biblelepik und Chronistik im Deutschen Orden als Modell korporativer Identitätsbildung, Tübingen 2007. 2 Paolo Borsa, Christian Høgel, Lars Boje Mortensen, Elizabeth Tyler, What is Medieval Eu- ropean Literature?, in: Interfaces: A Journal of Medieval European Literatures 1 (2015), p. 16; Nicholas Morton, Templar and Hospitaller attitudes towards Islam in the Holy Land during /aw 43 - 5.Lauf Francia / 197563-Thorbecke the 12th and 13th centuries, in: Levant 47 (2015), p. 316–327. 197563_Francia43_Buch.indb 41 23.08.2016 16:34:15 42 Rasa Mažeika – Loïc Chollet Sacred woods and funeral pyres: the Lithuanians’ religion seen by French eyes During the 14th century, travelling to the Baltic shore to support the Teutonic Knights in their fight against the pagan Lithuanians became a kind of fashion among the French as well as English aristocracy3. The prestige of the Reisen was probably enhanced by the courtly atmosphere displayed by the Teutonic Order, but also by the fact these expeditions were directed against pagans4, who in the sources from Western Europe are often called »Saracens«, as were all the non-Christians the cru- saders encountered on the margins of Christendom5. Another characteristic of the Reise was the crossing of the Wildnis, a huge expanse of forest and marshes separat- ing Prussia from Lithuania, which must have been an impressive way of starting the expedition6. One may imagine that most of the Order’s guests were mostly interest- ed in waging a chivalric war against infidels, but the few accounts we have show that the travellers interested enough to have written down their impressions were not only concerned with warlike activities. When in the middle of the 13th century Western Europe came into closer contact with the Baltic world through the mendicant orders’ networks7, encyclopaedists as well as popes treated the pagan Balts as ignorant victims of a superstition induced by demons8. This notion disappears in the French travellers’ testimonies, who describe the locals’ religious customs sometimes with details, but rarely characterise their be- liefs as idolatry9. However, a few elements of Baltic religion found in 13th century 3 Werner Paravicini, Die Preußenreisen des europäischen Adels, 2 vol., Singmaringen 1989– 1995. 4 Norman Housley, The Later Crusades, 1274–1580: from Lyon to Alcazar, Oxford 1992, p. 399– 400. 5 Allan V. Murray, Saracens of the Baltic: Pagan and Christian Lithuanians in the Perception of English and French Crusaders to Late Medieval Prussia, in: Journal of Baltic Studies 41/4 (2010), p. 413–429; Shlomo Lotan, The Teutonic Knights and their Attitude about Muslims: Saracens in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem and in the Baltic Region, in: Cordelia Hess, Jonathan Adams (ed.), Fear and Loathing in the North, Berlin 2015, p. 324–325; John V. Tolan, Les Sarrasins, l’islam dans l’imagination européenne au Moyen Âge, Paris 2003, p. 186. 6 Werner Paravicini, La Prusse et l’Europe occidentale. La participation de la noblesse d’Europe occidentale aux croisades de l’Ordre des Chevaliers Teutoniques contre la Lituanie, in: Cahiers de recherches médiévales et humanistes 1 (1996), p. 188. On the forest as symbolically associat- ed with paganism, Marek Tamm, Signes d’altérité. La représentation de la Baltique orientale dans le »De proprietatibus rerum« de Barthélemy l’Anglais (vers 1245), in: Outi Merisalo (ed.), Frontiers in the Middle Ages, Louvain-la-Neuve 2006, p. 161–162; Michel Pastoureau, La forêt occidentale, un univers symbolique, in: André Chastel (ed.), Le château, la chasse et la forêt, Bordeaux 1990, p. 83–98. 7 Marek Tamm, Communicating Crusade. Livonian Mission and the Cistercian Network in the Thirteenth Century, in: Ajalooline Ajakiri 3/4 (2009), p. 341–372. 8 Rasa Mažeika, Granting Power to Enemy Gods in the Chronicles of the Baltic Crusades, in: David Abulafia, Nora Berend (ed.), Medieval Frontiers: Concepts and Practices, Aldershot 2002, p. 153–171, here p. 160–161. 9 Philippe de Mézières on the Lithuanians: cest gens sont ydolatres (Songe du Viel Pelerin, ed. Joël Blanchard, Genève 2015, p. 207) and the native Prussians: veulent laissier en leurs cuers l’ydo­ latrie et la loy de leurs vieulz anchissours (ibid., p. 215). The ms. used by G. Coopland has veu­ lent laissier en leurs cuers l’ydolatrie et la loy de leur dieux et de leurs vieulx ancesseurs, Le Songe du Vieil Pelerin, ed. George W. Coopland, vol. 1, Cambridge 1969, p. 241. 197563_Francia43_Buch.indb 42 23.08.2016 16:34:15 Familiar Marvels? 43 encyclopaedists are also mentioned by our travellers. For example, in his »Bonum universale de apibus«, Thomas de Cantimpré explains that »until now, the infidels of Prussia honour the sacred woods and do not dare to notch them, nor to penetrate through them, except if they wish to make sacrifice to their gods«10. For the author of the said »Messin chronicle«, who probably took part in the Reise he describes11, the pagan Samogitians’ sacred grove even appears to be their last refuge, where they tried to flee before the crusader’s onslaught: »When they felt the strength of the Chris- tians, they fled to a marvellous wood which they called the Sacred Wood, where no Christian had ever been; when they felt pressed, they always escaped to this wood12.« The sacred woods have been mentioned by at least two other French authors, the chronicler Jean Cabaret d’Orville and the traveller Guillebert de Lannoy; interest- ingly enough, both link the pagans’ holy groves to cremation of the dead13. These descriptions lead us to the element which came most easily when French au- thors wrote about the Baltic customs: the funeral pyre, which was most probably used for the funerary rites of the Lithuanian nobles in the 13th-14th centuries14. The most impressive account of such a ceremony is to be found in »Le Songe du Viel Pe- lerin«, the work of Philippe de Mézières, who describes Prussia and Lithuania after the memories of his own travel to the Ordensstaat as an ambassador of the King of Cyprus, in 136415: 10 His adhuc Prussiae gentiles siluas aestimant consecratas, & eas incidere non audentes, nunquam ingrediuntur easdem, nisi cum in eis dijs suis voluerint immolare, L. 2, chap. 57, ed. G. Colven- erius, Douai 1627, p. 548; Wilhelm Mannhardt, Letto-Preussische Götterlehre, Riga 1936, p. 48–49. The use of sacred groves by the Baltic pagans is discussed by Stephen C. Rowell, Lith- uania Ascending: A Pagan Empire within East-Central Europe, 1295–1345, Cambridge 1994, p. 120–122. 11 Die Metzer Chronik des Jaique Dex (Jacques d’Esch) über die Kaiser und Könige aus dem Lu- xemburger Hause, ed. Georg Wolfram, Metz 1906, p. LXXIII, 336. The author of the chroni- cle is thought to be Jacques d’Esch, a member of the Messin aristocracy.
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