THE TEUTONIC ORDER AND POLAND
Foundation of the Teutonic Order—Struggles of Germans and Slavs in
the Baltic provinces—The Knights are invited to Prussia—Their
conquests—Quarrel with the Papacy and complete transfer of the Order
to Prussia—Further territorial acquisitions—The Order at the height
of its power under Kniprode—Union of Poland and Lithuania—The Battle
of Tannenberg—Decline of the Order—Internal discontent and disorder
in Prussia—The Prussian League—Civil war and Polish conquest—The
Peace of Thorn—End of the Teutonic Order and of the Order of the
Sword.
The great Emperor Frederick Barbarossa died in Asia Minor as he was
leading his forces to take part in the Third Crusade. The German army
broke to [Sidenote: Foundation of the Teutonic Order.] pieces after the
loss of its leader, and only a few scanty fragments reached Palestine to
take part in the siege of Acre (1189). The besiegers were decimated by
the diseases to which troops are liable in an unaccustomed climate, and
complaints were made that the German sick were neglected in such scanty
hospital arrangements as then existed. Under the pious care of some
merchants from Lübeck and Bremen, an order was formed to combine the
functions of soldiers and nurses. The ‘German Knights of St. Mary’
borrowed most of their rules from the Hospitallers or Knights of St.
John, but some of their military regulations were adopted from the still
more famous Order of the Temple. In 1191 the new crusading order
received a bull of confirmation from Pope Clement III., and the first
grand-master fixed his headquarters in Acre, which had now fallen before
the assaults of the Crusaders. Its origin and its peculiarly national
character were emphasised by the limitation of membership to men of
German birth and speech. Like the Templars and Hospitallers, the
Teutonic knights were the recipients of numerous gifts and bequests from
pious benefactors, and acquired considerable estates in western Europe.
But crusading ardour had begun to decline in the West, and the Germans
had never taken quite as prominent a part in the movement as the Romance
nations. If the activity of the Teutonic Order had been confined to
Palestine, it is not likely that its existence could have been either
prolonged or important. But within forty years from its foundation a new
sphere was provided for its military exertions.
By the end of the twelfth century immense strides had been made by
Christianity and German civilisation [Sidenote: Germans and Slavs.]
among the Slavonic peoples to the south of the Baltic. Bohemia and
Poland, the two outposts of the Slavs to the south-west, had been
converted and brought into some sort of submission to the German
Emperors. Their most thriving towns were filled with German settlers;
and some of the border provinces, such as Silesia, had already received
a preponderantly German element in their population. To the north-west
the efforts of Henry the Lion and Albert the Bear had conquered and
converted the Wends; Lübeck and other towns had been founded to serve as
centres of German commerce and German influence; and bishoprics had been
created for Mecklenburg and Pomerania. But from the valley of the
Vistula to the Gulf of Finland there stretched an immense tract of
dreary country, alternately sandy wastes and undrained marsh, in which a
number of Slavonic peoples—Prussians, Lithuanians, Esthonians, and
Livonians—still lived their primitive life, engaged in hunting, pasture,
and rudimentary agriculture. They retained their heathen religion and
their ancient customs, and were regarded by their more advanced
neighbours as little better than savages. In the tenth century St.
Adalbert of Prague had met with a martyr’s death as he sought to preach
the Gospel to the Prussians, and ever since there had been a nominal
bishopric on the eastern Baltic, but its holders had never ventured to
reside in their diocese.
In the thirteenth century a vigorous effort was made to extend
Christianity among these eastern Slavs. [Sidenote: Teutonic knights
invited to Prussia.] The Bishop of Riga founded in 1200 the Order of the
Sword to compel the acceptance of the faith by the people of Livonia.
Soon afterwards Christian, a Cistercian monk of Oliva, undertook to
preach the Gospel among the Prussians. The Pope gave him the title of
Bishop of Prussia; and a Polish duke, Konrad of Masovia, who claimed the
border district of Kulm, promised him active assistance. But the task
proved beyond the powers of duke and bishop. The Prussians rose against
the intruders, destroyed their settlements, and carried fire and sword
into the Kulmerland and Masovia itself. This war between the Christian
and the heathen Slavs gave occasion for the introduction of the Teutonic
knights into Prussia. In 1226 an embassy from Konrad of Masovia appeared
before the grand-master in Italy, and offered to cede the Kulmerland if
the Order would undertake to defend him from the Prussians.
Hermann von Salza, who was grand-master at the time, was an intimate
adviser of the Emperor Frederick II., who had given the black eagle of
the empire as the Order’s standard, and a man of no small importance in
the politics of southern Europe. Endowed with equal energy and
foresight, he welcomed the opportunity of founding a new Christian state
in the north, where greater security and distinction could be gained
than in upholding a losing cause in the Holy Land. But he had no
intention of fighting the battles of the Polish duke or the Prussian
bishop without adequate reward, and he took the most painstaking
precautions to secure the independent rule of the Order in what was
destined to be its future home. Frederick II., who knew little and cared
less about the fate of the Baltic provinces, was easily induced to grant
to the Order a formal investiture of the district of Kulm with all
future conquests in Prussia. This was followed by treaties with the Duke
of Masovia and with Christian of Oliva, whose original alliance had been
broken by their rival claims to suzerainty; and finally, to remove any
difficulties with Rome, Pope Gregory IX. was persuaded to claim the
lands of the heathen as the property of St. Peter, and to grant them to
the Order on payment of a nominal tribute (1234).
In 1231 the first detachment of Knights entered Prussia and commenced
the work of conquest. In spite of their smaller numbers, their superior
arms and [Sidenote: Conquest of Prussia.] discipline gave them an
immense advantage over the disorderly hordes which opposed them. As each
district was reduced to submission, a fortress was built to enforce
obedience and to serve as a base for further operations. Thus, in the
first few years, Thorn, Kulm, and Marienwerder were built and garrisoned
in rapid succession. In 1237 the Knights of the Sword agreed to form a
close alliance with the Teutonic Order, of which they became a
subordinate branch, though retaining a considerable measure of autonomy.
Thus the heathen were threatened with attack on both sides—on the west
from the valley of the Vistula, and on the north-east from Riga and the
coast of Livonia. But the rapid successes of the Knights provoked
jealousy and opposition. The Poles were indignant at the establishment
of a German state between their own borders and the Baltic, and
political and race antipathy soon overpowered the original alliance on
religious grounds. Konrad of Masovia bitterly repented his shortsighted
cession of Kulmerland, and both from Poland and from Pomerania aid was
sent to the heathen Prussians. Even the bishop, Christian of Oliva, was
alienated by the Order’s assumption of ecclesiastical independence, and
did his utmost to enforce his own claims to superiority in the conquered
districts. But the Papacy remained loyal to the warrior priests, whom it
regarded as submissive vassals. The usual indulgences were offered to
all who would undertake the pious duty of joining a crusade against the
heathen, and crowds of recruits were induced to secure their temporal
prosperity and their future salvation by fighting in the service of the
Knights. The most famous of the princely allies was Ottokar of Bohemia,
the lord of Austria, and the most powerful of German princes in the
middle of the thirteenth century. In 1255 he led a large army into
Prussia, and the fortress of Königsberg was named in his honour.
But the conquest of Prussia was not achieved without difficulties and
reverses. In 1260 a general rising was organised among the Slav
population, and for the next ten years the Knights were in serious
danger of losing all they had gained. But their dogged resolution
prevailed in the end, and by 1280 the land had once more been forced
into sullen submission. The desperate struggle had seriously diminished
a population which was always thinly scattered over a huge area. To fill
the place of those who had fallen or had migrated eastwards to preserve
their independence in Lithuania, the Order encouraged the settlement of
German peasants and German burghers. The conquest of Prussia was a
victory for Germany as well as for Christianity. The Slavs had to accept
the religion and the language of the conquerors.
The end of the thirteenth century ushered in a period of trial for the
great crusading orders. The fall of [Sidenote: Quarrel with the Papacy.]
Acre in 1291 marked the ultimate failure of the attempts to recover the
Holy Land for Western Christendom. The military associations were
discredited by their ill-success; and while they lost their hold upon
popular favour, their immense wealth excited the avarice of the temporal
princes. The Papacy had fallen from the lofty position which it had held
in the time of Innocent III., and was forced to become the accomplice
and the agent of the royal spoilers. The Templars were first persecuted
and then suppressed by Philip IV. of France and his creature Pope
Clement V. The Knights of St. John only escaped a similar fate by
throwing themselves into Rhodes, and by holding the island as a bulwark
of Christendom against the encroaching Mohammedan power. The position of
the Teutonic Order was as insecure as that of their older and, for a
time, more prosperous rivals. The grand-master had removed his
headquarters from Acre to Venice, and thence could watch the approach of
danger. When, in 1309, Clement V. issued a hostile bull against the
Order, the Knights were prepared with a practical and efficient answer.
The only way to prove their strength and their value to Europe was to
concentrate their undivided energies upon the work which had been
undertaken on the Baltic coast. The hostility of a distant Pope would
there be comparatively impotent, and they could strengthen themselves by
a close alliance with the interests and forces of Germany. It was, no
doubt, a great sacrifice for the Knights to abandon a residence in
southern Europe, where they had enjoyed considerable wealth and
influence, and to bury themselves in a [Sidenote: Transference of the
Order to Prussia.] remote and barbarous district in the inclement north.
But there was no other alternative if they would escape destruction; and
in 1309 the grand-master transferred his residence from Venice to
Marienburg, which became henceforth the headquarters of the Order.
The severance of the Teutonic Order from all connection with Palestine
and its concentration in Prussia had many important results. The close
connection which had been hitherto maintained with the Papacy was
weakened, and the ties with Germany and the Empire were drawn closer.
Henry VII. hastened to assure the Knights of his protection and to
confirm their rights and privileges. Hitherto they had conquered in the
name of the Church, henceforth their triumphs are to be for the
extension of Germany. And these triumphs were for a time proportioned to
their increased unity and strength. In 1311, by dexterously taking
advantage of a dispute between Brandenburg [Sidenote: Acquisition of
Pomerellen.] and Poland, they seized the district of Pomerellen on the
left bank of the Vistula, which contained the important city of Danzig.
This acquisition enormously strengthened the position of the Order on
its western or German border; but, at the same time, it led to the long
and desperate struggle with Poland which ultimately brought disaster in
its train. And the conquest illustrates the changed attitude of the
Order, for which the quarrel with the Papacy was partially responsible.
Its aims have become political rather than religious. It is no longer
solely absorbed in the task of forcibly converting the heathen, but can
turn aside to the pursuit of self-aggrandisement at the expense of its
Christian neighbours.
The Papacy, which had been so enthusiastic a supporter of the Teutonic
Order in the thirteenth century, was on the side of Poland in the
fourteenth. But its ecclesiastical [Sidenote: The Order at the height of
its power.] weapons were blunted by the energetic support which was
given to Lewis the Bavarian, and by the complete alienation of Germany
owing to the residence in Avignon. The first war with Poland ended in
the victory of the Order. In 1343 Casimir the Great concluded the Treaty
of Kalisch, by which he confirmed the cession of Pomerellen and other
disputed territories near the valley of the Vistula. In 1346 Denmark
handed over to the Order its ancient claims on the province of Esthonia.
The Knights had now acquired almost the whole of the Slav territories to
the south-east of the Baltic. Only the Lithuanians remained obstinately
heathen and obstinately independent, and against them the Order waged a
fairly successful war during the grand-mastership of Winzig von Kniprode
from 1351 to 1382. During these years the Teutonic Order was at the
zenith of its power and prosperity. Brandenburg, which might have
contested its ascendency in the north, was rendered impotent by the
extinction of the Ascanian line, and by its rapid transfer through the
hands of successive Wittelsbach and Luxemburg margraves. In Poland
Casimir the Great was succeeded in 1370 by his nephew, Lewis of Hungary,
who had no sympathy with the anti-German prejudices of the Polish
nobles, and was disinclined to employ his forces in the defence of the
heathen peasants of Lithuania. The campaigns of the Order had become a
recognised school of warfare for the active and ambitious youth of
northern Europe. Among the numerous allies who gave their services to
the cause of Christianity were the adventurous John of Bohemia, who lost
his eyesight in the marshes of Prussia, and Henry of Derby, son of John
of Gaunt, who later established the Lancastrian dynasty on the English
throne. Chaucer, in describing the career of his knight, says that
‘Full ofte tyme he had the bord bygonne
Aboven alle naciouns in Pruce,
In Lettowe had he reysed and in Ruce.’
The death of Kniprode in 1382 was followed by the death of Lewis the
Great of Hungary and Poland. The party of strong Slav sympathies among
the Polish nobles were determined to put an end to the union with
Hungary and the rule of a foreign king. Lewis’s [Sidenote: Union of
Poland and Lithuania.] younger daughter, Hedwig, was invited to assume
the crown of Poland, but she was compelled to offer her hand to Jagello,
the grand prince of Lithuania. Jagello agreed to purchase a bride and a
kingdom by accepting Christianity, and was baptized and crowned by the
name of Ladislas in 1387. The accession of this Lithuanian dynasty,
under whose rule Poland rose to the height of its power, dealt a fatal
blow to the interests of the Teutonic Order. The two great enemies of
the Order, whose quarrels with each other had more than once given the
Knights both military and diplomatic triumphs, were henceforth united in
a common cause. And the conversion of the Lithuanians, who now adopted
the faith of their neighbours and allies, struck at the very foundations
of the Order, which rested upon the conception of a crusade against the
heathen. Now that Prussia was surrounded by a ring of Christian states,
there could no longer be any pretext for a religious war; and foreign
princes and nobles were not likely to take an active interest in what
became from this time a purely political struggle. The stream of
auxiliaries from Europe was dried up at its source, and the Order had to
fall back upon the expensive and unsatisfactory expedient of filling its
armies with mercenary troops.
For more than three hundred years Germany had been steadily conquering
the Slavs, driving them eastwards, or subjecting them to overwhelming
German influences. [Sidenote: War with Poland.] Thanks to the Hanseatic
League and to the Teutonic Knights, the Baltic had been made into a
German sea. But with the fifteenth century a reaction set in in favour
of both Scandinavians and Slavs. Just as the Union of Kalmar involved a
serious danger to the Hanse towns, so the close association of Lithuania
and Poland threatened the vital interests of the Teutonic Knights. In
Bohemia the same reaction against German predominance found expression
in the Hussite movement, and in the internal quarrels within the
University of Prague (see p. 209). But it was in Prussia that the Slavs
gained their most durable successes, though the victories of Ziska and
Prokop over the crusading armies of Germany made the greater impression
upon Europe at the time. The inevitable struggle which altered
conditions forced upon the Teutonic Order broke out in 1409. In the next
year the largest armies which had ever met in these northern wars
confronted each other on the field of Tannenberg. After a [Sidenote:
Battle of Tannenberg.] terrible contest, in which John Ziska, the future
leader of the Hussites, fought for the men of his own race, superior
numbers gave a decisive victory to the forces of Poland and Lithuania.
The grand-master and the flower of his Knights fell in the battle, and
Prussia seemed to be at the mercy of the conquerors. But the progress of
King Ladislas was checked by the heroic resistance of the fortress of
Marienburg; and he consented, in the Peace of Thorn (1411), to give up
all his conquests except one district, which was to be ceded only for
his own lifetime. The ruin of the Order was postponed for half a
century.
The defeat at Tannenberg might have proved less fatal in its results if
it had not been accompanied by growing internal weakness. An order of
militant monks may provide [Sidenote: Decline of the Order.] a
magnificent fighting force, but it is unlikely to prove a satisfactory
conductor of civil administration. The great evil in Prussia was the
absence of any substantial common interest between the governors and the
governed. At first the German settlers were bound to the Knights as
their protectors against the original inhabitants; but as time went on,
and new generations grew up in the country of their birth, the original
enmity between Germans and Slavs gradually cooled, and the two peoples
were brought closer together in the ordinary intercourse of industry,
trade, and social life. But this growing union was a source of danger
rather than of gain to the ruling Order, because it deprived them of the
aid of that section of the population which might naturally have been
expected to support the Government. The Knights themselves, being bound
by the priestly vow of celibacy, could not train up successors with a
hereditary knowledge of the people and the country. Each generation of
Knights came from other districts, and had to learn the work of
government afresh. They came for the most part from southern Germany,
and their habits and even their language differed in many respects from
those of the Low Germans who had come in to settle in their towns and
villages. And strict as the disciplinary code of the Order was, it was
difficult to enforce its rules among men who were not secluded from the
world in monasteries, but were busily engaged in the work of war and
administration, and were in constant intercourse with visitors from all
countries. The charges of immorality and unbelief which had been urged
against the Templars could certainly be brought with equal if not with
greater force against the members of the Teutonic Order. The Knights had
none of the ordinary restraints of family affection, private property,
and home life; and it would have been superhuman if most of them had
been able to resist the temptations to which their mode of life and
their despotic authority over their subjects exposed them. For there was
nothing like constitutional life in Prussia outside the Order itself.
The authority of the grand-master was limited by the necessity of
gaining the consent of his chapter and by the great independence of the
provincial masters. But there was no machinery by which the Knights
could receive advice and information from the people whom they ruled.
Even the Prussian nobles, whether of German or Slavonic origin, were
excluded from all voice in the government. After the battle of
Tannenberg an attempt was made to establish a representative diet, in
order to enlist popular sympathy in the task of resisting invasion. But
it was the arbitrary act of an individual grand-master, and it broke the
standing rule which forbade priests to be guided by the counsel of
laymen. The economic policy of the Order was peculiarly affected by this
want of easy intercourse with the traders whose interests were at stake.
The most important towns within its dominions—Danzig, Elbing, Memel,
Thorn, Kulm, and Königsberg—were extremely flourishing, and all except
Memel were members of the Hanseatic League. On the whole, a wise
instinct impelled the Knights to maintain a close alliance with the
League, which so ably championed the cause of Germany in the western
Baltic, and thus the danger of conflicting interests between the Order
and the Hanse towns proved less than might have been expected. But the
Knights themselves embarked in trade, especially in amber; and, after
the fashion of rulers, they sought to regulate the market to bring gain
to themselves, a course of action which excited the jealous hostility of
the professional merchants. And their imitation of the action of the
League proved disastrous. For the maintenance of their great war against
Denmark, the Hanse towns had imposed a duty upon all exports to be
levied at each port (see p. 434). The Teutonic Order imposed a similar
tax for the Polish war, and endeavoured to make it a permanent source of
revenue. But the inevitable comparison was not in their favour. The
Hanseatic League was fighting in the common interests of all German
traders, and it was reasonable to ask them to contribute. The Order was
conducting a war in which the merchants as such had no appreciable
interest at all. The heavy taxation necessitated by the employment of
mercenaries raised the question whether the government of the Order was
worth the expense. Both nobles, citizens, and peasants were gradually
convinced that their welfare was by no means bound up with crusades in
Lithuania and perpetual warfare with Poland. In 1440 a number of nobles
and twenty-one towns combined to form a ‘Prussian League’ for the
defence of their liberties and common interests. There was no overt
defiance of the Order, but the League constituted a state within the
state, and a collision with the older government was sooner or later
inevitable. And when it did occur, it was more than probable that the
foreign enemies of the Order would be able to make use of the League to
serve their own purposes.
As the alienation of their subjects became more and more pronounced, the
Knights were driven to maintain their power by measures of
ever-increasing severity. They denounced their opponents as traitors.
But they themselves had no better claim to be considered as patriots.
They were not native Prussians, and they had none of that instinctive
devotion to the cause of their country which can hardly ever be acquired
except under the subtle influences of birth and early training. For this
love of the soil loyalty to a corporation proved a very inadequate
substitute. Henry of Plauen, the hero of the defence of Marienburg in
1410, was rewarded for his services by election to the vacant
grand-mastership. But a few years later he incurred the displeasure of
the chapter and was formally deposed. In his chagrin he did not hesitate
to open treacherous negotiations with the Polish king, and ultimately he
died in the prison to which he was justly condemned. Such an instance
was by no means isolated; and, in fact, many of the Knights were
secretly members of the Prussian League. The wonder is, not that the
Order fell, but that its rule was for a time so successful, and that it
lasted as long as it did.
Under the circumstances that grew up in the fifteenth century, with the
Government divided in itself and confronted by the growing hostility of
its subjects, a renewal [Sidenote: Civil war and Polish invasion.] of
the Polish war could only be attended with disaster. For many years a
quarrel was averted by a series of abject concessions, which were
interpreted as a sign of weakness, and naturally encouraged further
demands. At last the final catastrophe was hurried on by the outbreak of
civil war. The Prussian League had become more and more openly
antagonistic to the rule of the Order, and it was determined to make a
resolute effort to crush the disaffection. In 1453 the Emperor Frederick
III. was induced to condemn the League, and the Order armed its forces
to carry out the imperial decree. The result might have been foreseen.
The League renounced all allegiance to the Teutonic Order, and offered
the suzerainty of Prussia to Casimir of Poland. The offer was accepted.
The Polish king declared Prussia to be annexed to his dominions, and an
army was led by Casimir himself to aid the rebels. For twelve years the
unfortunate country was doomed to suffer all the horrors of civil strife
and foreign invasion. In spite of the tremendous odds against them, the
Knights offered a resistance worthy of their military reputation in the
past. In 1457 the grand-master was forced to quit the fortress of
Marienburg, where seventy of his predecessors had held their residence
for a century and a half. A refuge was found for a time in the eastern
castle of Königsberg, which was to be the future home of kings of
Prussia in times of similar distress. But the town of Marienburg held
out with heroic obstinacy for another three years, and siege operations
there and elsewhere delayed the progress of the Poles long after they
had crushed all resistance in the open field. The grand-master made
frantic appeals to the Emperor and the German princes for aid against
the Slavonic conquerors of the great province which the Order had won
for Germany. To Frederick II. of Brandenburg he sold the Neumark (1455),
which had been handed over to the Teutonic Knights by Sigismund in 1402.
But prayers and bribes were equally unavailing to excite any sentiment
of nationality among princes who had long ceased to regard anything but
their own territorial interests. In 1466 it was at last necessary to
submit to the consequences of defeat [Sidenote: Treaty of Thorn, 1466.]
and to sign the Treaty of Thorn. The whole of western Prussia, with
Pomerellen, including the towns of Danzig, Thorn, Elbing, and Kulm, was
ceded to Poland, and the valley of the Vistula passed once more into the
hands of the Slavs. Eastern Prussia, with Königsberg as its capital, was
left in the hands of the Order, but it was to be held as a Polish fief.
All allegiance to any other secular prince was to be repudiated, and
thus the connection with Germany was formally ended. Future
grand-masters were to do homage on election to the king of Poland, and
were to sit on his left hand in the Polish Diet.
It is needless to dwell at any length on the subsequent fate of the
Teutonic Order, which had fallen so lamentably [Sidenote: End of the
Teutonic Order.] from its high estate. The Knights of the Sword
repudiated their subordination to a grand-master who was no longer a
sovereign prince, and assumed the independent rule of Livonia and
Esthonia. The House of Jagellon went from one triumph to another; and
its ascendency in eastern Europe seemed to be established when Ladislas,
a younger son of Casimir IV., was elected to the crown of Bohemia in
1471, and to that of Hungary in 1490. Resistance to so great a power as
Poland had now become must have seemed chimerical, yet the Knights
continued to cherish the idea of recovering their lost independence.
With this object in view they resisted all proposals to unite the
grand-mastership with the Polish monarchy, and adopted the policy of
electing successive chiefs from the great families of northern Germany,
in the hope of enlisting their support for the cause of Prussia. Thus in
1498 they chose Frederick of Saxony, and in 1511 Albert of Hohenzollern.
The latter was for a time encouraged by the promise of assistance held
out by Maximilian I. But the Hapsburgs ever preferred the interests of
their house to those of Germany; and the hopes of Albert were dashed to
the ground when he learned that Maximilian had, in 1516, concluded a
treaty and a double marriage alliance with the Jagellon princes in order
to secure to his grandson Ferdinand the succession in Hungary and
Bohemia. In anger and despair Albert determined to repudiate his
allegiance both to Church and Empire. In 1525 he adopted the Protestant
faith, confirmed the cession of West Prussia to Poland, and received
East Prussia as a hereditary duchy for himself and his heirs. Although
an obstinate minority of the Knights refused to acknowledge the validity
of the grand-master’s action, the Teutonic Order was practically
dissolved. The remnant of the state which it had built up with such
strenuous exertions fell a century later to the main line of the
electors of Brandenburg, and gave a title to the monarchy which has
become in later times the paramount power in a united Germany.
The Order of the Sword lingered a few years longer, only to meet with a
similar fate in the end. In 1561 the last grand-master, Gotthard
Ketteler, finding it impossible [Sidenote: End of the Order of the
Sword.] to maintain independence, imitated the action of Albert of
Hohenzollern. He carved out for himself the secular duchy of Courland,
to be held in vassalage to Poland, while the rest of Livonia and
Esthonia was thrown as an apple of discord into the midst of the rival
Baltic states—Poland, Denmark, Sweden, and Russia. The struggle which
followed is noteworthy, not only because it led to the temporary
ascendency of Sweden in the Baltic, and so to the achievements of its
warrior-kings, Gustavus Adolphus, Charles X., and Charles XII., but also
because it gave occasion for the first appearance of Russia as a
European power.