The Clash of Cultures on the Medieval Baltic Frontier

Herausgeber: Murray, Alan V.

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

The conversion of the lands on the southern and eastern shores of the Baltic Sea by Germans, Danes and Swedes in the period from 1150 to 1400 represented the last great struggle between Christianity and paganism on the European continent, but for the indigenous peoples of Finland, Livonia, Prussia, Lithuania and Pomerania, it was also a period of wider cultural conflict and transformation. Along with the Christian faith came a new and foreign culture: the German and Scandinavian languages of the crusaders and the Latin of their priests, new names for places, superior military technology, and churches and fortifications built of stone. For newly baptized populations, the acceptance of Christianity encompassed major changes in the organization and practice of political, religious and social life, entailing the acceptance of government by alien elites, of new cultic practices, and of new obligations such as taxes, tithes and military service in the armies of the Christian rulers. At the same time, as the Western conquerors carried their campaigns beyond pagan territory into the principalities of north-western Russia, the Baltic Crusades also developed into a struggle between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. This collection of sixteen essays by both established and younger scholars explores the theme of clash of cultures from a variety of perspectives, discussing the nature and ideology of crusading in the medieval Baltic region, the struggle between Catholicism and Orthodoxy, and the cultural confrontation that accompanied the process of conversion, in subjects as diverse as religious observation, political structures, the practice of warfare, art and music, and perceptions of the landscape.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Routledge
• Seitenzahl: 394
• Erscheinungstermin: 23. Juli 2009
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 240mm x 161mm x 26mm
• Gewicht: 756g
• ISBN-13: 9780754664833
• ISBN-10: 075466483X
• Artikelnr.: 41251907

Autorenporträt

Alan V. Murray is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds, UK.

Inhaltsangabe

Contents: Introduction, Alan V. Murray; Part I Culture and Identity: A new
world into old words: the Eastern Baltic region and the cultural geography
of medieval Europe, Marek Tamm; The Baltic crusades: a clash of 2
identities, Eva Eihmane; The emergence of Livonia: the transformations of
the social and political structures in the territory of Latvia during the
12th and 13th centuries, Andris Å ne; Sweden's conquest of Finland: a clash
of cultures?, Philip Line. Part II Crusade and Mission: Pope Honorius III
and mission and crusades in the Baltic region, Iben Fonnesberg-Schmidt;
Violent victims? Surprising aspects of the just war theory in the Chronicle
of Peter von Dusburg, Rasa Mazeika. Part III Converting Landscapes,
Converting Peoples: Sacralization of the landscape: converting trees and
measuring land in the Danish crusades against the Wends, Kurt Villads
Jensen; How to convert a landscape: Henry of Livonia and the Chronicon
Livoniae, Carsten Selch Jensen; Rural society and religious innovation:
acceptance and rejection of Catholicism among the native inhabitants of
medieval Livonia, Tiina Kala; Saints' cults in medieval Livonia, Anu Mÿnd.
Part IV Catholicism and Orthodoxy: Sterile monsters? Russians and the
Orthodox Church in the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia, Torben K. Nielsen;
Archbishop Vasilii Kalika of Novgorod, the fortress of Orekhov and the
defence of orthodoxy, Michael C. Paul; Orthodox churches in medieval
Livonia, Anti Selart. Part V Warfare on the Baltic Frontier: Music and
cultural conflict in the Christianization of Livonia, 1190-1290, Alan V.
Murray; Crossbows or catapults? The identification of siege weaponry and
techniques in the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia, Stephen Turnbull; The
significance of the local Baltic peoples in the defence of Livonia (late
13th-16th centuries), Kaspars Klavinš; The Eastern Baltic lands in the age
of the Crusades: a select bibliography of publications in English, Alan V.
Murray; Index.