During the Battle of Grunwald, he commanded the Lithuanian army. Battle of Grunwald (1410). See what the "Battle of Grunwald" is in other dictionaries

600 years ago, on July 15, 1410, the decisive battle of the "Great War" took place - the Battle of Grunwald.

Battle of Grunwald - the decisive battle of the "Great War" (1409-1411), in which the Polish-Lithuanian troops on July 15, 1410 defeated the troops of the Teutonic Order.

"Great War" 1409-1411 (the war between the Teutonic Order on the one hand, the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania on the other) arose as a result of the aggressive policy of the Teutonic Order, which claimed the border Polish and Lithuanian lands.

The "Great War" was preceded by the conclusion between Lithuania and Poland of the Kreva Union (union) (1385, renewed in 1401) in order to organize a rebuff to the order.

On August 6, 1409, the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order Ulrich von Jungingen declared war on the Kingdom of Poland. Troops of Teutonic knights invaded its borders. The Polish king Vladislav II Jagiello (Jagiello) began to create a "general militia" in the country, agreed with the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vitovt on joint actions. The hostilities were hesitant, and in the fall of 1409 an armistice was concluded.

In the winter of 1409-1410. both sides were preparing for a decisive struggle. The order received great help from the "Holy Roman Empire" and other Catholic states, the Hungarian king Sigismund I of Luxembourg became its ally. By the summer of 1410, the order had created a well-armed and well-organized army (up to 60 thousand people), consisting mainly of heavily armed cavalry and infantry.

The troops of Lithuania and Poland included Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian regiments, as well as Czech mercenaries and Tatar cavalry. The total number of troops is over 60 thousand people. The basis of the allied forces was light infantry. Both belligerents had artillery firing stone cannonballs. The allied forces, having united in the area of ​​Cherven, on July 9, 1410 crossed the border of the order's possessions and moved to its capital and the main fortress - Marienburg (Malbork). Maneuvering in order to take advantageous positions for the battle, the troops of both sides by the evening of July 14 settled in the area of ​​the villages of Grunwald and Tannenberg, where the Battle of Grunwald took place on July 15.

The allied army, having discovered the enemy, formed up for battle in three lines on a front of 2 km. On the right wing, 40 Lithuanian-Russian banners were deployed (the banner is a military unit of medieval Poland and Lithuania) under the command of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Vitovt, as well as the Tatar cavalry, on the left - 42 Polish, 7 Russian and 2 Czech banners under the command of the Krakow governor Zyndram. The position of the allied forces on the right flank and from the rear was covered by a swamp and the Marsha River (Maranza), and on the left - by a forest. The crusaders lined up in 2 lines on the front 2.5 km, having 20 banners under the command of Liechtenstein on the right wing, and 15 banners under the command of Wallenrod on the left; 16 banners remained in reserve (2nd line).

The battle began at noon. The Tatar cavalry and the 1st line of Vitovt's troops attacked the left flank of the Teutons, but were overturned by the knights of Wallenrod. The 2nd and 3rd lines of Vitovt's troops entered the battle, but the Teutons again threw them back, and then began to pursue. The situation was saved by three Russian Smolensk regiments, which, bravely defending themselves, fettered part of Wallenrod's forces. At this time, Polish banners boldly attacked the enemy's right flank and broke through the front of Liechtenstein's troops. The successful attack of the Polish troops, as well as the courage of the Russian soldiers, their skillful actions in the battle against the knights of Wallenrod allowed the Lithuanian banners to stop the enemy, and then go on the offensive.

The forces united by Wallenrod were defeated. On the left wing, Polish, Russian and Czech troops surrounded Liechtenstein's troops and began to destroy them. Jungingen brought his reserve into battle, but Jagiello moved the 3rd line of his troops to meet him, which, together with the Lithuanian and Russian banners that came to their aid, defeated the last banners of the Teutons. The leaders of the order, including Jungingen, were killed in the battle.

The Battle of Grunwald marked the beginning of the decline of the Teutonic Order. She contributed to the development of the national liberation struggle of the Slavic and Baltic peoples, became a symbol of their military community.

In 1960, a monument was erected on the site of the Battle of Grunwald.

Since 1998, a reconstruction of the Battle of Grunwald has been carried out on the territory of Poland, in which members of military history clubs from Russia, Germany, the Czech Republic, Lithuania and other countries participate.

The material was prepared on the basis of open sources using materials from the "Military Encyclopedia" publication. Chairman of the Main Editorial Commission S. B. Ivanov. Military Publishing. Moscow. in 8 volumes -2004 ISBN 5 - 203 01875 - 8

The Battle of Grunwald, 1410

NS ate in 1226. Polish prince Konrad Mazowiecki invited Warband to the lands of Chelmno, located on the Vistula River, counting on the help of the Order in the struggle against pagan Prussia.

In the same year, the Grand Master of the Order, Hermann von Salz, brought his first German knights to Poland, with the supposed intention of staying there for a year or two. Almost two centuries later, they already owned most of the Baltic coast, including the lands of Latvia and Estonia, without even hiding their intentions to further seize Lithuania, Poland and Russia.

Knights of the Teutonic Order achieved excellent diplomatic relations with other Western countries, they were especially good at cooperating with the Pope. They seemed to want to take control and conquer all of Eastern Europe and, acting under the auspices of the Pope, Christianize all lands in the Baltic region. Regardless of how they conducted this process, the knights of the Order could always refer to the fact that they were acting on behalf of the Lord, and their actions were approved by the Pope.

Their first mission to Christianize in the 13th century. included the planting of faith to the Prussians, a tribe that controlled the amber trade along the entire Baltic coast. The Teutonic knights decided to act with them in the most effective way: they simply destroyed everyone. Those who survived were forbidden to marry, and this meant the complete extinction of the Prussian people. Many centuries later, when Prussia had weight and honor among the states of Europe, there were no longer true Prussians in it, and the archaic language had already slowly died out under the yoke of the Teutonic Order.

The Teutons continued their occupation and seizure of Pomerania (1308-1309), Chelmno, Kujava, Dobrzyń and Kalisz in Poland. Each time Polish land was captured, the population was exterminated, and the Germans moved to the occupied lands. So, for example, in 1308 during the march of the knights to Gdansk to the song Jesu Christo Salvator Mundi(Jesus Christ the Savior of the World), the Teutons killed most of the Polish citizens of the city (about 10 thousand people) and replaced them with German immigrants who were completely loyal to them. In the same year, the knights of the Order in the occupied Prussian lands completed the construction of the most powerful and largest fortress in Europe - Malbork.

Malbork Castle today (clickable)

In the XIV century. The offensive of the Order was mainly against the pagan Lithuanian principality, and combined both missions to spread Christianity and the desire to seize Lithuanian lands, especially the area around Samogitia (Zhmudi). But to carry out such large-scale hostilities, the knights of the Teutonic Order needed reinforcements. Therefore, well-armed knights from France, England, Luxembourg, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, as well as the Netherlands, came every year to take part in the "Lithuanian Crusades". Although these mercenaries never dared to become full members of the Order, they were given the great privilege of fighting alongside real Teutonic knights. For more than two years, the attacks of the Crusaders continued, but the Lithuanians defended very fiercely, not giving the invaders a chance to win.

In 1385, Lithuania entered into an alliance with the Kingdom of Poland, and the next year, the Grand Duke of the Duchy of Lithuania, Vladislav Yagailo, married the Polish queen and took the throne of Poland. Jagiello converted to Christianity and changed his name to Vladislav Jagiello.

Jagiello brought Christianity to Europe's last pagan country, Lithuania, in 1387. Thanks to this, the understanding was reached on both sides that only by joining forces would they be able to repel the powerful forces of the Knights of the Order. It became obvious that the war between the two enemies could not be avoided.

In 1401 Jagiello passed the title of Duke of Lithuania to his cousin Vitovt the Great in order to be able to fully concentrate on the affairs of Poland. King Jagiello and the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vytautas the Great faced a lot of difficulties in the process of restoring their occupied lands, in particular with the massacres of civilians in villages located near the Polish-Lithuanian-Teutonic border. Also, the rulers realized that every day the Order is becoming more powerful and preparing to conquer all of Eastern Europe. For some time after the unification of Poland and Lithuania, peace remained on the lands of this power, but in 1398 the Teutonic Knights invaded Polish and Lithuanian territories and occupied Samogitia, Santok and Drezdenko. This is what caused the Cold War between the Polish-Lithuanian state and the Teutonic Order, because the former considered Zemantia to be part of its territory.

The Poles and Lithuanians very quickly realized that they were not strong enough to withstand the terror that the Knights of the Order were doing when they visited the distant outskirts of the land, and silently endured all the invasions and insults of the enemy.

But everything changed on August 14, 1409 - Grand Master of the Teutonic Order Ulrich von Jungingen declared war on the Polish-Lithuanian state. He also offered a truce to his neighbors, as he understood that neither side was ready for war. Jagiello and Vitovt accepted this offer, but later, the Polish prince said: "Next year we will either defeat the crusaders, or we will perish as a nation and as individuals."

According to Jungingen's statements, the truce was to last from October 8, 1409 until sunset on June 24, 1410. Taking the opportunity, Jagiello sent his scouts to the lands occupied by the Order, so that they would find out everything they could about a powerful enemy. Throughout Poland and Lithuania that winter of 1409, there was a large-scale preparation for military operations. The pikes were fitted with new shafts, the swords were sharpened or hardened if they lost their former power, the horses were shod, and the armor was tightly fitted to the powerful camps of strong warriors. But the knights of the Order also did not sleep and conducted full-scale training, gathering forces from the farthest corners of the captured territory, as well as from France, England and Holland.

Both sides understood that a titanic battle was coming.

At the same time, Jagailo sent his people to Kiev, seeking help from the Tatars, who agreed to send 1,500 of their cavalrymen to help after May 1410. The Bohemians sent 3000 soldiers under the leadership of Jan Sokol, and help came from Moldova and Russia, as they also understood the importance of the upcoming battle. In December 1409, Jagello, Vitovt and Jelal-ad-din, the leader of the Tatars, met in Brest-Litovsk and decided on a plan on how to go to Malbork and crush the Teutonic Order, once and for all.

In the second week of June 1410, just eleven days before the end of the armistice, Polish troops were surprised by the arrival of three Teutonic knights in full ammunition and brightly decorated. They sought to meet with King Jagella in order to propose to him to extend the truce for another three weeks. Jagiello asked the knights what caused their "generosity" and they replied that some of the European knights expressed a desire to go on a crusade and this is an honor that cannot be denied.

Jagiello agreed to the terms of the knights, but not out of respect for the Teutonic Order, but because these additional days would be very necessary for better training of his army.

Soon, on July 2, Jagiello and Vytautas the Great with their armies and banners gathered in Mazovia, namely in Chervinsk on the Vistula River. On July 3, the armies of the princes moved towards the enemy. On July 8, the huge armies of Jaghella and Vitovt crossed the border with the intention of moving towards Malbork. But Grand Master Ulrich von Jungingen, a brilliant leader and fearless warrior, tried to trap his enemies. He knew from his own scouts where the enemy would pass and placed his Crusaders on the opposite bank from Jaghella's army, not far from the small village of Drvechi. But the Polish king and Vitovt did not want to fight in this area, where the Crusaders would have a significant advantage, and decided to attack Malbork from the other side, through the occupied city of Dabrovno.

The crusaders chose a different path in order to be able to resist the huge enemy army in Grunwald, Frignowo or Rikhnovo. On July 13, the Polish-Lithuanian troops reached the city of Dabrovno, which was occupied by the Crusaders and at that time inhabited by German citizens. Within several hours of the assault, the Poles and Lithuanians managed to take the city completely under their control. None of the city's knights defenders survived. They were all killed. The hatred of the Poles and Lithuanians towards the Crusaders was so strong that the city was burned to the ground, even though the enemy troops might have noticed the conflagration, who followed the army of Vitovt and his cousin literally on the heels. Flame and thick smoke that night was seen by the Grand Master and his entire army, who realized that Dabrovno had been captured and burned, and the battle simply could not be avoided. One of the crusader commanders told his master that he should not allow the Polish-Lithuanian army to cross the border. The crusaders gazed silently at the blazing city.

A huge army of Poles and Lithuanians left Dabrovno before dark on July 15, and by sunrise they reached Lake Lubien. This time the Grand Master overtook the army of Jaghella and Vitovt and for the second time planned to confront the enemy on Tuesday 15 July near the villages of Grunwald, Stebankom and Lodvigovo in the area of ​​Lake Lubien. The whole area was covered with forests and was just perfect for hiding the Polish-Lithuanian army.

When the sun rose on that fateful day, July 15, one can only guess how the whole of Europe, with bated breath, awaited the one who would win the titanic battle that had been awaited for so long. Everyone understood its enormous importance, since the winner would take control of the whole of Eastern Europe.

The Crusaders located their headquarters near the small village of Grunwald, while only three miles from this place, near the village of Tannenberg, Polish-Lithuanian troops set up their camps. In subsequent history, the Poles called this massacre the Battle of Grunwald, the Lithuanians the Battle of Zalgiris, and the Germans and the rest of the Western world the Battle of Tannenberg.

When the priest from the Polish-Lithuanian side finished his prayer, Jagiello turned to his commanders: “Brothers, on this day we will put an end to the tyranny that has occupied our lands. The crusaders went against us with the blessing of the church and a cross on their chest. But they also came dressed in deceit. We go forward with faith in our banner and deep love for Jesus Christ on our shields. To freedom! To victory!".

Soon, the commander asked the king when they should move to the battlefield, to which Jagiello simply replied: "We don't need it." Jaghella was 60 years old that day. He was older than any of the commanders of his army and the enemy leaders, and together with his cousin Vitovt the Great drew up a plan that gave their army a significant advantage over the Crusaders. The shortcomings of the army of Jagiello and Vytautas were numerous and even the smallest mistake could destroy the Polish-Lithuanian state once and for all.

The Poles gathered just a huge army, consisting of 18 thousand mounted knights, 11 thousand reitars and 4 thousand foot soldiers. To this should be added the Lithuanian army, consisting of 11 thousand horse knights and foot soldiers, 1.1 thousand Tatars and more than 6 thousand Bohemians, Russians, Moravians and Moldavians, who came to the aid of the Polish-Lithuanian army. Most of the Lithuanian and Polish infantry were armed with ordinary clubs, and their ammunition was much worse than that of the Crusaders. The crusaders at that time managed to collect 21 thousand skilled heavy cavalry, 6 thousand well-armed infantry and 5 thousand vassals, well trained in military affairs and armed much better than most of the Lithuanian and Polish infantry. Most of these Crusaders were Germans, but knights from all over Western Europe came to their aid in the fight against "pagan" Lithuania and the Poles (who dared to come to the aid of pagans, not Christians). The British, French, Hungarians, Austrians, Bavarians, Thuringians, Bohemians, Luxembourgers, Flemings, Dutch and even some Poles came to the aid of the Teutonic Order, but the Grand Master expected much more help from Western Europe. The Crusaders had 100 cannons that could fire cannonballs larger than a human head, while the Polish-Lithuanian army had only 16 cannons.

Poles and Lithuanians also had another problem. The Germans had the best warriors in the world - seasoned in many battles with the Lithuanians and Tatars. Ulrich von Junginen Grand Master, Frederick von Wallenrod Commander-in-Chief, Cuno von Lichtenstein, one of the greatest swordsmen of the century and a great general, and Albrecht von Schwarzenberg, Marshal and Commander of the Army's supplies. Each of these people proudly wore full armor, as befits a true Crusader. They were made from chains of armor, and not from massive metal plates like those of the same Poles and Lithuanians. Each of the crusaders wore a large black cross in front of his white tunic, and all the knights looked very impressive, especially with their huge horses and armor, capable of frightening the enemy from a distance with only one appearance.

Despite the numerical minority (more than 50 thousand Poles, Lithuanians and other allies against 32 thousand Crusaders, mostly Germans), the Crusaders significantly outnumbered their enemy in weapons, armor, horses and battle experience. It was to be truly one of the most decisive battles of all time - a huge clash of armies that would determine the fate of Eastern Europe and the two new countries of Lithuania and Poland.

The sun rose at 5 o'clock in the morning. Three Polish commanders went to the king in order to lead the army and send it to attack the enemy.
"No!",- was the answer of the king, and he told them his strategy for the future battle:
“Let them wait under the scorching rays of the sun. Let them wait all morning while we stay here in the cool shade of the trees. When they are exhausted by heat and thirst, then our hour will come, the time to attack and kill ".

Hovering Black in the painting by Jan Matejko "Battle of Grunwald"

Three Polish knights, including Zawisz the Black, who was famous for his participation in many battles, were impatient and did not like the royal strategy. But when the sun began to bake hotter and hotter, they fully appreciated the wisdom of their king and remained in the shadow of the forest, while the Crusaders literally "melted" under the scorching sun rays. At the same time, Vytautas the Great was checking the regiments / flags of Lithuanians, Poles, Bohemians and Russians and with his loud, loud voice raised the morale of the soldiers. Vitovt will take part in the battle as one of the allied commanders, but in fact he will be the real leader of the army.

Vytautas did not want to wait, since the Crusaders, according to spies, had marched more than 25 km a day earlier in the pouring rain in order to have time to block the enemy near Grunwald. The Crusaders are clearly tired and one attack in the early morning can defeat the exhausted Crusaders. But Jagiello believed that it was imperative to engage in battle in the heat, when the Crusaders were irritated and demoralized. Everyone knew that the Knights Templar in the past on many of the battlefields of Europe won battles only because of their mental stability and common sense. Unlike Vitovt's participation in the battle, Jagiello will be located on a hill and will observe the battle and calculate the next tactically advantageous move.

At 8.30, when the Crusaders were simply drenched in sweat and exhausted from the heat, Grand Master von Jungingen made a very cunning trick - he sent two of his best knights to the opposite side, so that they would carry out one assignment. When the two Teutons were some twenty meters away from the Polish camp, one of them shouted in a loud voice:
"Lithuanians and Poles, princes Vitovt and Jagiello, if you are afraid to go out and fight, then our Grand Master will send you this additional weapon".
And the knights with contempt threw down their swords, which, falling with their point into the ground, swayed regularly.
"Besides, you are cowards, - said the teuton "If you need more room to maneuver, our master will lead his troops a mile to help you.".
And suddenly, at a signal from one of the knights, the Crusaders turned and retreated exactly one mile.

The insult greatly embittered warriors such as Zavisha the Black, but Jagiello remained unperturbed and sent one of his servants to take the swords. Waving one of the received guns, Jagiello said:
"I accept both of your swords and your choice of the battlefield, but I have entrusted the results of this day to the Lord."
With these words the heralds of the Teutons departed. Everything was ready for a great battle, perhaps the greatest of all that ever happened.

On the left side were Poles, Bohemians, Moravians and Moldovans. On the right were the troops of Vitovt the Great, a platoon of Tatars, Russian troops and Latvian knights. The infantrymen, along with the Poles, were hidden among the trees. The crusaders spoke directly against the Polish-Lithuanian army. They have just lined up their cannons and infantry in front of the ranks of their troops.

Suddenly Jagiello gave a signal to attack "Krakow-Vilnius", and soon the formidable cry "Lithuania!" like a roar from the mouth of a lion escaped from Vitovt the Great. Many voices and horses, by which one could recognize the Russians, Lithuanians and Tatars, moved to attack the front ranks of the Crusaders. The Teutonic cannons fired only twice before being swept away by the cavalry. Soon the knights of Vitovt reached the enemy's line of defense with rather small losses, since they were very competently built (not too close to each other) and plunged the enemy troops into panic.

Vitovt the Great in the painting by Jan Matejko "Battle of Grunwald"

Von Jungingen, seeing the failure of his artillery and infantry, immediately dispatched his cavalry to stop the Lithuanian advance. "Our cavalry will attack our own people, Sire!"- said von Walenrod to the Grand Master. "Attack the Lithuanians!" Cried von Jungingen angrily, despite the deaths of his infantrymen, and soon his cavalry reached the enemies. The unfortunate infantrymen, trying to escape from the enemy, saw dust flying out from under the hooves of the heavy cavalry, and were taken by surprise. The Lithuanians and Tatars pursued them from behind, and the infantry fled back to their own positions, from where the Teutonic cavalry was advancing. Soon, most of the Crusader infantry were trampled to death by the horses of their own cavalry. Those who were more afraid of their cavalry turned back and they were overtaken by death at the hands of the Lithuanians. The first line of the Crusader army was literally swept away. A few infantrymen still managed to escape from the battlefield and hide in the tents of the Crusader camp, but most of them, which were crowded in the center by the cavalry, did not survive.

This maneuver of Jagiello and Vytautas the Great was very skillful, because they only managed to destroy the enemy's guns with the help of light cavalry and prevent the problems that they could create for the heavy cavalry. Also, such a maneuver forced the Crusaders to throw their heavy cavalry into battle much earlier than planned.

But now everything has changed. When the Tatars saw huge horses on the hill and no less huge Crusaders who were walking right at them, they simply fled, leaving the Lithuanians and Russians to their fate. It was a chaotic and undisciplined retreat, and some of the Teutons followed, whistling and shouting war cries.

After a chase that lasted four miles in which more than 50 Tatars were killed, the Crusaders returned to their comrades who fought the Lithuanians and were embroiled in a completely different battle.

Soon, the Grand Master sent a large force of Crusaders into battle to tackle the Polish knights who were awaiting command on the other side. Trumpets sounded. The exclamations rose. And the Polish knights, who were waiting for a tough attack from the Crusaders, raised their banners and sang "Christ is risen", as if they had come out against the "pagans."

The right side of the Poles also began to slowly move forward and sing at the same time "Ojczysta Piesn" (song of their homeland) "Bogurodzice" ("Mother of God"). Both sides, with fluttering banners and the sound of exclamations and chants, marched to join the wild battle in which the Lithuanians and the Crusaders had already fought.

The battle was fierce. The incessant clinking of swords was like the rolling of thunder. The horses whinnied and, falling down, dragged the riders with them, throwing them under the hooves of the oncoming horses. The terrible hand-to-hand combat raged to no avail for both sides for nearly two hours. The reserve regiments of the Allies and Crusaders, with horror in their eyes, watched the dust, completely covering the sky, in which horses, swords, soldiers flickered and war cries, prayers and groans of the dying sounded. When Kuno von Lichtenstein fought his way through the Lithuanian wall and was reunited with his Grand Master, who was watching the battle from his side, he said: “The Tatars have confirmed their cowardice, but these damned Lithuanians have learned to fight. The battle promises to be fierce to the very end, Sire. ".
"We will crush them!"- said the Grand Master, who always underestimated the Poles and Lithuanians, confidently believing that his army was better armed and more experienced.

The Grand Master, seeing that the Lithuanian army was smaller in number than the Polish and less well armed, sent some forces of the Crusaders, who fought with the Poles, to crush the Lithuanians of Vitovt the Great. Indeed, now the Teutons have begun to crowd out the Lithuanians. Vitovt the Great, realizing that his people were under strong pressure, ordered a tactical retreat in order to lure the Crusaders into the forest. Most of the Lithuanians began to roll back into the forest, and the Teutons happily began to pursue them. Only a small detachment, mostly consisting of Russians from Smolensk and a few Lithuanians who were very close to the Polish knights, continued to fight. One Russian regiment was completely swept away by the Crusaders, but the rest continued to fight desperately against the much better armed Teutons.

But few Crusaders pursued the Lithuanians. Some of them feared the sight of the forest, suspecting that it might be a trap. So it really was, because as soon as the Teutons entered the forest through the narrow bridge of the Morens River, the fresh forces of the Polish reserve suddenly jumped out from the trees like lions and began to kill the surprised Crusaders without mercy or pardon. The retreating Lithuanians immediately returned to battle, thus helping the Poles.

But the tactical maneuvers of the Lithuanians were dangerous for the Poles, as they left their left flank open. Nine regiments of the Crusaders attacked the Polish knights from that direction, and some even managed to break through the Polish front. The complete encirclement of the Poles was prevented by three regiments from Smolensk, as well as some Lithuanians who did not retreat.

Now the Teutons had a certain advantage, and they were even close to the end of the battle.

Marcin iz Wrocimovice in Jan Matejko's painting "The Battle of Grunwald"

To the benefit of the Crusaders, Marcin of Wrocimowice, the chamberlain of Krakow, was honored to carry in the very center of the battle a large Polish flag depicting a white eagle. When the Teutons saw the standard-bearer, they decided that King Jagiello should also be somewhere nearby, fighting at the head of his army, as was customary in Europe. They did not imagine that Jagiello was at that moment on the top of the hill and watched the battle, as well as the Grand Master - a tactic that was invented by Genghis Khan and his successors.

With great courage and determination, a detachment of German knights crashed into Marcin, wounded him, throwing down the Polish flag and triumphantly singing "Christ is Risen". In an ordinary battle, this would serve as a signal of the defeat of the army, the flag of which fell, and the Crusaders interpreted this exactly in this way and rushed to finish off the hypothetically fallen king and his entourage.

Jagiello heard the chanting and asked if they were Teutons. The knight guarding him replied that it was the Crusaders. He was worried that perhaps the Teutons had already won the battle. It looked a lot like they were celebrating a victory.

The Teutons apparently thought that this was the long-awaited end of the battle. But this was no ordinary battle. Knights from Krakow, including Zawisza the Black, rushed to defend the flag and the battle, even more fierce, broke out with renewed vigor. The Polish knights, more determined than the Crusaders, saved their flag and fell on the Teutons, who believed that the battle was over, but in reality it only became even more brutal and savage. The chanting of the Teutons was again replaced by the sounds of battle.

On the other hand, while the Teutons sang, Vitovt's Lithuanians did not sleep. The great commander, having restored the formation of the troops - those who did not leave the battlefield - returned again to the battle. “The Crusaders are celebrating too early! Let's show them what we Lithuanians are capable of. They can start praying for their souls because when we arrive
they will not have time for this! " And immediately in the first line, he killed two Crusaders with his sword.

The voices of returning Lithuanians, heard by Poles and Bohemians, raised their morale. It was already two o'clock in the afternoon, the hottest time of that long, brutal day, and the strategy of Yagaila and his brother was beginning to take off. The Germans and other knights from among the bravest warriors in the world were sweating in the saddle from dawn, and some also began to get tired, especially those who persecuted the Tatars.

When Jagiello saw his cousin returning to battle, he sent into battle his knights who had not yet participated in the battle, and when these fresh forces joined the battle, the ranks of the Crusaders began to slowly back away.

But the Grand Master, seeing this, sent his personal reserve to help his people in the battle. Combat is now mostly hand-to-hand. Individual warriors fought with each other, and one horseman pursued the other. The battle was so difficult that the advantage passed from one side to the other and back.

The alarmed German commander reported to his Grand Master: “I have traveled all the way around and I assure you, Sir, that the Polish and Lithuanian infantry have not even entered the battle yet. They must be hiding in these damned dark forests. We must destroy them ".
“Don't worry, we are winning. I can feel it, and soon we will join the battle and defeat them. The infantry will not join the battle, they are afraid of us. ".

It was almost 6 o'clock and Jagiello moved to another position on a hill near Lodvigovo, closer to the battlefield, to give orders. Suddenly, the Polish knight gave a sign and from the thicket of the forest Polish and Lithuanian peasants began to appear, treading at first timidly and uncertainly, after passing to a half-run, waving their pitiful wooden weapons in the air, and finally rushed forward with shouts with which they, may have hunted a bear. They walked closer and closer, their screams becoming louder and more piercing, frightening the Crusaders, who no longer wore snow-white clothes and were no longer white horse decorations. The Teutons killed many of them, but still a huge army of infantrymen, like a huge flock of ants, moved forward without stopping.

Now the Crusaders had to face both the knights and the infantry. Blood and bodies were everywhere, making it difficult for the knights to move. Desperate cries for help from those who were dying were heard from everywhere. The Poles and their allies were beginning to gain the upper hand. The stubborn infantrymen made the Teutons nervous, and they did not know who to fight first.
The Crusader infantry had been crushed even earlier by Jungingen's poor tactics. The desperate cries of the Teutons were heard from everywhere. “The God who leads us - shouted Cuno von Lichtenstein, - deliver me from these damned flies! ".

Von Jungingen's face was ashen gray and his throat suddenly went dry, because he knew that this would be a battle to the death and that his knights could lose. The Allies were victorious and the Crusaders everywhere were driven back. Many of them lost their nerves, and the allies killed and killed the Crusaders.
“Now the time has come when we have to defend the work of Jesus Christ at the cost of our own lives! Behind me!". Without hesitation, he spurred his horse, and 16 German regiments followed him.

Ulrich von Junginen in the painting by Jan Matejko "Battle of Grunwald"

This raid was very dangerous for Jagiello, who was close to him, and the white eagle on the flag could betray the king in him. There were only a few knights around him, much less than Jungignen, who rushed into battle. The Crusaders may have noticed the flag, but they were in a hurry to follow their commander to help their fighting comrades. But one knight, Leopold von Kokeritz, breaking away from his fellows, wanted to single-handedly attack Jagiello, probably noticing the flag.

Perhaps von Kokeritz recognized Jagiello's face, and possibly his clothes, but he was no doubt on his way to kill the king. The king prepared to defend himself, but his secretary, Zbigniew from Oleshnich, unarmed, directed his horse to the German's horse and threw him off the horse. The other knights killed the Teuton before he could get up and warn his comrades that the Polish king was here.

At the same time, 16 Crusader regiments reached the battlefield to help their own against the enemy. The oppressed Crusaders retreated in order to join the Grand Master, but Vitovt the Great immediately ordered his troops to weaken the center and strengthen the flanks, thus encircling the Teutons who were rushing towards the center of the Allied line. Many Polish regiments immediately attacked the Teutons and the final phase of the mortal battle began. Slowly, like the ruthless tentacles of an octopus, various groups of allies - Lithuanians, Poles, Bohemians, Russians, Tatars, Moravians, Moldovans - squeezed the Crusaders. When the circle was closed, a real massacre began. Spears, daggers, pikes, scythes, insane strength of hands - all this was combined in order to crush the Germans and achieve a victory that seemed unattainable a day ago.

The foot soldiers, many of whom were villagers, fought just fanatically, filled with revenge and hatred towards the Teutons, as they often saw their villages destroyed by the raids of the Crusaders, and many of their comrades were killed by these God's People.

The encirclement was completed. Even these 16 regiments could not save the situation for the Teutons. Vitovt the Great bore death to every Crusader who met him on the way. He shouted and encouraged the allies even more, who, like bees, pressed more and more on the unfortunate Crusaders. But the battle was still deadly. The Teutons, armed with long swords, killed many lightly armed infantry, but most of the Crusaders were simply disoriented, their white robes turning red due to the amount of blood that was on the ground and on their horses. Those Crusaders who wanted to improve visibility tore off their heavy helmets and were immediately left without heads, which the Poles demolished.

The Lithuanians were on the left flank of the attack, and the Poles were on the right. The encirclement was so dense that not a single Crusader managed to slip out of it. The Teutons fought very bravely and stubbornly, not wanting to admit defeat, continuing to fight desperately. The Grand Master, with the help of von Wallenrod and six of his bravest knights, tried to hold back the peasants and determined knights. But there were too few of them and they were overturned. The warriors pounced on the Teutonic leader with great force, striking him from all sides. Jungingen was mortally wounded and shouted: "Jesus, save me!" Dying, he probably realized that his crusade, the purpose of which was to crush the Polish-Lithuanian state and the capture of Eastern Europe, failed.

At the same time, a brave Pole snatched the Teutonic flag from von Wallenrod's hand. Vitovt the Great, who was near when the Grand Master was defeated, threw up his hands and shouted: "Victory!".

From his vantage point, Jagiello had a good view and saw that the carnage was still going on and even heard some Lithuanian and Polish songs. Desperate prayers were also heard from the surrounded Crusaders, who now asked for help from God. Now that the Grand Master was dead, many lost their nerves and threw down their weapons, seeking salvation for themselves. But those unfortunate people who came from all over Europe to fight the "heathens" no longer had hope.

At 7:20, half an hour before sunset, the last stage of the battle ended with the complete defeat of those 16 Teutonic regiments. Now the hunt has begun on the few who survived and sought help from the Crusader camp. There, a small group of infantry and a few knights prepared to help their comrades.

Battle of Grunwald. Jan Matejko (click to enlarge)

The army of Poles and Lithuanians very quickly captured the Teutonic camp. The Crusaders did not even expect a tired enemy to be able to reach their camp so quickly, but Jagiello still had fresh reinforcements, even at this late stage, to throw them into battle. The carnage began again, and those who were not armed and asked for their lives were taken prisoner.

Some of the Crusaders, alone or in small groups, tried to escape through the forest, but they got lost and were captured or killed by their allies.

Only about 1,400 crusaders managed to leave the battlefield and reach the Malbork fortress.

In the base camp of the Teutons, there was a lot of wine and handcuffs, which were intended to take the defeated pagans to Malbork as dogs, so the Crusaders were confident of victory. Vitovt ordered to burn everything belonging to the Order, and several prisoners were to be handcuffed. "Chain them up so that they know what it is like to be chained like dogs, so that they feel what our poor compatriots felt when they were captured by them during their raids on our villages, and being thrown into these terrible prisons of Malbork.", - shouted Vitovt the Great. Jagiello ordered to pour wine on the ground, because he did not want his people to be drunk, but had strength for tomorrow, when the flags of the Crusaders would fall to the ground, at the feet of the victors. Thus, on earth, wine mixed with blood. According to some knights, there was so much blood on the battlefield that it covered the entire beautiful green landscape near Grunwald. The whole landscape was covered with thousands of bodies, and the priests walked and prayed for their souls. It was a sad sight that will leave a mark forever.

The next day was important for the winners. First, the king went to the wounded on both sides. Enemies were no longer in handcuffs, because the victors considered them people, not animals, no matter how much they hated them. The chivalrous spirit was enough among the Poles and Lithuanians.

Soon the two great leaders Vytautas the Great and Jagailo, surrounded by their magnificent commanders, arrived on the battlefield to see the enemy flags falling one by one to the ground. Poles captured 39 flags and 10 Lithuanians. 1,400 lucky Crusaders were able to take only 7 flags with them, and it was good luck for them.

Later, some of the prisoners were taken to identify the bodies.
There was also the body of the Great One, and Jagiello, looking at him, said:
“So this is the man who wanted to conquer us and make us slaves to his Order? Cover his corpse in purple and bury him with honor. ".

There was the body of the greatest hero of the Order of von Liechtenstein, Schwarzenberg, von Wallenrod, and among the foreign knights lay Jaromir Prazhsky, Gabor of Buda, the leader of the Hungarians, Richard of York and others.

28,000 Crusaders and their assistants were killed the previous day. More than 50 of the 60 leaders of the Order were killed.

It was a complete defeat for the Teutonic Order, which will never recover from this important battle. 209 Knights of the Crusaders died. And only 12 Polish knights were killed, along with several other allied knights. More than two thirds of the Lithuanian and Polish infantry were killed, along with more than 100 Tatars. The total number of victims in the Polish-Lithuanian army is unknown, but it is almost certain that more than 20,000 people died to save their beloved homeland from the barbarian Teutonic Order.

The Tatars, who were relatively small in number, caused a scandal. The priest Anton Grabener of Lubeck, who did not take part in the hostilities, sent a report to all the capitals of Europe, informing the courts that the Teutonic knights were defeated only because the pagan Jagailo and his cousin Vitovt hired 100,000 Tatars, who crushed the defenders of Christianity. This, of course, is completely untrue. There were only about 1,500 Tatars there, and they all fled!

But the strongest powers of that time - England and France - were preoccupied with problems with each other, and left Poland alone, becoming cautious after the terrible defeat inflicted on the Crusaders. The Pope did not expect this to happen.

On February 1, 1411, a peace treaty was signed by both sides. Poles and Lithuanians re-established some territories, including Samogitia and part of Pomerania, but Malbork was still in German hands. Of course, the Teutonic Order will pay compensation to the Poles, and all prisoners will be released. After that, the weak Teutonic Order did not have any problems with Poland and Lithuania, but they still continued to occupy the formidable fortress of Malbork.

Vitovt the Great will be known in the subsequent history of Lithuania as the savior of the nation and the whole of Eastern Europe, and in the eyes of Polish historians, Jagiello is considered the same. The Battle of Grunwald is the most important battle in the history of both nations. Another decisive battle took place near Vienna in 1683, where the Poles once again saved Europe when Jan Sobieski's hussars defeated the Turks. But the Battle of Grunwald remains the most important for Poland. As a result of this terrible battle, perhaps the most terrible that ever took place, Eastern Europe was not Germanized, and the Polish and Lithuanian culture developed successfully in the following centuries.

The Crusaders is one of the best historical novels by the classic of Polish literature, Nobel Prize winner Henryk Sienkiewicz. The plot of the novel revives the pages of the heroic past of Poland and is dedicated to the struggle of the Polish people against the Teutonic Order. The culmination of the novel - which became an important milestone in the history of Poland.

July 15 is inexorably approaching)) Fatal day for the Teutonic Order of the Battle of Grunwald, it is the battle of Tannenberg, it is the battle of Zalgiris. First, an old translation of an article by Polish historian Adam Krzeminski, written in 2010, when we celebrated the 600th anniversary of the great battle.

Translation: Tortilla
Country: Germany
Edition: Zeit

Polish-Prussian history

Mythic battle

At Tannenberg in Masuria in 1410 the knights of the Teutonic Order took their last battle. This great battle was a turning point in Polish and Prussian history.

These two swords are known to every Pole. They were received before the battle from the envoys of the order, the Polish king Vladislav II Jagiellon (c. 1351 - June 1, 1434 - the prince of Vitebsk, the Grand Duke of Lithuania and the king of Poland. The grandson of Gediminas, the son of Olgerd and the Orthodox princess Juliania (Ulyana Alexandrovna of Tver). approx. transl.). Obviously, not as a gesture of friendship. The Grand Master of the Teutonic Order, as the envoys said, called the Poles and Lithuanians to battle, and if the royal army does not have enough room, the master is ready to make room for a little so that the enemy's bones do not decay in the bush. The answer that followed to this was so short and dignified that even now, more than half a millennium later, all schoolchildren repeat it, playing their war games: "We have enough swords, but we will accept these as a sign of our victory!"

On that day, July 15, 1410, the two armies stood up, stretching out almost three kilometers, at a distance of 200 meters from each other. They were ready to engage in the most significant battle of the late Middle Ages, which predetermined the division of power in Eastern and Central Europe for more than 400 years: the Battle of Grunwald (German Gruenfelde), which in Germany has been called the Battle of Tannenberg since Prussian times. Both of these towns are in close proximity to the battlefield - southeast of the Polish Olsztyn (German Allenstein) in Mazury. On the one hand, more than 20,000 soldiers were waiting - the army of the Teutonic Order, consisting of 250 knights, thousands of mercenaries, horse and foot from all countries of Europe, and 100 cannons. On the other hand, there are about 30,000 Poles and Lithuanians, as well as three Smolensk banners (an organizational and tactical unit in the knightly army of medieval Poland and Lithuania, consisting of 25-80 copies, approx. Transl.) And 2,000 Tatar horsemen.
Light Lithuanian and Tatar horsemen were the first to act as a seed. They had to test the reliability of the soil after the previous rain and irritate the enemy. When they were pushed back, the German sounded "Christ is risen!" And the two Christian armies moved against each other.

While on the left flank the Polish banners are gaining the upper hand, on the right the Lithuanian-Smolensk and Tatar ones are beginning to retreat. The Tatars, unable to withstand the pressure in the resulting breakthrough, flee, dragging along the Lithuanians and Czech mercenaries. And only the resistance of the Smolensk banners, one of which is almost completely worn out, prevents a catastrophe.

Three times the Grand Master of the Order, Ulrich von Jungingen, tried unsuccessfully to break through the Polish ranks. Suddenly, his soldiers scouted the opportunity to encircle the enemy regiments. With one of the assault detachments, the Grand Master himself tried to bypass the Polish phalanx and turn around. With this maneuver, his knights even found themselves dangerously close to the hill from which King Jagiellon himself led the battle. Only at the last moment did his small escort manage to roll up the royal banners.
At the same time, the Poles, noticing the approaching danger, changed the front line. This somewhat relieved their troops. Meanwhile, the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vitovt calms down his fugitive regiments and leads them back to the battlefield. Here the felling begins, in which the Grand Master of the Order himself perishes. The pursuit of the fleeing knights continues until darkness. In the hands of Poles and Lithuanians, 51 banners fell, which now, together with two swords, settled in Krakow in the castle on the Wawel (a hill and an architectural complex of monuments in Krakow, on the left bank of the Vistula, of which the most important are the Royal Castle and the Cathedral of Saints Stanislav and Wenceslas. Wawel is a symbol of Poland and a place of special importance for the Polish people, approx. transl.)

According to the chroniclers, the Polish losses were surprisingly small, the Lithuanian ones were significant, and the losses of the order were terrifyingly huge - 8000 people, 209 of them were knights. It rained all night, which led to additional casualties among the wounded, which, as the chronicler Jan Dlugosh wrote a few decades later, could still have been saved by taking them out of the battlefield in time and providing assistance.

First - against the pagan Prussians

The great battle had a long, almost 200-year history. It all began when, as the English historian Robert Bartlett noted, "the birth of Christian Europe from a spirit of violence" took place in the crusades against Muslims in the Mediterranean and pagans in the Baltic.

The Crusader states in the Middle East were striving for decline, when in 1226 the Polish prince Konrad Mazowiecki (1187 - August 31, 1247 - a representative of the Piast dynasty, one of the Polish princes of the period of feudal fragmentation. -1247, approx. Transl.) Invited the knights of the Teutonic Order, by that time just ousted from Palestine to Hungary, to his own Poland. The order consisted, like other religious knightly brotherhoods of the Middle Ages, of male nobles who, although they took a monastic vow, otherwise led the way of life the same as other warriors in Western Europe. Konrad counted on their help in the violent Christianization of the pagan Balts.
The prince pursued a very ambitious regional policy, cared about good relations with Kiev and wanted to sit in Krakow as king. However, he could not catch up with the wise life experience of the Teutons. Their Grand Master Hermann von Salz was a close friend of Emperor Frederick II Staufen (Holy Roman Emperor, approx. Transl.) And easily defeated the Polish provincial with one left, having received guarantees of sovereignty over the occupied lands from the Pope and the Emperor. Thus, in less than a few decades, to the east of the lower Vistula, an effective crusader state arose, which, relying on modern residence monasteries that turned into fortresses during the war, such as the powerful Marienburg near Danzig, offered the knights defeated in Palestine new opportunities for development and new crusades.

To begin with, they went against the pagan Prussians and partly pagan, partly Orthodox, Lithuanians. And later, against his own brothers in faith: Catholic Poland. At first there was mutual agreement with the latter. But when the Brandenburgers (meaning the Margrave of Brandenburg, founded in 1157 and inhabited by the Germans and Flemings, approx. Transl.) From the west captured the Vistula delta, the Poles in 1308 again called for help from the crusaders. However, the knights not only drove out the Brandenburg invaders, but also drove out the Polish "masters" and themselves fortified themselves on these lands. The Crusader state ignored the decision of the papal arbitration court in 1321 and did not return Eastern Pomerania with Danzig to the Poles (only in 1466, according to the Peace of Torun, Eastern Pomerania was returned to Poland, approx. Transl.) Since then, the knights faced protracted wars on two fronts - with Lithuanians in the north and Poles in the west. This united the latter. The reaction to the new enemy within its own four walls was the Polish-Lithuanian alliance, which emerged in 1385 (Krevo Union, approx. Transl.) It was a unique alliance for Europe, as it lasted 400 years - until the Union of 1569 (Lublin union, approx. transl.) Union of unequal partners: The Polish kingdom was smaller, but more modern and recognized in Europe. Territorial division was overcome, and so was the devastation of the Mongol raids.

38-year-old prince marries 13-year-old queen

Lithuania, on the other hand, was at that time one of the great powers of Eastern Europe. She took advantage of both the disintegration of Kievan Rus as a result of the Mongol invasions and the vassal dependence of Moscow on the Golden Horde. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania with its capital in Vilna stretched from the shores of the Baltic to the Black Sea, including Smolensk, Kiev and bordering Novgorod. It was a strange structure. The country of origin was pagan, the outskirts of the giant principality were Orthodox. But the Lithuanians gravitated towards Western Christianity, and from these considerations, the smaller Poland was suitable as an ally.

The union was sealed by a wedding: in 1386, 38-year-old Lithuanian prince Jagiello Algidraitis married 13-year-old Polish queen Jadwiga and became Vladislav II Jagellon, crowned king of Poland. The marriage was facilitated by a German merchant from Riga - not disinterestedly, of course. The cities on the Baltic coast were afraid of the Crusader state and opposed it in every possible way. They appreciated the more liberal state order in Poland. And later, in the 15-16 centuries. this was one of the reasons for the Prussians' choice of submission to the Polish crown (as an autonomy within the union), which strengthened their resistance to the Teutonic Order.

At the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries, the Crusader state was at the zenith of strength and power. It made every effort to split its new opponents. And flattery and threats. However, this strategy did not justify itself, Lithuania and Poland could not be separated and they more and more, for their part, pressed the Teutonic Order.

In August 1409, Grand Master Ulrich von Jungingen began a campaign, which, however, soon "reached a dead end." An armistice was concluded until June 24, 1410. In the meantime, the order's ally, the king of Bohemia, had to settle the dispute peacefully.

The decision of the arbitrator from Prague was entirely, as expected, in favor of the rulers from Marienburg. Weapons rattled again on both sides. The Bohemian king communicated the support of 1000 horsemen to the order; he agitated knights in his own country, in Silesia, Hungary and Western Europe. The Polish-Lithuanian army was also "international", but German names could sometimes be found in the list of knights.
June 24, 1410 Poland and Lithuania declared war on the Teutonic Order. Soon after, the entire army crossed the dashingly designed "pontoon" bridge to the eastern bank of the Vistula and moved north. Both armies were steadily drawing closer. And on July 15, the hour of the decisive battle came at Grunwald.

Historians are still wondering what they were talking about, face to face, after the battle won, two Lithuanians: Jagiello and Vitovt. Why did they not move to Marienburg at the same hour to deal the mortal blow to the decapitated state of the Crusaders? Why was the time given to the heir of von Jungingen - Heinrich von Plauen to organize the defense of the stronghold of the knights on the banks of the Nogat? The fortress withstood the siege and, despite subsequent victories, Jagiello signed a very nasty peace treaty, which in fact did not lead to peace, but provoked new wars with the strengthened Crusader state. Only in 1466, Eastern Pomerania with Danzig returned to the rule of the Polish crown as part of Royal Prussia, which means by their own decision on the basis of autonomy (according to the Peace of Torun, Eastern Pomerania was returned to Poland and became part of the so-called Royal (or Western) Prussia, province under the rule of the Polish king, but using predominantly German law, approx.transl.)

It was only in 1525 that the last Grand Master of the Teutonic Order, Albrecht von Hohenzollern, finally took an "oath of allegiance to the lord" to the Polish king in Krakow. At the same time, Albrecht converted to the Protestant faith and abolished the remnants of the Crusader state, creating the Duchy of Prussia (already being the Grand Master of the order, he realized that the age of chivalry had outlived its time, that it was time to change something in his state. Albrecht secretly accepts Lutheranism and announces the abolition of the order and the birth of the duchy In April 1525, Albert of Brandenburg arrives in Krakow to conduct a ceremony for the liquidation of the Teutonic Order (burning of clothes). Later, the duchy would unite with Brandenburg, creating a state that, 250 years later, in alliance with Russia and the Habsburgs, would ensure the end of "Polish-Lithuania".

Tannenberg's dishonor

The Battle of Grunwald was the fruit of the military alliance between Poland and Lithuania. After the death of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vitovt in 1430, the King of Poland became at the same time the Grand Duke of Lithuania. In the period from 1569 to 1795, the union remained a federation with a single monetary circulation, however, in foreign policy, both countries were completely independent. For example, the Lithuanians did not take part in the campaign of the Polish king Johann Sobiesky against the Turks to lift the siege of Vienna in 1683.

The Polish-Lithuanian state, Rzeczpospolita, had however significant shortcomings. The centralized government was undeveloped, the economic monoculture dominated. To this must be added the estate egoism of the nobility, which suppressed the freedoms of the townspeople and peasants, as well as the Cossacks, which contributed to a large extent to the impossibility of Ukraine joining the union as a third component.
On the other hand, the preservation of political classes in the country in the sense of freedom and justice, as far as possible in a parliamentary monarchy with the most modern, European constitution from 1791 at that time. After the final division and loss of statehood, only the memories of the Commonwealth became carriers of ideas national identity, both in Poland and Lithuania.
Over and over again, the 19th century poets chanted and conjured past victories. Especially in the Russian and Austrian part of the country, the well-groomed cult of the Battle of Grunwald was directed against the Bismarck and Wilhelm anti-Polish policies.

Nobel laureate Henryk Sienkiewicz's novel "The Crusaders", published in 1900, has become a real national bible. And the Grunwald monuments, erected in 1900 in Krakow and in New York, demonstrated the right to self-determination and sovereignty.
For the Prussian-German nationalists, the dishonor at Tannenberg became, on the contrary, a thorn in the eye, which they tried to compensate for with myths about the German outpost of culture among the barbarians - Marienburg. Later, the victory over the Russian army in September 1914 was successfully stylized into the second battle of Tannenberg, as a revenge for Grunwald.

And the Nazis tried to eradicate these memories from the people's memory. After the occupation of Poland in 1939, they destroyed the Krakow monument to Jagaila and solemnly transferred copies of the banners captured in 1410 to Marienburg; the originals were already stolen by the Habsburgs in 1797 and have since been considered lost, as are the copies today.

Almost every day of the German terror, the Grunwald myth served the Poles to "warm the heart." The soldiers of the underground army took on pseudonyms the names of the heroes of Senkevich's novel. The communists also used Grunwald's symbolism to identify the Polish-Soviet brotherhood in arms. So the three Smolensk banners, which held the line despite the flight of the Lithuanians, suddenly became the harbingers of the Red Army.
Grunwald became the motto for the national show of power.

Back in the 80s, the impenetrable concrete foreheads of the Communist Party, panicking at the success of Solidarity, tried to inflame anti-German attitudes in the country by creating the Patriotic Association Grunwald - a funny idea and especially hopeless in view of the German action in support of Poland during the days of martial law 1981- 82 BC

Also for the endless Polish-Lithuanian dispute of historians, the Battle of Grunwald is a fertile fodder. Since, in the Lithuanian interpretation, it was not the Poles who decided the outcome of the battle, but the Lithuanians, who applied the Tatar tactics and by their flight lured the crusaders into the swampy swamps. What a pity, the modern warriors of Grunwald answer, and even if this is so, the plan was still wasted, since more Lithuanians fled than those whom they were supposed to lure from the battlefield. The differences were settled a few years ago by the Swedish historian Sven Ekdahl, who found a letter in the Göttingen archive dated the year of the battle. In it, the author (anonymous) warns the knights of the order that if the Lithuanians flee, they should not be pursued, as this would be a deceptive maneuver.

These exceptional disputes are of little interest to modern knights, who each year stage the famous battle in the meadow near Grunwald.

Likewise, the Kaczynski brothers did not really care about historical details when in 2005 they opened their (then successful) election campaign in the Warsaw National Museum against the backdrop of the famous battle painting by Jan Matejka.

For the 600th anniversary of Grunwald, anti-German speeches are no longer heard

The rest, however, is quiet over the battlefield. The fact that the Teutonic Order was not only a sworn enemy, but also had a positive impact on the development of the Kingdom of Poland, seems to be a well-known truth. And it is absolutely clear that anti-German hysteria will no longer be rekindled in this anniversary year. President Lech Kaczynski, who died in a plane crash near Smolensk, was going to celebrate the anniversary together with the Lithuanian president, timed to coincide with the planned election campaign. However, the time for such dramatizations has passed. The festivities will rather be held in the key chosen by Angela Merkel last year at the festivities in Kalkriese (a museum and park about 16 kilometers from the Lower Saxon city of Osnabrück, where the so-called Teutoburg Forest is located - a mountainous area between the Weser and Ems rivers. In 9 AD e. there was a battle between the Romans and a number of Germanic tribes, approx. transl.) - we "won the battle in the Teutoburg forest *, but did the Germans become more peaceful after that and did they come closer to Europe?"

Thus, the outcome of the jubilee year and past policies should be conciliatory. In Poland, the idea is already gaining momentum, to make this a pretext for the transfer of patronage over the restoration of Steinort Castle in Masuria to the Prime Minister and the Bundeskanzler. Here, according to hopes, there could be a collaboration of scholars dealing with the history of this part of Europe. History, which belongs, for example, Ignatius Krasitsky. Polish bishop, friend of Frederick the Great, enlightener and famous writer, who consecrated St. Jadwiga Cathedral in Berlin in 1773 (built in the 18th century as the first Catholic church in Prussia after the Protestant Reformation by personal permission of King Frederick II, approx. Transl.), and who willingly spent time in Steinort with friends of the Lendorffs (owners of the castle, approx. transl.), not paying attention to which side their ancestors stood on in 1410 near Grunwald ...

Translator's Notes

* The Teutoburg Forest was first mentioned in the history of Tacitus when describing the defeat of the Roman legate Kvnktiliy Vara in Gaul in the war with the alliance of the Germanic tribes Cherusci and Hutts in 9 year. The Germans managed to lure the three Legions of Var into an inaccessible forest and swamps, surround them and after three days of fighting completely destroy them. On the battlefield, 27 thousand legionnaires were killed, which was a heavy defeat for Rome. Emperor Augustus was so distressed that for several months he did not shave his beard as a sign of mourning. Contemporaries kept a description of how he banged his head against the jamb, exclaiming: "O Var, give me back my legions." In Rome, the day of defeat was celebrated every year with mourning and mourning.
Six years after the battles in the Teutonburg forest, the Roman generals Tiberius and Germanicus, avenging Var, visited the battle site, collected the remains of Roman soldiers and erected a burial mound over them.

Exhibition 600 years since the Battle of Grunwald / Tannenberg

Small photo gallery from the Ordensland website

Since 1960, the Polish triumphal column in Grunwald / Tannenberg reminds of the victory over the Teutonic Order

The chapel built by the Teutons on the battlefield in 1411 in memory of the victims was destroyed over time over the centuries, but in recent years it has been renewed again.

It is believed that it was at this place that the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order died

The stone bas-relief clearly represents the fighting

Maybe these are the barely recognizable remains of the former Master's Stone? A modern inscription in Polish explains that the Great Master Ulrich von Jungingen died on this site in a battle on July 15, 1410. The "original stone" inscribed in German was at one time "neutralized" for the opening of the memorial.

In the struggle for the German cause and German law here on July 15, 1410, the great master Ulrich von Jungingen fell the death of the brave

But Ulrich von Jungingen - the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order - is alive! Well, for at least one day of annually held knightly tournaments in the East Prussian Tannenberg / Masurian Grunwald

Amateur knights from Poland, Lithuania and Germany show today the course of hostilities that took place 600 years ago

The second battle of Tannenberg, successful for the Germans, took place on August 23 - 31, 1914. The army under the leadership of Paul von Hindenburg managed to defeat the Russian tsarist army in the largest encirclement operation for that time and return East Prussia. In memory of this victory, in 1927, south of the town of Olsztynek (German: Hohenstein), a wreath-shaped monument of eight towers was erected, in which the tomb for Paul von Hindenburg and his wife was later built. In 1945, this imperial monument was blown up by the retreating Wehrmacht, and von Hindenburg's ashes were taken to the West. The Germans feared that the sarcophagus might fall into the hands of the advancing Red Army and be displayed for display in Moscow.

About the Tannenberg Imperial Memorial - I'll post a translation and a photo gallery a little later.

By the way, here is a very interesting article by the Belarusian historian Ruslan Gagua "The Battle of Grunwald in Russian and foreign historiography". It's in PDF format so here's the link:

The different approach to this event in different countries is well shown.

Battle of Grunwald.

Polish artist J. Matejko, 1878

When the event happened

Where the event took place

Near Grunwald and Tannenberg in Prussia, near the Vistula River in the territory of the Teutonic Order

Participants:

Allied army of the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (headed by the Polish king Vladislav Jagailo and the Lithuanian prince Vitovt). Russian troops, mercenaries from the Czech Republic, Moravia, Prussia. Hungary, Belarus and Tatar soldiers.

Teutonic Order (commander - Ulrich von Jungingen) + mercenaries from Austria, France, Germany.

Number of participants

Teutonic Order - 27 thousand

Allied Forces - 39 thousand

• Background

1192 - formation of the Teutonic Order

1242-battle on Lake Peipsi with the troops of Alexander Nevsky. The defeat of the knights.

Since 1280 - constant raids of crusaders - Teutonic knights - on the Lithuanian lands, which separated Livonia, which belonged to the knights, from their lands. At the same time, the crusaders pursued the goal of converting the population of Lithuania to Catholicism

1385, Krevo Union... According to it, a union (union) of Lithuania and Poland was created. Jagiello entered into an alliance with the Polish queen Jadwiga. Lithuania officially adopted Catholicism in 1378, so that the external cause of the Teutonic Order's aggression was gone.

1409- The territorial claims of the Order to Lithuanian territories were renewed. The reason is the demonstration of the population of Samogitia against the Teutons. Poland supported Lithuania.

On August 6, 1409, the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order Ulrich von Jungingen declared war on Poland and Lithuania. Started "Great War" 1409-1411

July 15, 1410 year, the decisive battle took place - Grunwald (or Tannenberg).

Causes

Warband: the capture of Poland would give him access to the Baltic Sea, along which the northern border of Poland passed. It was possible to control trade along the Neman, Western Dvina and Vistula rivers. In addition, through the Baltic Sea, there is a direct route to the Moscow State, which has long attracted people with its wealth and vastness.

Poland, Lithuania, Russia- to get rid of the constant aggression of the Teutonic Order, to defend independence.

The troops of the Teutonic Order were dominated by heavy cavalry and artillery, and the allied - light, as well as peasant militia on foot.

The course of the battle

Outcomes

During the battle, the Teutonic Order lost a third of the army - 8 thousand people and part of the territory Torun peace February 1, 1411. The order began to decline, and in 1466 it ceased to exist and became a vassal of Poland.

Cities Hanseatic League(arose in 1241, united the trading cities of Europe in the 14-16 centuries) refused to cooperate with the order.

This is one of the greatest victories of the allied Polish-Lithuanian-Russian troops over the Teutonic Order. Its aggression to the east was suspended ... For 5 centuries, until 1914, an aggressive and armed German never set foot on Russian lands.

The outcome of the battle was decided by the firmness and courage of the Russian troops - the Smolensk regiments.

The negative qualities of the clumsy heavy cavalry of the knights and the maneuverability of the allied troops were manifested.

Meaning

The victory in the Battle of Grunwald became a symbol of the commonwealth of the peoples of Lithuania and the Slavic peoples.

The victory showed the importance and effectiveness of joint actions against a common enemy.

Russia, like Lithuania and Poland, was freed from encroachments by the Germans for many centuries.

Prepared by: Vera Melnikova

Poland. Krakow. 1910 - a monument at the site of the Battle of Grunwald in honor of the 500th anniversary of the victory. Sculptor Anthony Vivulsky.

On July 15, 1410, one of the largest battles of the Middle Ages took place - the Battle of Grunwald. The outcome of the battle changed the balance of power in Europe and marked the beginning of a new era.

Prehistory of the conflict and the beginning of the Great War

In 1224, the state of the Teutonic Order was created on the territory of the Baltic States, consisting mainly of German knights-crusaders. Due to the constant acquisition of land from ruined feudal lords, the absorption of smaller and weaker knightly orders, as well as the constant influx of military booty, the new state grew richer and gained increasing influence. In terms of his power, the Grand Master, who headed the Order, could even compete with the Pope. The knights minted their own coins, traded, opened schools, and together made up a splendid, well-trained and disciplined army. The order pursued an expansive policy towards the states of Eastern Europe and Russia. From the end of the 12th century, a series of so-called Northern Crusades began, aimed at the forcible Catholicization of Russia, Lithuania and Poland. Of course, the Order pursued not only purely religious goals - they were, rather, secondary, the main task of the Teutonic knights was to expand the territory of their state and establish complete control over the Baltic coast.

Lithuania and Poland suffered the most from the raids of the Teutons. The Russian state was also periodically raided, but the memory of the crusaders still had fresh memories of the defeat of the order troops by Prince Alexander Nevsky.

At the end of the 14th century, the situation in eastern Europe became more complicated due to the struggle between two cousins: the Lithuanian princes Jagiello and Vitovt. In order to achieve power, the cousins ​​periodically turned to the Teutonic Order for help, allowing the German knights to ravage Lithuania. But in the end, Jagailo and Vytautas realized what damage their opposition to the welfare of the state brings. They made peace and decided to jointly confront foreign invaders. The result of their conflict was:

• The signing of the Krevo Union (1385). Through the dynastic marriage of the Lithuanian prince Jagiello and the Polish princess Jadwiga, the two Eastern European states were united. Jagiello, while remaining the Lithuanian ruler, received the Polish crown. Despite the fact that the union did not put an end to the civil war, it was an important decision that led to peace between nations. In more backward pagan Lithuania, Polish cultural trends and the Catholic religion began to penetrate. Immediately after the signing of the union, Jagailo and Vitovt jointly engaged in the baptism of Lithuanians.
• Signing of the Ostrovets agreement (1392). According to this document, Vitovt became the Grand Duke of Lithuania, but at the same time was a vassal of the Polish king.

The concluded alliance contributed to the strengthening and growth of the power of both powers.

Uprising in Samogitia

At the beginning of the 15th century, the main goal of the German knights was the capture of the Lithuanian Samogitia. This small area was located between the Teutonic and Livonian orders, after mastering it, the two knightly organizations could merge into a single whole. In addition, Samogitia remained the last region through which Lithuanians and Poles could enter the Baltic Sea. The seizure of Samogitia meant complete control over the entire Baltic region.

In 1404, Jagailo himself handed over to the Order of Samogitia, but just five years later, the local population, dissatisfied with the new order, raised an uprising against the Teutonic knights. Lithuania and Poland began to support the rebels, which caused the extreme discontent of the Grand Master - Ulrich von Jungingen. At the same time, the master accused Yagailo of the fact that the latter was not sincere in his acceptance of Catholicism and continues to remain Orthodox (in the childhood of the future king he was baptized by his mother, the princess of Tver). Ultimately, von Jungingen declared war on Vitovt and Jagiello.

The first stage of the war

The first actions of both sides were rather hesitant. In addition, the onset of cold weather forced the opponents to return to their positions. But the truce was short-lived and rather tense. Throughout the winter months, Poland, Lithuania and the Teutonic Order were engaged in the preparation of weapons and provisions, increasing the number of troops, buying horses and negotiating military alliances.

As a result, the Order managed to win over to its side:

• The Hungarian king;
• Feudal lords of the Pomeranian and Olesnitsky Duchies;
• Livonian Order;
• Bishopric of Warmia.

And supporters of Vitovt and Yagailo were:

• Jelal Ad-Din, the Golden Horde Khan;
• Some Russian appanage principalities (Smolensk, Kiev, Polotsk, Galicia);
• Jan Zizka's Czech troops;
• Mazovian and Moldavian principalities.

Troop numbers vary widely. Presumably, the Lithuanian-Polish army could have numbered from 15 to 40 thousand people, and under the banner of the Teutonic Order, from 10 to 30 thousand fighters could fight.

Second stage of the war

According to the general plan of Vitovt and Jagailo, their armies were to move out in the late spring of 1410. Both rulers were well aware that in terms of technical equipment and level of training, their troops were significantly inferior to the battle-hardened Teutons. Therefore, the allied command was instructed to think over the offensive plan to the smallest detail and to foresee all possible difficulties. In preparation for hostilities, warehouses with provisions and ammunition were built along the entire route of the troops, in winter, the transfer of individual regiments closer to the border began. A pontoon bridge was built to ferry the army across the rivers - a real engineering miracle for that time. Even the Teutonic knights did not have such a design.

In the spring of 1410, the crusaders raided the large Lithuanian city of Volkovysk. By coincidence, not far from the city was Prince Vitovt with his wife. Obviously, the Grand Master conceived the attack on Volkovysk as a provocation. But Jagailo and Vitovt refrained from decisive retaliatory actions, allowing the Teutons to go unpunished. The allied army was not yet fully prepared for war.

In early July, Polish and Russian-Tatar-Lithuanian troops met in the area of ​​the Vistula city of Chervensk. The combined army continued its movement towards the capital of the Order - the well-fortified Malbork castle, which is still in the north of Poland. The troops crossed the border of the Order and reached the Drvenca River.

The original plan was to force the river and then give a general engagement. But it turned out that on the other side the enemy had built a fortified camp, from where it was possible to fire at the fording troops. Jagailo and Vitovt pulled their armies back, which the Teutons saw as a retreat. But in fact, the allies decided to cross the river in another place, bypassing the fortifications of the crusaders.

After von Jungingen understood the meaning of this maneuver, he gave the order to build bridges across Drwenca. The Grand Master decided that his troops should immediately cut the path of the Polish-Lithuanian army and defeat it in a general battle. This plan was adopted hastily and thoughtlessly. In just two days, the numerous shortcomings of the Teutonic command will lead to a shameful defeat.

The troops spent the night of July 14-15 only 15-20 kilometers from each other. And in the morning the two armies met in a large field near the villages of Grunwald and Tannenberg.

The course of the battle

Troop formation

By the time the Polish-Lithuanian troops appeared on the battlefield, the Teutons had already managed to line up in battle formation. The heavy Teutonic cavalry was commanded by the Grand Master himself. The riders lined up in two two-kilometer lines, awaiting the order to attack. Artillery was located in front of them, and infantry and carts were in the rearguard. The place chosen by the Teutons was very successful: the knights occupied a small elevation, and on the sides of the army there were two villages.

Meanwhile, the beginning of the battle was postponed. The devout Jagailo first listened to two masses, and then began to knight the gentry. Some historians accuse the Polish king of cowardice or imprudence, but some believe that Jagiello deliberately took his time with the start of the battle so that all allied troops had time to pull up to the battlefield.

Ultimately, the allied forces lined up in three lines (gufs). The third Guf played the role of a reserve, so he entered the battle only in the very last hours of the battle. At the same time, the army was not deployed, but in a wedge, the tip and sides of which were the best heavily armed horsemen. Artillery units were in front of the troops, just like the Teutons.

The first stage of the battle

The battle did not begin until noon. The troops exchanged minor artillery salvos, after which the left flank of the allied army, which was made up of Lithuanian and Russian regiments led into battle by Prince Vitovt, moved into the attack. At the same time, the Polish units continued to remain in their positions. The Teutons, who took up comfortable defensive positions, were interested in the Allies starting the battle. Experts evaluate further events in different ways. It is known that under the onslaught of the German cavalry, Vitovt ordered his troops to retreat. But it still remains a mystery: was it a fraudulent maneuver or an unexpectedly successful blunder of the Lithuanian prince.

The Teutons rushed after the retreating Vitovt, deciding that the entire Polish-Lithuanian army was in front of them, but unexpectedly they met in front of them the Smolensk regiments, which were standing in the center of the allied army. Smolyan fiercely defended themselves, not allowing the German knights to bypass their positions. Several Lithuanian detachments came to the rescue of the Russian regiments. Together they managed to restrain the attack of the Teutons, which turned the whole further course of the battle.

Second stage of the battle

At that moment, Polish units joined the battle. Under the pressure of the Teutons, the royal troops began to retreat. The Germans managed to come close to the place where Jagiello himself and his retinue were located, and capture the royal banner. The situation was critical, but Vitovt managed to deploy his flank in time, push back the crusaders and save the royal banner.

Jungingen ordered the withdrawal of reserves to the battlefield, and the Allies did the same. At this stage, the battle between the Poles and Lithuanians was rescued by the superiority in manpower. The Teutonic reserve quickly grew tired, and the allies began to outflank the Order's defensive line from the left flank. A ring formed around the Teutons, which was getting harder to break through every minute.

Only a small number of knights managed to get out of the encirclement. The allies killed the entire top leadership of the order - the Grand Master, the great commander and the great marshal. Almost 15,000 people were taken prisoner. So Poland, Lithuania and northern Russia together managed to defend their independence.

Reasons for the defeat of the Teutonic Order

• Before the outbreak of the Great War, the Order actively sought allies in Western Europe. The main stake was placed on Hungary, whose military support the Grand Master estimated at a considerable amount transferred to the Hungarian king. However, the Hungarian lord never fulfilled his promises.
• The Livonian Order also did not join the struggle on the side of the Teutons, fearing the outbreak of war with the Novgorod principality.
• The allies had a larger army.
• The Grand Master underestimated his opponents, who not only managed to gather a large army, but also very carefully prepared for the war.
• The same Poles and Lithuanians lived on the lands controlled by the Order, who with all their might tried to get rid of the hated Germans, and therefore helped the allies.

Aftermath of the battle

The Great War continued for another six months. On February 1, 1411, the opponents concluded a peace, according to which Samogitia remained in Lithuania, some of the previously annexed lands were also returned to Poland. In addition, the Order paid a considerable indemnity to the two states. Despite the fact that the Teutonic Order existed for more than a century, the Battle of Grunwald was the beginning of its decline. The knights never managed to achieve their former influence and position. But the authority of Lithuania and Poland in Europe has grown significantly. These states will maintain their union, and in the 16th century they will turn into a single strong state - the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.