Powers & politics¶
Factions, treaties and the political board of the Grand Duchy and its neighbours, 1377-1450.
Labels. [Historical record] is attested in the sources or standard scholarship; [The saga’s invention] was made for this series.
The one-sentence game. Everyone wants Lithuania’s land, the Order wants its souls as a pretext for the land, Poland wants its crown without its cousin, and Lithuania’s own princes want each other’s cities. The gods want the flames. Every treaty in this page trades one of those for another.
1. How power works in the Grand Duchy [Historical record]¶
The Grand Duke (didysis kunigaikštis) rules from Vilnius. Until 1392 the realm is effectively a family firm: Algirdas and Kęstutis’s diarchy (1345–77), then Jogaila with Kęstutis as senior partner (1377–81).
Appanages. Every son receives a city and its lands (Polotsk, Vitebsk, Kyiv, Grodno, Trakai…). The appanage prince owes service and loyalty but has his own court, men and ambitions. Vytautas’s reign (1392–1430) is the slow replacement of appanage princes by appointed governors (namiestniki), often boyars.
The council (later Ponų taryba) is informal before 1413 and powerful after it. Horodło (1413) creates the voivodes of Vilnius and Trakai; by 1440 the council elects grand dukes.
Samogitia governs itself through its elders and assemblies and owes the Grand Duke service, not obedience. It is the land everyone trades and nobody holds.
Religion as politics. A pagan dynastic core; an Orthodox majority in the Ruthenian lands; Catholic merchants and friars in Vilnius. Baptism is a bargaining chip: the Gediminids offer it to the Pope (1323), Louis of Hungary (1351), the Order (1380, 1382, 1383) and Moscow (1384), and finally give it to Poland (1385–87).
Oaths. Treaties are sworn with pagan rites (Kęstutis’s ox in 1351), on the cross, or both. [The saga’s invention] Every oath form is literally binding by a different power (Power systems §2.6), so the side that swears in the wrong form is the side that pays.
2. Factions inside the Grand Duchy¶
2.1 The Algirdaičiai (Jogaila’s party)¶
[Historical record] Uliana of Tver’s sons and their followers: Jogaila, Skirgaila, Kaributas, Lengvenis, Karigaila, Vygantas, Švitrigaila, with Uliana herself until c.1391. They hold Vilnius and the eastern appanages. After 1386 Jogaila is King of Poland and governs Lithuania through Skirgaila (governor from 13 Mar 1386; VLE gives 1387–92), then through Vytautas as lieutenant (1392 onward).
Book |
What they want |
|---|---|
I (1382–87) |
Remove Kęstutis; get the Order off their backs (Dovydiškės 1380, Dubysa 1382); then trade baptism for a crown (Krėva 1385). Uliana’s alternative: an Orthodox marriage with Moscow. |
II (1387–99) |
Hold Lithuania through Skirgaila; keep Vytautas small (Grodno, not Trakai). After 1392, accept Vytautas as lieutenant and keep overlordship. |
III (1399–1411) |
Secure Vilnius–Radom (1401): Lithuania reverts to the Crown when Vytautas dies. Then join him against the Order. |
IV (1411–30) |
Heirs for Jogaila (Sophia’s sons, 1424 and 1427); buy the lords‘ consent with privileges; stop the Lithuanian crown without breaking with Vytautas. |
V (1430–50) |
Švitrigaila claims Lithuania for the Algirdaičiai alone; Casimir (1440) recovers it for the Jagiellonians through the Lithuanian council. |
Leverage: the Polish crown, papal legitimacy after 1386, Polish knights and money, Jogaila’s patience, Skirgaila’s sword.
Red lines: Lithuania must remain Jagiellonian property, never a separate kingdom under a Kęstutaitis line.
Force patron: Šešėlių Pardavėjas (Jogaila’s 1382 bargain: the crown gained, the land lost; Magic rules §8); the White Silence settles where his baptism is bought (Cosmology §3.3); the Gold-Glutton feeds on his heirs‘ privileges. [The saga’s invention]
2.2 The Kęstutaičiai (Vytautas’s party)¶
[Historical record] Kęstutis (to 1382), Vytautas, his brothers Tautvilas and Žygimantas, his sisters‘ Masovian husbands, the Samogitians, and the Trakai and Grodno boyars.
Book |
What they want |
|---|---|
I |
Survive Krėva; avenge Kęstutis; recover Trakai and Samogitia. Vytautas uses the Order (1383–84) and then betrays it. |
II |
Trakai (held by Skirgaila until 1392); the grand-ducal throne (Ostrów 1392); then empire: Kyiv, Smolensk, Podolia, the steppe through Tokhtamysh. |
III |
Recover Samogitia and break the Order (Grunwald 1410); keep Vilnius–Radom’s reversion clause a dead letter. |
IV |
A crown to make Lithuania a kingdom equal to Poland; the succession, which he does not have (no son). |
V |
Žygimantas takes the throne (1432) to save the Kęstutaičiai inheritance from Švitrigaila; his son Mykolas is dispossessed in 1440. |
Leverage: Vytautas’s generalship; the Samogitians‘ loyalty to Kęstutis’s son; his marriage web (Masovia, Moscow through Sofija); his willingness to change sides.
Red lines: Samogitia for good (he trades it away three times, but always as a loan); never again a prisoner of his cousins.
Force patron: the Amber Queen through Birutė; Perkūnas’s claim (Magic rules §7), contested by the Root-Mother; the flame vow (Magic rules §6). [The saga’s invention]
2.3 The boyars¶
[Historical record] Lithuanian servitor nobility: before 1413 they are the duke’s men; after Horodło (1413), Catholic boyars hold Polish arms and the new offices; by the 1440s the council lords (Goštautas, Daugirdas, Kęsgaila) are the state.
Want: land grants, offices, privileges (1387, 1413, 1432, 1434, 1447), no Polish governors, and a grand duke of their choosing.
Book by book: I–II, they back whichever cousin can win and reward them (many Trakai men follow Vytautas into exile). III, Vytautas’s companions rise with his conquests. IV, Horodło makes them heraldic nobles; they fear the reversion clause and support the crown as Lithuanian independence. V, they make and unmake grand dukes: Švitrigaila (1430), Žygimantas (1432), Casimir (1440, against Kraków’s wishes).
Leverage: they run the castles; the grand duke cannot raise an army without them.
Red lines: Incorporation into Poland as a province; a tyrant who executes them (which is why Žygimantas dies in 1440).
Force patron: the Gold-Glutton (Book V outline ch. 17). [The saga’s invention]
2.4 The Orthodox Ruthenian princes¶
[Historical record] Algirdas’s elder sons (Andrius of Polotsk, Dmitrijus of Bryansk, Vladimiras of Kyiv), the Karijotaičiai of Podolia, the Volhynian houses (Ostrogski, Czartoryski), the Halshany princes, the Smolensk Rurikids. Orthodox, Ruthenian-speaking, the majority of the Grand Duchy’s population and land.
Want: their patrimonies; protection of Orthodoxy; equal access to office; a Kyivan metropolitan independent of Moscow (Vytautas had Gregory Tsamblak elected Metropolitan of Kyiv in 1415).
Book by book: I, Andrius fights Jogaila with Moscow and the Livonian Order (to 1387). II, Vytautas removes appanage princes (Vladimiras, Kaributas, Fedor Koriatovich, 1393–95); many still die for him at the Vorskla. IV, Horodło bars the Orthodox from the highest offices, a lasting grievance. V, they are Švitrigaila’s army; Žygimantas’s privilege of 1434 tries to buy them back; the Union of Florence (1439), signed by Metropolitan Isidore of Kyiv and repudiated in Moscow, splits them again.
Leverage: numbers, wealth, the eastern frontier, the Church.
Red lines: forced Catholicism; loss of patrimony. Their dvoeverie keeps the household spirits fed after the gods fall silent. [The saga’s invention suggestion] the Unbinding is gentler in the Orthodox east because custom never stopped there.
2.5 The Samogitians (Žemaičiai) as a political actor¶
[Historical record] The western lowland between Prussia and Livonia: the land bridge the Order needs to join its two halves. Ceded on paper in 1382 (Dubysa), 1384 (Königsberg), 1390 (Lyck), 1398 (Salynas), 1404 (Raciąż); actually held by the Order only 1404–09 (and partly 1398–1401). It rose in 1401 and 1409 (the second rising triggered the Great War). Restored to Lithuania for the lifetimes of Jogaila and Vytautas at Thorn (1411) and permanently at Melno (1422). Baptised 1413 (with Jogaila and Vytautas present) and 1417 (bishopric of Medininkai). Samogitian delegates testified at Constance (1416) that the Order had never tried to convert them, only to conquer them. A revolt against the new clergy in 1418. In 1440–41 they negotiated their own terms with Casimir.
Want: to be left alone by everyone: the Order, Vilnius and the Church.
Leverage: forests, swamps and men; the ability to make any treaty unworkable. They are the only actor who can veto a deal they never signed.
Red lines: the felling of their groves; being sold.
Force patron: Šaknų Motina and Perkūnas; the Hidden Groves bought by Birutė’s sacrifice (Cosmology §4.2) are Samogitian. Galminas is their voice. [The saga’s invention]
2.6 The pagan clergy¶
[Historical record] Little is certain. Długosz describes the Vilnius sacred fire, grove and snakes destroyed in 1387. Peter of Dusburg describes a Prussian high priest (Criwe) at Romuva; whether Lithuania had an equivalent Krivis is debated. Legend names Lizdeika, interpreter of Gediminas’s dream. Priestly titles (žynys, vaidilutė) survive in later sources and folklore.
[The saga’s invention]: the Krivis of Šventaragis witnessed the Silent Pact (1345). The flames of Šventaragis, Palanga and the Samogitian alkai are its collateral. After 1387 the priesthood breaks into lineages that are dying out (Power systems §4). The saga’s Galminas (a forest-keeper and sap-bleeding priest, invented) becomes a grove at Grunwald; he shares his name only with the historical Jurgis Galminas, Vytautas’s deputy in the 1409 rising and Samogitian elder 1432–34 (VLE). The last žynys of Book V ch. 27, who dies in the 1440s, is his pupil, the beekeeper-žynys, not Galminas.
Want: the flames kept; the Pact honoured; kin-killing punished.
Leverage: the commons‘ belief; the oath ceremonies that treaties need; the ability to read signs in public (a priest who declares a lightning-struck oak a verdict can end a campaign).
Red lines: the extinguishing of a flame (1387 is the end of the world for them).
Force patron: the gods themselves: they are the Pact’s human party.
3. Factions outside the Grand Duchy¶
3.1 The Teutonic Order (Prussia)¶
[Historical record] A crusading corporation with an amber monopoly, grain exports, Hanse towns, papal and imperial privileges, and the Reise: seasonal raids into Lithuania with Western guests. Grand Masters: Kniprode (to 24 Jun 1382), Zöllner (1382–90), Wallenrode (1391–93), Konrad von Jungingen (1393–1407), Ulrich von Jungingen (1407–10), Plauen (1410–13), Küchmeister (1414–22), Rusdorf (1422–41).
Book |
What the Order wants |
|---|---|
I |
Keep the cousins at war; buy Samogitia from each in turn (Dovydiškės, Dubysa, Königsberg); hold Vytautas as a puppet claimant and keep Ona and the children as surety. |
II |
Use Vytautas again (1389–92, the 1390 siege of Vilnius); after his second defection, win Samogitia by treaty (Salynas 1398). |
III |
Hold Samogitia; stop the Polish–Lithuanian alliance; decisive war (Ulrich von Jungingen). Lose at Grunwald; survive at Marienburg. |
IV |
Pay the Thorn indemnity; win the propaganda war at Constance (Falkenberg’s tract) and before Sigismund’s arbitration; support Vytautas’s crown to split the union. |
V |
Back Švitrigaila (Christmemel 1431); after Pabaiskas (1435), sign Brest; face the Prussian Confederation (1440). |
Leverage: the best army in the Baltic; money; hostages; castles on the Neman; the claim that Lithuania’s baptism is fake; papal and imperial friends; guests from all over Christendom.
Red lines: Marienburg and Pomerelia (Danzig); the crusade’s legitimacy. A baptised Lithuania leaves the Order with no reason to exist, which is why it insists the baptism is false.
Force patron: Geležinis Šventasis (Iron Saint): Reise, forced baptism, furnace heat in winter (Cosmology §3.3). Its „final screams“ at Grunwald (series outline).
3.2 The Livonian Order¶
[Historical record] The Order’s autonomous northern branch (Riga, Wenden, Dünaburg) under its own Landmeister. Feuded with the archbishops of Riga and with Pskov and Novgorod. Supported Andrius of Polotsk against Jogaila (1380s). Raided Lithuania from the north. Allied with Švitrigaila and crushed at Pabaiskas (1 Sep 1435), where Master Franco Kerskorff and much of the Livonian leadership died.
Want: Samogitia (the land bridge to Prussia); Polotsk and the Daugava trade; to dominate Riga.
Leverage: northern raids; the Daugava; alliances with Ruthenian princes.
Red lines: Riga’s independence from the Order.
Force patron: the Iron Saint’s northern face. Book V ch. 14: „the Iron Saint is finally silenced in the North.“ [The saga’s invention]
3.3 Poland: the Crown and the Lesser Poland lords¶
[Historical record] After Louis I’s death (Sep 1382), two years of interregnum. The Lesser Poland lords (Spytko II of Melsztyn, Jan of Tarnów, Dobiesław of Kurozwęki and others) crown Jadwiga (16 Oct 1384), reject Wilhelm of Habsburg and Siemowit IV, and choose Jogaila (Krėva 1385). Jadwiga recovers Red Ruthenia from Hungary (1387). Later the Oleśnicki generation fights the Lithuanian crown (1429–30) and the Hussite sympathisers (Spytko III, d. 1439).
Book |
What Poland’s lords want |
|---|---|
I |
A king who brings an army against the Order and a realm to the Crown: Krėva’s ambiguous applicare (to „attach“ Lithuania). |
II |
Lithuania governed for the Crown (Skirgaila, then Vytautas as lieutenant); Red Ruthenia; peace with the Order. Spytko II dies at the Vorskla with Vytautas. |
III |
Vilnius–Radom: Lithuania reverts to the Crown; recover Dobrzyń (Raciąż) and then Pomerelia (war, 1409–11). |
IV |
Horodło (union on Polish terms); privileges in return for Sophia’s sons‘ succession; no Lithuanian crown. Oleśnicki’s guards block the crown embassy at the border (Aug 1430). |
V |
Podolia and Volhynia (from 1430); a Polish king in Lithuania (Władysław III’s governor Casimir). The Lithuanians outmanoeuvre them in 1440. |
Leverage: the crown Jogaila wears; election of his heirs; papal law; Polish knights.
Red lines: a separate Lithuanian kingdom; Jogaila’s sons inheriting without new privileges.
Force patron: the Gold-Glutton and the White Silence (purchased purity; Jadwiga’s anchor, written as its victim). [The saga’s invention]
3.4 Hungary and the Luxembourgs¶
[Historical record] Louis I (d. 1382) ruled Hungary and Poland. Sigismund of Luxembourg married Louis’s daughter Mary (1385), ruled Hungary from 1387, lost the crusade at Nicopolis (1396), sold the Neumark to the Order (1402), arbitrated between Poland and the Order (Buda 1412; Breslau 1420, which went in the Order’s favour), hosted Constance, and at Lutsk (1429) offered Vytautas a crown.
Want: Hungarian claims to Red Ruthenia and Moldavia; an anti-Ottoman coalition; to split Poland from Lithuania; money (often the Order’s).
Leverage: imperial authority to grant crowns; Council and arbitration; marriage (Barbara of Celje is kin to Jogaila’s second queen).
Red lines: a Polish–Lithuanian bloc dominating Central Europe; the Hussites (his Bohemian inheritance).
Force patron: the Shadow-Seller serves him in 1429–30; the Gold-Glutton flatters him. [The saga’s invention]
3.5 Masovia¶
[Historical record] The Piast duchies north of Poland: Janusz I (Warsaw, Czersk) ⚭ Danutė Kęstutaitė; Siemowit IV (Płock, Rawa) ⚭ Aleksandra Algirdaitė; Henryk, bishop-elect, ⚭ Rimgailė (1392). Vassals of the Polish crown, neighbours of the Order.
Want: survival as Piast duchies; to avoid both absorption by Kraków and Order raids.
Leverage: refuge (Vytautas runs here after Krėva, late 1382); mediation (Henryk at Ostrów 1392); marriage links to both Gediminid lines.
Red lines: incorporation into the Polish crown.
Force patron: none. Masovia is neutral ground in the saga.
3.6 The Golden Horde and its succession wars¶
[Historical record] Tokhtamysh reunited the Horde (1380), burned Moscow (Aug 1382), was broken by Timur (1391, 1395), and fled to Vytautas. Edigu, beglerbeg and kingmaker, with Temur Qutlugh, destroyed Vytautas’s coalition at the Vorskla (12 Aug 1399). Tokhtamysh’s sons (Jalal ad-Din at Grunwald) were Lithuania’s clients. The Horde fractured in the 1420s–40s: Ulugh Muhammad, and Hacı Giray’s Crimea, founded with Lithuanian backing.
Book |
What the steppe wants |
|---|---|
I |
Tribute from the Rus‘ lands; to punish Moscow (1382). Lithuania is a distant partner (Jogaila’s 1380 alliance with Mamai). |
II |
Tokhtamysh: restoration, paid for with rights over Rus‘. Edigu: Tokhtamysh’s head and no Lithuanian protectorate over the steppe. |
III |
Edigu: punish Moscow (1408); keep Lithuania off the Black Sea. Tokhtamysh’s sons: Vytautas’s help to the throne; Jalal ad-Din’s Tatars ride at Grunwald. |
IV |
Rival khans court Vytautas (who makes and unmakes khans in the 1410s–20s). |
V |
Crimea breaks away under Hacı Giray with Lithuanian support; Kazan is founded. |
Leverage: cavalry; tribute; the ability to wreck Kyiv and Podolia.
Red lines: a Christian protectorate over the khan.
Force patron: Stepių Alkis (Steppe-Hunger), which is not Tengri (Cosmology §2.2), but the hunger of horizon-kings. It feeds on Vytautas as much as on Edigu.
3.7 Muscovy¶
[Historical record] Dmitry Donskoy (to 1389): Kulikovo 1380; the 1384 marriage draft with Uliana. Vasily I (1389–1425) ⚭ Sofija Vytautaitė (1391); fought his father-in-law over Smolensk, Pskov and Novgorod in 1406–08, ending with the stand-off on the Ugra (1408). Received the defecting Švitrigaila (1408). Vasily II (1425–62) was placed under Vytautas’s protection (Vasily I’s testament), with Sofija as regent, and was blinded in 1446 in the Muscovite civil war.
Want: to „gather the Rus‘ lands“: Smolensk, Novgorod, Tver; the Metropolitan of all Rus‘ to sit in Moscow.
Leverage: Orthodoxy; Horde favour; marriage (Sofija).
Red lines: a Lithuanian metropolitan of Kyiv; Lithuanian control of Novgorod. [The saga’s invention suggestion]: the Steppe-Hunger’s shadow, since Moscow learned rule as the Horde’s tribute-collector.
3.8 Novgorod and Pskov¶
[Historical record] Merchant republics that hire princes: Lithuanian Gediminids served them (Narimantas earlier, Lengvenis 1389–92 and again in the 1400s). Vytautas besieged Opochka (Pskov land, 1426) and Porkhov (Novgorod land, 1428), taking large ransoms. Their trade runs through the Hanse’s Peterhof in Novgorod.
Want: independence; trade; a prince who protects without ruling.
Leverage: silver; the fur trade; playing Vilnius against Moscow.
Red lines: a resident overlord.
Force patron: [The saga’s invention suggestion]: the Gold-Glutton, through the Hanse.
3.9 The Hanse¶
[Historical record] The German merchant league. The Prussian towns (Danzig, Thorn, Elbing, Königsberg) are the Order’s subjects and increasingly its opponents (Prussian Confederation, 1440). Riga dominates Daugava trade and Polotsk. Hanseatic merchants in Vilnius (Hanulas of Riga led the townspeople who took Vilnius castle for Jogaila on 12 Jun 1382 and became first elder of Vilnius). A Hanseatic office (Kontor) at Kaunas from 1441.
Want: privileges, safe roads, an end to the Reise’s disruption, wax, furs, grain and amber.
Leverage: credit; ships; the Order’s tax base.
Red lines: monopoly breaches; war that closes the rivers.
Force patron: the Gold-Glutton: its envoys walk Trakai in Book I ch. 28 (Cosmology §3.3). The Shadow-Seller’s first mask, Hanulas, is a Riga merchant. [The saga’s invention]
3.10 The Papacy and the Councils¶
[Historical record] The Western Schism (1378–1417): Rome against Avignon (and Pisa from 1409). Poland and Lithuania follow Rome. The bishopric of Vilnius is founded in 1387–88. The Council of Constance (1414–18) ends the schism, burns Jan Hus (6 Jul 1415), and hears the Polish–Lithuanian case against the Order: Paulus Vladimiri (Paweł Włodkowic) argues that pagans have rights; the Samogitian delegation testifies (1416); the Order’s Johannes Falkenberg attacks Jogaila in a libel later condemned. The Council sets up the Samogitian bishopric (1417). Martin V (1417–31) presses Lithuania over the Hussites. The Council of Basel (1431–49) and the Union of Florence (1439) follow.
Want: unity, Church union with the Orthodox, crusade against the Ottomans, control over the Order’s crusade.
Leverage: legitimacy; crowns (no crown without Rome); bishoprics.
Red lines: heresy (the Hussites); schism.
Force patron: the White Silence gathers around purchased baptism and purity (Cosmology §3.3). Honest clerics (Włodkowic, the Vilnius Franciscans) are its victims, never its agents (Cosmology §2.2). [The saga’s invention]
3.11 Bohemia and the Hussites¶
[Historical record] After Hus’s burning, Bohemia revolts (1419). The Hussites offer their crown to Jogaila and then to Vytautas (1420–21), who sends his nephew Žygimantas Kaributaitis to Prague (1422; again 1424–27). Jogaila issues the anti-Hussite Edict of Wieluń (1424) under papal pressure. In 1433 a Polish–Hussite army raids the Order’s Pomerania to the Baltic. Lipany (1434) breaks the radicals. Hussite sympathy survives among Polish lords (Spytko III, killed at Grotniki in 1439).
Want: allies against Sigismund; recognition.
Leverage: the most feared infantry in Europe; a vacant crown to offer.
Red lines: Sigismund on the Bohemian throne. [The saga’s invention suggestion]: Hussites scorn bought indulgences, so they starve the White Silence, which makes them the egregore’s enemies and the saga’s unexpected allies of the old gods‘ logic.
4. The treaty ledger [Historical record]¶
Date |
Treaty / event |
Parties |
Terms |
Samogitia |
Saga overlay |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
29 Sep 1379 |
Truce of Trakai |
Order; Kęstutis, Jogaila |
Ten-year truce for certain borderlands |
Not covered |
The last joint act of uncle and nephew. |
31 May 1380 |
Dovydiškės (secret) |
Jogaila; Order |
Jogaila will not aid Kęstutis against the Order |
Exposed to raids |
First crack in the Pact; the Shadow-Seller’s first thread (Cosmology §4.2). |
Autumn 1381 |
Kęstutis’s coup |
— |
Kęstutis takes Vilnius; Jogaila released to Krėva and Vitebsk |
Kęstutaičiai |
Kęstutis’s mercy. |
31 Oct 1382 |
Dubysa |
Jogaila; Order |
Baptism within four years; Samogitia to the Dubysa; four-year truce; alliance |
Pledged to the Dubysa (never ratified) |
Bought with Kęstutis’s death. |
30 Jan 1384 |
Königsberg |
Vytautas; Order |
Vytautas becomes vassal; Samogitia to the Nevėžis |
Pledged |
The Amber Debt comes due. |
Jul 1384 |
Vytautas’s first defection |
Vytautas; Jogaila |
Vytautas burns Georgenburg (9 Jul 1384) and Marienwerder; receives Grodno, Brest, Podlasie, later Lutsk; Trakai stays with Skirgaila (his since 1382; Jogaila had promised it to Vytautas in spring 1384) |
Back to Lithuania |
„Išdavikų išdavikas“; the Hidden Groves bought. |
1384 (draft) |
Moscow marriage draft |
Uliana, Jogaila; Dmitry Donskoy |
Jogaila to marry Dmitry’s daughter and accept Orthodoxy |
— |
The road not taken. |
14 Aug 1385 |
Krėva |
Jogaila; Polish lords and envoys |
Baptism of Jogaila and Lithuania; marriage to Jadwiga; recovery of lost Polish lands; Lithuania „attached“ to the Crown |
— |
Signed one floor above the death cell; the White Silence settles. |
19 Jan 1390 |
Lyck (Ełk) |
Vytautas; Order |
Renews Königsberg; hostages (incl. Žygimantas; Ona and the children) |
Pledged again |
Surety, again. |
4–5 Aug 1392 |
Ostrów (Astravas) |
Jogaila; Vytautas |
Vytautas lieutenant (de facto Grand Duke) for life; Trakai and his patrimony returned; Skirgaila compensated (Kyiv, 1395) |
Lithuanian |
Henė changes masters. The Order’s revenge: Vytautas’s sons poisoned (1392; a contested tradition, Grunau; Sofija is the only child in the record). |
12 Oct 1398 |
Salynas |
Vytautas; Order |
Samogitia ceded to the Nevėžis; peace; Order aid against the Horde. Lithuanian lords proclaim Vytautas „king“ at the feast |
Ceded |
The Hidden Groves under the Order’s flag. |
18 Jan / 11 Mar 1401 |
Vilnius–Radom |
Jogaila, Polish lords; Vytautas, Lithuanian boyars |
Vytautas Grand Duke for life; lands revert to Jogaila and the Crown after him |
Ceded (uprising 1401) |
The reversion clause: Book IV’s crown is its answer. |
22–23 May 1404 (en.wikipedia 22nd, VLE 23rd) |
Raciąż |
Poland, Lithuania; Order |
Samogitia to the Order; Dobrzyń bought back by Poland |
Ceded (held 1404–09) |
The last sale. |
1408 |
Ugra stand-off |
Vytautas; Vasily I |
Peace; the Ugra as border |
— |
Grandfather and son-in-law, two riders. |
15 Jul 1410 |
Grunwald / Žalgiris |
Poland, Lithuania; Order |
Order defeated; Ulrich von Jungingen killed |
Rising since 1409 |
The Iron Saint screams. |
1 Feb 1411 |
First Peace of Thorn |
Poland, Lithuania; Order |
Samogitia to Lithuania for the lifetimes of Jogaila and Vytautas; Dobrzyń to Poland; 100,000 kopas of Prague groschen in four instalments; a clause that both rulers will convert the remaining pagans |
Lithuanian (lifetimes) |
Victory that changes nothing for the gods. |
2 Oct 1413 |
Horodło |
Poland; Lithuania |
Union renewed; separate Grand Duke kept; 47 boyar families take Polish arms; Catholic-only high offices; voivodes of Vilnius and Trakai |
Baptism begins |
The heraldic marriage; the Orthodox grievance. |
1414–18 |
Council of Constance |
All |
Samogitian case; Medininkai bishopric (1417) |
Baptised |
Groves fall one by one. |
27 Sep 1422 |
Melno |
Poland, Lithuania; Order |
Samogitia permanently Lithuanian; Klaipėda (Memel) to the Order; the border lasts until 1918 |
Lithuanian |
The land is won as the gods are lost. |
Jan 1429 |
Congress of Lutsk |
Sigismund, Jogaila, Vytautas and envoys |
Sigismund offers a crown |
— |
Henė’s last bargain: the crown for the flame. |
Aug 1430 |
The crown embassy blocked |
Polish border guards (Jan Czarnkowski) |
Sigismund’s couriers robbed on the Neumark border; the embassy stalls at Frankfurt (Oder); the crown itself never seized |
— |
The crown turned to leaves. |
19 Jun 1431 |
Christmemel |
Švitrigaila; Teutonic Order (Rusdorf) and Livonian Order |
Mutual aid if attacked; war only by joint consent; shared spoils (en.wikipedia adds a cession of Palanga; VLE says the Melno borders stood, unconfirmed) |
— |
— |
15 Oct 1432 |
Grodno |
Žygimantas Kęstutaitis; Bishop Oleśnicki for Jogaila (Jogaila himself absent; his act issued at Lwów, 30 Oct 1432) |
Žygimantas recognised as Grand Duke under Polish overlordship; reversion to the Crown |
— |
Vilnius–Radom, again. |
1 Sep 1435 |
Pabaiskas (Wiłkomierz) |
Žygimantas, Poland; Švitrigaila, Livonian Order |
Švitrigaila and the Livonians crushed; Kaributaitis captured |
— |
Kin-slaughter worse than the crusades. |
31 Dec 1435 |
Peace of Brest (Brześć Kujawski) |
Poland, Lithuania; Order |
The Order abandons Švitrigaila; Melno confirmed |
— |
The Order’s last stand as a crusader. |
29 Jun 1440 |
Casimir elected |
Lithuanian council |
Casimir (aged 12) Grand Duke |
— |
„A child on the throne“. |
2 May 1447 |
Privilege of Casimir |
Casimir; Lithuanian nobility |
Noble liberties; Lithuania’s integrity guaranteed |
— |
Ink against spells (Book V ch. 26). |
5. Board states, book by book¶
Book I: Vilko Tremtis (spring 1382 → spring 1387)¶
Piece |
Start (spring 1382) |
End (spring 1387) |
|---|---|---|
Vilnius / grand-ducal throne |
Kęstutis (since the autumn 1381 coup); Jogaila at Krėva and Vitebsk |
Jogaila, now King of Poland; Skirgaila governs for him |
Trakai |
Kęstutis |
Skirgaila (Vytautas’s grievance) |
Vytautas |
Duke of Grodno, his father’s heir |
Vassal of Jogaila: Grodno, Brest, Podlasie (and Lutsk); baptised twice (Wigand, Aleksandras) |
Samogitia |
Kęstutaičiai |
Lithuanian in fact; pledged to the Order on paper (1382, 1384) |
Poland |
Louis I (d. Sep 1382); interregnum |
Jogaila and Jadwiga |
Teutonic Order |
Kniprode (d. 24 Jun 1382) → Zöllner |
Zöllner, without a pretext: Lithuania is baptised |
Horde |
Tokhtamysh (burns Moscow, Aug 1382) |
Tokhtamysh, at the height of his power |
Moscow |
Dmitry Donskoy |
Dmitry Donskoy; Vasily (I) escapes the Horde |
Elder Algirdaičiai |
Andrius of Polotsk in revolt |
Andrius captured (1387) |
The Pact |
Cracked (Dovydiškės) |
Ended (Šventaragis extinguished, Feb 1387); Hidden Groves remain |
Book II: Auksinis Šešėlis (1387 → 1399)¶
Piece |
Start (1387) |
End (autumn 1399) |
|---|---|---|
Throne |
Jogaila (king) with Skirgaila as regent |
Vytautas, Grand Duke since Ostrów (1392) |
Trakai |
Skirgaila |
Vytautas |
Skirgaila |
Regent, Duke of Trakai and Polotsk |
Dead (Kyiv, Jan 1397) |
Kyiv, Podolia, Smolensk |
Appanage princes (Vladimiras, Koriatovichi, Yuri of Smolensk) |
Vytautas’s governors (1393–95); Smolensk will revolt in 1401 |
Samogitia |
Lithuanian |
Ceded to the Order (Salynas 1398) |
Poland |
Jogaila and Jadwiga |
Jadwiga dead (Jul 1399); Jogaila’s Polish title in question |
Order |
Zöllner |
Konrad von Jungingen |
Horde |
Tokhtamysh |
Temur Qutlugh and Edigu; Tokhtamysh a refugee |
Moscow |
Dmitry Donskoy |
Vasily I ⚭ Sofija |
Losses |
— |
Vytautas’s sons (1392, a contested tradition); Andrius, Dmitrijus, Spytko II and many princes at the Vorskla |
Book III: Žaliasis Miškas (1399 → 1411)¶
Piece |
Start (1399) |
End (Feb 1411) |
|---|---|---|
Vytautas |
Humbled after the Vorskla |
Grand Duke for life (1401); victor of Grunwald |
Samogitia |
Order (since 1398); risings 1401, 1409 |
Lithuania for the lifetimes (Thorn) |
Smolensk |
Lost (1401) |
Retaken (1404) |
Moscow |
Vasily I |
Border fixed on the Ugra (1408) |
Švitrigaila |
Vitebsk/Podolia, restless |
Defected to Moscow (1408); prisoner at Kremenets |
Poland |
Jogaila, widowed |
Jogaila ⚭ Anna of Celje (1402); daughter Jadwiga (1408) |
Order |
Konrad von Jungingen |
Heinrich von Plauen, indebted and defiant |
Horde |
Edigu’s puppets |
Edigu still dominant; Jalal ad-Din Lithuania’s client |
Book IV: Nematoma Karūna (1411 → Oct 1430)¶
Piece |
Start (1411) |
End (Oct–Nov 1430) |
|---|---|---|
Throne |
Vytautas |
Vytautas dead (27 Oct 1430, Trakai); Švitrigaila raised by the Lithuanian lords |
Samogitia |
Lithuanian (lifetimes); pagan |
Permanently Lithuanian (Melno 1422); baptised; bishopric of Medininkai |
Ona |
Alive |
Dead (1418); Vytautas ⚭ Julijona |
Poland |
Jogaila, no son |
Jogaila ⚭ Sophia; sons Władysław (b. 1424) and Casimir (b. 1427); Oleśnicki ascendant |
Order |
Plauen |
Rusdorf |
Moscow |
Vasily I |
Vasily II (a minor), under Vytautas’s protection; Sofija regent |
Bohemia |
Under Wenceslas, then Sigismund |
Hussite wars; Kaributaitis’s adventure over |
Podolia |
Lithuanian |
Seized by Polish lords on news of Vytautas’s death |
Book V: Vilko Palikimas (1430 → 1450)¶
Piece |
Start (late 1430) |
End (1450) |
|---|---|---|
Throne |
Švitrigaila |
Casimir (Grand Duke 1440, King of Poland 1447) |
Kęstutaičiai |
Žygimantas waiting |
Žygimantas murdered (1440); Mykolas in exile (d. 1452) |
Švitrigaila |
Grand Duke |
Duke in Volhynia (Lutsk) until his death in 1452 |
Poland |
Jogaila (d. 1 Jun 1434) |
Casimir; Władysław III dead at Varna (1444) |
Order |
Rusdorf |
Konrad von Erlichshausen (to 1449); the Prussian Confederation (1440) prepares revolt |
Livonia |
Allied with Švitrigaila |
Broken at Pabaiskas (1435) |
Moscow |
Vasily II, Sofija regent |
Vasily II, blinded (1446) but restored |
Steppe |
Fragmenting Horde |
Crimea under Hacı Giray (Lithuanian client); Kazan |
Church |
Constance settled; Basel opens |
Florence union (1439) repudiated by Moscow; the Orthodox divided |
The gods |
Last flame out (1430) |
„Folklore“: the statue no longer glows (1445) |
7. Quick reference: factions and Forces¶
Faction |
Force |
Feeds on |
Typical sign in a scene |
|---|---|---|---|
Algirdaičiai (Jogaila) |
Shadow-Seller; White Silence where baptism is bought |
bargains; purchased purity |
sound dying; warm coins; frost on blades |
Skirgaila |
Shadow-Seller (the discarded tool); Perkūnas’s enmity |
his broken safe-conduct |
three stones; thunder without rain |
Kęstutaičiai (Vytautas) |
Amber Queen, Perkūnas (claim), Root-Mother (contest) |
memory; oaths; forest |
amber warming or dying; lightning on oaks; sap |
Samogitians |
Root-Mother, Perkūnas; the Hidden Groves |
groves; resistance |
crows leading columns; ground softening |
Pagan clergy |
the gods (the Pact’s human party) |
flames |
flames leaning; the Beggar |
Boyars (Book V) |
Gold-Glutton |
land grants; bribes |
the counting voice in quiet rooms |
Teutonic and Livonian Orders |
Iron Saint |
Reise; forced baptism |
furnace heat in winter; crosses ringing like anvils |
Polish lords, Oleśnicki |
Gold-Glutton, White Silence |
ledgers; bought purity |
coins; lilies on frozen fields |
Luxembourgs (1429–30) |
Shadow-Seller, Gold-Glutton |
the deal |
Henė at Sigismund’s court |
Golden Horde |
Steppe-Hunger |
conquest without end |
dust devils; horse-hair in wells |
Hanse |
Gold-Glutton |
tolls; dead amber |
warm coins |
Papacy (as institution) |
White Silence (honest clerics are its victims) |
purchased baptism |
frost-flowers |
Orthodox princes; Moscow; Novgorod; Hussites; Masovia |
— |
— |