Originally posted by Siena
So Kreva first.
Somebody asked why Lithuania wanted Kreva's "union". First of all - Kreva was not a union at all. It was simply Jogaila's marital treaty. It was not a decision of Lithuanian nobles. It was Jogaila's decision. Lithuanians, differently from Poles - considered Grand Duchy sort of personal property of Grand Duke, therefore it was in his right to vouch it as there and here as he wished. That is what he did at Kreva. Of course he meant that from now on he is going to rule both Poland and Lithuania. And hopefully his decendants too.
So it was not a looking for Polands help, it was looking for better deal. "King" is a much more prestigious title that "Grand Duke" after all...
That was the case in more countries. Poland was considered personal fiefdom of the Piasts as long that dynasty survived. That did not exclude the fact that great groundowners, the 'aristocrats' of that time were very influential in the politics. The king did not have any carte blanche in internal or foreign politics. A don`t say it was different in Lithuania. Of course Jogaila needed support of the Lithuanian aristocracy which had indeed interest there of themselves. Poland just enacted the Kausitz proclamations and suddenyl Polish aristocracy was the ruling body of the country. Was that not attractive to Lithuanian aristocrats? When in the history do that group not want to decrease the power of the sole ruler?
And well, in Europe of these days 2 countries being ruled by one and the same person makes it usually a union. That`s how Hapsburgs inherited Hungary and Bohemia, that`s how the Hapsburg empire in the west was created, that`s how Kalmar union existed, that`s how Brandenburg became Prussia later.
You do really like to diminish the role of the Polish-Lithuanian unions but the reality is that they were there as both countries had equal interests to make them and to keep them. If Lithuanians were so against it (and I mean the ruling class; whatever peasant sthought was not considered obviously) why did they persist on keeping it for the next 400 years?
Keep something in mind, that just because of Kreva Poland did not get any political or other kind of influence over Lithuania. If there was an influence - it was because Jogaila was Grand Duke.
Jogaila did not just get the Polish crown because Poland couldn`t find anyone else to govern it mind you. Poland did indeed achieve influence - by the fact that Jogaila was dependant on decisions of Polish aristocrats also when these affected Polish-Lithuanian co-interests. But even more important was the Polish church-structure that now also extended to Lithuania. Church was possibly an even bigger centralizing body than rulers or aristocracy.
Lithuania continued fighting its own wars, Poland continued sitting and looking at GDL lands.
By the way - GDL's Ukrainian lands (the ones Polish nobles desired the most) - were fertile, and not steppes.
Actually, Polish kings before Jogaila left their lands to TO and were looking into GDL's lands very intently, just waiting while Lithuania will not have a spare army to defend it.
Before Jogaila Lithuania did not own the Ukrainian lands at all (Kiev and Chernigov were conquered by Jogaila). When Poland started their interest in these there were still independant duchies in Ukraina. And Poland did here the same thing as Lithuania (and Hungary btw) - improving themselves with territories of a weak and internally destroyed opponent. Why had Lithuania here more claims than Poland then according to you?
Anyway, it did not stop them from fighting TO. You seem to forget suddenly the 1409 war. Or the wars after 1447 which brought the whole Teutonic Order under Polish supremacy.
Again I`m calling up the fact that here thus Lithuania was helped by the union with Poland - would Poland also sit there only and not interferring when Lithuania was being beaten in its own wars if there was no union?
Now to your points.
I don't get importance of the fact that nobility spoke other language than Lithuanian. What does that have to do with importance or sthrenght of Lithuania? Many nobles of Europe did not speak their own language. The important point is that Lithuanian nobles did not consider themselves Russians of Poles, no matter what language they wrote or spoke.
The important thing is - that all Grand Dukes were Lithuanians - and all, except one quickly deposed one - were pagan or catolic Lithuanians. So so called ruthenization was not in of believes, but only writing (which was church language, not some king of national ruthenian language anyway) and probably spoken language. The religion was the most important culture factor in Middle ages, not language.
Not the dukes perhaps (though most dukes - mostly from the Lithuanian ruling families - ruling the inherited Russian principalities under Lithuanian dominion did indeed convert to orthodox faith) but the aristocracy did not seldom convert to orthodoxism. Well, what is the importance of it? There is more in culture than language which indeed did not play an equally important role. But most important anyway is the motivation. Lithuanian culture was non-existent and so a real Lithuanian identity could not continue to exist either. So it would be logical for Lithuanian aristocracy to polonize or russificize entirely. The fact that they did not was because of the political reasons - to keep a distinct political role and position in the later union (I do talk now mostly about the post-Lublin period) against the Polish aristocrts on one side and Russian Boyars on the other. THat did preserve Lithuania as a distinct political body in the unionist state and that is also what made the country after 1569 so ungovernable and caused (at least aprtially) its decline.
About crusaders and their military ability.
Well, Teutonic Order had no worse military organization than any European state. Actually, by most accounts they had superior military organization to any European state.
They could raise better armies than most monarchs.
They had those same European monarchs as volunteers. They had famous guys coming from all over Europe.
Military organization only is not enough, you need to be able tor aise troops. And that was the biggest problem for the Teutons and other orders: they were entirely dependant on influx of foreign mercenary-knights. The amount of knights in west europa was also not endless mind you.
Teutons did also raise troops from the native population but these were very unreliable.
And well, western kings preferred to fight in palestina actually anyway...
If you look, how fast TO overcame Prussians (which by some accounts were more numerous and richer than Lithuanians at that time) - you can see that they were very capable of conquering. And land was their goal.
Prussians had no state-constuctions as the other balts. They were actually the least centralized people. Moreover, did TO so easily pacify the territory? It did take them some 50 years to fully accomplish that. Finally, these coastal lands were not really woodlands...
If you read something about crusader orders, you know that they were forbiden from doing any diplomatic dealings with non catholics. They did it anyway, but did not talk loud about it.
So make no mistake - their main tool was military.
When they needed it they did it and if that included treachery then even more. It is indeed diplomacy that caused eventually most of the TO-successes and not the military power - for that they lost far too many wars to make that point of yours believable.
The thing about forests - Livonia had no worse forests than Lithuania. And so did other countries around there.
So forests themselves do not save countries.
AS I just said: It did save Zemgale which was the strongest Lavian duchy thus for 80 years of wars against te orders. They were also eventually not defeated by orders but by Lithuanians.
In the same way it saved Lithuania. In any way most Latvian tribes were only defeated as they wern`t able to unite themselves against the orders and because orders managed to ally themselves with one tribal chief against the other. Direct military casued Teutons mostly defeats.
As for Teutons not daring to come into the woods - well that is contradicted by the number of times that they came. There are well over a hundred TO attacks counted against Lithuania from 1340s to 1370s. They sieged and countrasieged dozens of castles. And so did Lithuanians.
Believe you me - there was very bloody fighting going on.
They didn`t came far more than the borders which was what I said. Their way of conquest was not to push right to the heartland of Lithuania and that was noth the cause of their typical strategy but also of the geograhical situation in Lithuania which were thus the hard to control forrests.
There was enough fighting there for sure - I didn`t claim otherwise. But the Teutons never really showed the intention to conquer all of Lithuania at once.
Mongols were fought in todays Ukraine, not in woods. Algirdas beat Mongols for control of Kiev in 1359 (I think - maybe +- 5 years).
Never heard of that. In any way Mongols 'controlled' Kiev around 1370 (=the princes there paid tribute to Mongols. Mongols never ruled that part of Ruthenian lands directly.)
Well Russians did not come after Lithuanians for simple reason - Lithuanians were coming for them.
And Russians were not a threat to Lithuania up until 1500.
Sure. There were of course no Mongols who managed to raise troops of size and strenght that any European power could only dream of - yes, they did that still even in the 14th century. The Russians had other priorities than some Lithuanian raiders.
Moreover, let`s not forget that there was no central Russian government in 15th century. The centralizing power in growth was Muscovy and that had as first priorities in late 14th and early 15th centuries:
-defending itself against Mongols
-defeat the other Russian states for hegemony in north-eastern Russia
They weren`t yet interested in Lithuania and Lithuanian conquests of the RUssian perifiery in the west. Till Jogaila the Lithuanian conquests were these of the smallest and least important Russian western principalities, Smolensk and Vladimir-in-Volyhna being maybe the most important. Jogaila defeated Chernigov and Kiev which were in the 12th century very important but were still only city-sattes in late 14th century. The core-lands of Russia were since ~1200 the north-eastern lands around Vladimir, Jaroslavl, Tver, Novgorod and Moscow. Lithuania never managed to come there (well, one Lithuanian ruler once sacked Moscow in its early days iirc but that was it).
So only when Russians (read:Muscovy) handled that they started to interest themselves in the west. For the first time they did during the reign of Ivan III. During his reign Lithuania lost 1/3 of its eastern territories to Muscovy.
Russian territories were lost, because Lithuania's policy making became rather passive (and Russian very active). Until 1432 , Lithuania was a state ruled by the most energetic and able guy in the dinasty - otherwise he was quickly deposed. That changed after Lithuania and Poland started sharing kings. King was most often sitting in Poland and Lithuania was left to fare by itself, but without the benefit of one energetic ruler. And with a hindrance of laws that let nobles do whatever they wanted with the country. In the end - nobody cared. That was the end of Poland too.
Till 1506 at least Lithuania had always a duke who was a distinct person than the king. During some periods there was even no union at all (1434-1447 and 1492-1502) and was Lithuania governed directly by a duke sitting in Lithuania. Frankly Lithuania lost most of its power and territory in these days.
When however since Zygmunt I in 1506 they indeed shared the same king Poland-Lithuania started suddenly to expand again into Russia and Inflanten. That went like that till the Lublin-union, thereafter Lithuanian demands made the unified country ungovernable.
I don't get how union with Poland had saved Lithuania. By having to share very limited power of a king (who was often very uncapable guy anyway)? In the end both Lithuania and Poland disspeared from the map. It does not seem like Poland was such a great saviour, does it?
Again, you miss the point here. THe first union saved Lithuania not as such that Poland saved it but that Poland and other countries did not destroy it which would be likely because of the points I made before.
The final decline of Poland-Lithuania did not start till long after the 2nd union which was in the first place favourable to Lithuanian aristocracy, though some Poles indeed profited from it as well. The state didn`t but that was not the fault of the king or of Poland but of Lithuanian misconception of its position.
Anyway, don`t forget that all the later great magnate-famileis who are so often being made the cause of Polish decline were of Lithuanian offspring.
And I`m not trying to blame Lithuania now for everything - I try rather to make you see what your points are and what implications they have if you apply them to real facts.
Ok, so Lithuania just inherited "small Russian principalities, destroyed by the Mongols", which Poland obviously did not want.
I didn`t say that Poland didn`t want them. The fights for Halich and Volyhna proof otherwise.
Well, not at first anyway. Only after Lithuania had taken them...
Lithuania fought for control of Kiev in the middle of XIV century - it would seem that Kiev would have recovered in 100 years. And it certainly was not far from Poland.
Following the rivers which were the most usable routes of conquests it was much closer to Lithuania indeed. Not to mention that there wasn`t anything of importance between Lithuania and Kiev anymore in 14th century. Poland needed first to take out the still strong Halich-Volyhna, for which also Hungary contested (and Hungary was in these days much stronger than Poland) and it had indeed serious enemies on its other borders of the already mentionned Hungary, strong centralized Bohemia, the fast growing Brandenburg and the Teutonic Order (which was more efficient in Polish lowlands than in Lithuanian woods).
The whole Lithuanian conquest was one of entering the political vacum of non-existent RUssian central govenment.
So these "small" principalities were that small, that they only just about tripled GDL's population. And somebody was claiming that in increased it 10 times. They must have been really tiny.
Simple mathematics for you: take 100 little principalities and put them together and you get.... one big principality!
Winning the battle is not the same as conquering a country. Right.
So which of my statements were ridiculous?
Here you are:
It is very interesting why Poles did not conquer Lithuania, if later was so weak? Or why TO did not conquer it - it certainly had time. Don't tell me that the threat of Poland stopped them.
Also, if Russia was so weak, why Livonian order did not conquer them? Or why Poland did not conquer Russia? Why was it only Lithuania that did it all? maybe because it was very weak?
YOu make here the following implications:
-If a country is not weak it should conquer its neighbour.
-If a country did not conquer its neighbour it was weak
-If a country did conquer a neighbour, no matter how weak, it became suddenly a superpower which could never be defeated.
These are the points you made in that last quote and I hope you see why I think these are ridiculous.
In any way, your vision in general sounds like that:
Lithuania was a great country, it was a magnificent construction of a godly, absolutist ruler who with thanks to his exceptional abilities managed to unite his kinfolks and started long and hard conquests of the greatest nations of history. The country he united like that was strong, centralized and well governed. It had superior armies and a strong national identity. The Lithuanian culture and religion persisted in mind of the Lithuanians over the whole history.
Lithuanian armies managed for years to keep also all ivaders from their countries. But then they got a ruler who was far too ambitious and wanted to become a king by unifying themselves with the weak and anarchistic Poles, whoes only goal was to conquer Lithuanian lands in Ukraina to settle their nobles there. Moreover, Lithuania now had to fight seriously against the Teutonic Order, which ws entirely unlogical to do even if that country managed to invade Lithuania in bloody wars all the time.
So done it was christianized and unfieid but luckily they found anew great ruler who then formally was suboridate to the now Polish-Lithuanian king but in fact could take care of the country. THat construction remained and the still independant Lithuania faired great, even if it lost some 1/3 territory to its neighbours, but that was of course all the fault of Jogaila, even if he had no direct influence in Lithuanian affairs. But that last was of course the fault of Poles who did not come to help them - yes, they could have come but Lithuania did not wanted them as they wanted to remain free from Polish interventions in its own affairs.
Finally a definitive union had to be made. Lithuanian aristocrats howled of pain by losses of Ukraina, even though it were the Lithuanian families controllign the estates there, but they did remain idnependant. They were happy as they had their own army, their own parliament and culture. They did not have to listen to Krakow and later Warsaw and the politics of some of its kings who wanted to govern the country in a more centralistinc ways - that would be bad for Lithuania so they blocked it. Then the Russian and Swedes came and Liuthuania wanted help but they did not get it as the country - decentralized for all these years by Polish and Lithuanian nobility - could not defend itself and though Liuthuania itself aimed on such a situation, it was all only Polands fault. Moreover, the aristocrats in Lithuania adn Ukraine thoiught it was best to just go to Russia - as long they did not have to fight - but that was also Polish fault. And so they were entirely happy when they found themselves within the border of Russian Empire eventually and only then they discovered how bad their position there became.
I tried to enter into it all of your points from your previous posts, together with some 'facts' which there can`t be much discussion about. Forgive me a small bit of irony in it but I could sometimes not resist it...
In any way I don`t think it will be a surprise for you that I entirely disagree with such history of Lithuania as you present and I compiled from your points.
