ANST - FW: Musing on July 23rd -- The Prize of Peace

[j'lynn yeates]

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- -----Original Message-----
From: Ellsworth Weaver [mailto:astroweaver at yahoo.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 23, 2000 23:02
To: 2thpix at surfari.net
Subject: Musing on July 23rd -- The Prize of Peace


Dear Folk,

On this day July 23, 1343, Casimir the Great in the town of Kalisz
signed a peace treaty with a band of tough dude knights which gave
away
Pomerania and ensured that his country could have a chance at
tranquility, unity, and access to the sea.

Toward the end of the 13th century, Poland was divided into
increasingly small duchies. This division (what we now call
Balkanization) was a hassle for everyone except the dukes who
controlled the parcels. The Catholic church found it to be a bother
because their diocese borders were not the same as the provinces.
Every
petty tyrant wanted to be important and make businesses pay extra for
trade. Warsaw did not even belong to Poland. Foreign invaders could
just walk in and take a small duchy and no one would come to their
aid.
Who would want to build a town in a place like that? It was a mess.

Don’t get me wrong, there was a real perception of the need to unify.
Problem was, who was going to do it and take credit? Like rival
street
gangs, everyone knew outside boys were going to bust their chops but
who should rule the place: Crips? Bloods? Warriors? Baseball Furies?
The Church? Knights? Nobility? Burghers?

While all of this thinking was going on, Gdansk Pomerania was seized
by
the Teutonic Knights in the years 1308-1309. The loss of Pomerania
and
of Poland's access to the Baltic Sea were ominous events, as they
ushered in a long period of wars between Poland and the Teutonic
Order
for the recovery of those territories. As we saw with the former
Soviet
Union, access to the sea is a very important thing for any country
who
hopes to trade with others at a distance.

During the first few decades of the 14th century, Poland was the
weakest of those sovereign kingdoms facing a constant threat from the
alliance between the Czechs and Teutonic Knights. Ladislaus the
Short,
King of Poland, in his struggle to recover Pomerania, took advantage
of
the Pope's support and of the alliance with Hungary, but neither a
court trial before the papal envoys, which he won, nor an armed
struggle, brought the desired effect. Sometimes one must think in
different directions.

His son and successor, Casimir [Kazimierz] the Great (1333-1370), one
of the most outstanding Polish rulers, made peace with the Teutonic
Knights on this day in 1343, giving away Pomerania as "an eternal
alms"
to them. By giving that, he then could bargain for the recovery of
other lands held by the Order. He also made John of Luxembourg give
up
his claim to the Polish crown. Okay, he had to give Silesia on
Poland’s
western border over to Bohemia. Nothing comes for free.

Once Poland was at peace, Casimir got to work encouraging new
villages
and towns. He promoted trade and helped get some rules for extracting
salt, lead, silver and iron. He established a unified state currency
which just had to help trade. As far as governing, he included lots
of
folks on his advisory counsel and actually listened to them! He
actually separated the concept of the crown and the king – something
folks in some medieval recreation groups have yet to understand
completely. He set up border-guarding castles and reformed the army.
Heck, he even sponsored the first Polish university, the Krakow
Academy
in 1364.

Toward the end of Casimir’s reign, the population of Poland was about
2
million. The population density increased by at least a factor of 2
from a century or two before. Polish culture diffused to over one
million folks outside its borders. Within the kingdom Jews, Germans,
Ruthenians all lived with native Poles.

Casimir had no lawful son. He concluded a treaty with Louis Angevin,
the King of Hungary, so that when Casimir died the crown went to
Louis.
Louis eventually bartered away many privileges to Polish knights (not
the Teutonic ones) in order to secure the recognition of one of his
daughters as an heir. Well, knights need stuff, too. Rather sweet,
actually, that he wanted his daughter to reign.

What have we learned from this? Access to the sea is everything?
Everybody wants to rule Gdansk? Sometimes it pays to think outside
the
Czechs? Caring means sharing? How about a country generally does lots
better when it is at peace? King, Rodney said it best, “Can’t we all
just get along?”

As always, if you can find someone not reading these and want those
unfortunates to be enlightened, informed, entertained or just plain
annoyed at spamming their mailbox, go ahead and forward them. Please,
leave my name and sig. attached.

A little over an eighthton knight,
J. Ellsworth Weaver

SCA – Sir Balthazar of Endor
AS – Polyphemus Theognis
TRV – Sebastian Yeats


=====
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Modern & Medieval (but always discreet)
If you are interested, contact me at
astroweaver at yahoo.com or 805.473.8867

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