Medieval Christianity: Knighthood

The Teutonic knights were powerful and ferocious advocates of holy war. Their history is suffused with crusading, campaigning and struggle. Feared by their enemies but respected by medieval Christendom, the knights and their Order maintained a firm hold over the Baltic and northern Germany and established a formidable regime which flourished across central Europe for 300 years. This book surveys the gripping history of the knights and relates their rise to power; their struggles against Prussian pagans; the series of wars against Poland and Lithuania; the clash with Alexander Nevsky's Russia; and the gradual stagnation of the Order in the fourteenth century. The book is replete with dramatic episodes - such as the battle on frozen Lake Peipus in 1242, or the disaster of Tannenberg - but focuses primarily on the year-after-year struggle to maintain power, fend off incursions and raiding bands, and to launch crusades against unbelieving foes. And it was the crusade, with knights demonstrating their valor, which chiefly characterized and breathed life into this militant, conquering Holy Order. The narrative charts the rise and fall of the Order, and, in an accessible and engaging style, throws light on a band of knights whose deeds and motives have long been misunderstood.

This is the most complete history in any language of the Order of St John, or Knights Hospitaller, successively known as the Knights of Rhodes and of Malta. Founded in eleventh-century Jerusalem, the Order has played an important military, religious and political role over succeeding centuries.

Orders of lay knights-the most famous of which are those of the Garter and the Golden Fleece-were founded at some time between 1325 and 1470 in almost every kingdom of Western Christendom,and played an important part in the life of the court.Modelled either directly or indirectly on the fictional society of the Round Table,they incorporated varying numbers of elements borrowed from the older religious orders of knighthood and from contemporary institutions.Jonathan Boulton defines the monarchical orders as those with corporate statutes which attached the presidential office to the crown of the princely founder,or made it hereditary in his house.This study of the nature and history of thirteen such orders shows them to be not only an ingenious supplement to (or replacement for ) the feudo-vassalic ties that still bound the leading members of the nobility to their sovereign,but also the most important institutional embodiments of he secular ideals of chivalry that were at the heart of the international court culture of the age.- Back cover.

One of the most unusual contributions to the crusading era was the idea of the leper knight - a response to the scourge of leprosy and the shortage of fighting men which beset the Latin kingdom in the twelfth century. The order of St. Lazarus, through which the idea became a reality, founded establishments across Western Europe to provide essential support for its hospitaller and military vocations. This book explores the important contributions of the English branch of the order, which by 1300 managed a considerable estate from its chief preceptory at Burton Lazars in Leicestershire. Time proved the English Lazarites to be both tough and tenacious: following the fall of Acre in 1291 they endured a period of bitter internal conflict, yet they emerged reformed and reinvigorated in the fifteenth century.-Flap cover.

No individual Knight Hospitaller dominates the history of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.Among the professed brethren of the Order ofSt.John of Jerusalem,one will find no Bernard of Clairvaux, no Thomas Aquinas,no Suger of St.Denis.Although the Hospitallers made an important contribution to the ideals and organisation of the care of the sick poor,their decline from early priciples of purity was swift, and they earned the disapproval of some of the most powrful intellects of the time.By the middle of the thirteenth century their way of life was already outdated,imperfectly reflecting the hard,ascetic ideals of an earlier age.-Introduction

The main aim of the book is to reveal the consequences of the chief socio-legal characteristic of German knighthood: that most of the knights were at once noble and unfree. The author analyses their ambivalent status; how descent determined their standing; the rules, rights, and obligations under which they operated; the exact relation of their legal unfreedom to the customs of knightly vassalage; the meaning of their being owned by the German magnates; and the controversial problems surrounding their emergence in the eleventh century. A substantial introduction deals with the fundamental idea that the unfree knights were above all professional warriors in an empire where tactical violence was an integral part of the political structure. These realities, the author argues, formed the central dynamic in the development of the knighthood, and are emphasized throughout this thorough and original study.-Flap cover.

"Orders of Knighthood and of Merit" presents the many Catholic-founded Orders of Knighthood, but with the many Catholic-founded but secularized Orders - dynastic, state and crown - that exist today. He examines their relationship, where one exists, to the Apostolic See and the Papacy in the light of the changes that have taken place, as well as the dichotomy between the different roles and functions of the Holy See and the Apostolic See, the "Master et Magistra" of all Catholic-founded Orders of Knighthood. Having been able to study various source materials hitherto and not since available to others, he exposes the misunderstandings and misinformation that exist in this field, and highlights errors that have been perpetuated, sometimes for centuries, through genuine lack of information, as well as those that, for political expediency, have been deliberately concealed. The chapter and appendices on the Pontifical Orders of Knighthood are designed to assist papal knights in their role and functions that their appointments have given them. The author places these Orders in perspective, and shows that their continued existence is based on authoritative documentation. Papal Briefs, Papal Bulls and, in the light of recent developments, on the relevant Canons of the 1983 "Codex Iurix Canonici". This book is therefore one of the most important contributions to the study of phaleristics that has been published in the past decades.-Flap cover.

This work goes beyond the scope of an authoritative historical,juridical and practical compendium;it shows clearly the Holy See's role as Mater et Magistra of all ancient Orders of Knighthood.The author strikes a most serious note when he clarifies the Holy See's uncompromising attitude towards self-styled orders of knighthood; most of these organisations claim without justification some form of recognition by the Holy See.For obvious reasons the attitude adopted by the Holy See towards individual orders of Knighthood usually makes the difference between international recognition and rejection.-Flap cover

The book is concerned primarily with knighthood in Germany,and most of the evidence is drawn from German documents and German literature,but there is frequent comparison with knighthood in other countries,particularly in France.The author's object is to establish what contemporaries understood by knighthood in a political,social,and even moral sense;he does not concern himself with the often fanciful ideas of knighthood held by authors of the later Middle Ages and by writers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.To this end he has drawn heavily on legal documents of the period,but much of the evidence is derived from literary sources.It may be asked whether evidence taken from such diverse sources is strictly comparable,but the author shows conclusively that many aspects of knighthood were strongly influenced if not determined by features developed in literature.Nevertheless,he makes it clear that it is impossible to speak of a concept of knighthood which is applicable to all instances which occur in literature and in social life.When faced by the detailed evidence presented by Professor Bumke,many of the cherished conventions on the nature of knighthood prove to be ill-founded: that knights were always military servants;that they were noblemen or always became such;and,most important,that there was a knightly class. It is not part of the author's purpose to explore the nature of courtliness,but a great deal of information on this subject emerges from his study.-Preface.