[61a] PART THREE

 

                               The noteworthy events which took place

                       in Livonia, the Duchy of Courland, and elsewhere

                                             between 1577 and 1590

                                 during the reign of King Stephen until

                                       the time of King Sigismund III

 

 

          Above, at the end of the preceding Part Two, we noted and recorded the particulars of King Stephen's election.[1] He then held his first reichstag at Thorn in Prussia and was persuaded to wage war against Danzig. What took place during that war has been described by others and so it is unnecessary for me to burden my reader with a repetition of those events.[2] Nor is it my intent to range very far outside of Livonia unless it be that something important and imperative has to be included and introduced into my history.

 

          And so, in God's name, we return to the history of events in Livonia. On January 23 of this year the Russian besieged the city of Reval for a second time, with 50,000 men. He bombarded it for six entire weeks, day and night, but he achieved no more than he had previously and he had to withdraw in disgrace and defeat, may God be rendered honor, glory and thanks. As for what took place in and around the city during the siege, the skirmishes and the other actions, this too has been described in detail elsewhere and the reader is thus referred to those accounts.[3]

 

          After the monster and brutal tyrant once again failed against Reval, through God's grace and steadfast assistance, as has just been mentioned, and withdrew from there, he decided to try his luck against the remaining areas of Livonia to see if he might not gain control over them. [61b] He had an excellent opportunity and occasion to do so, since the King of Poland was burdened and encumbered with the Danzig war at this very time.[4] Thus he in person, along with his eldest son, countless soldiers, and all the war materiel and other supplies necessary to such an undertaking,[5] went to Pskov that same summer. He summoned King Magnus to appear there and on June 29 he had harsh words with him and criticized him soundly for having requested an escort even though he was under the protection of the Grand Duke as his sworn subject. He surmised that Magnus was up to no good or that he had something in mind that would be detrimental to him, the Grand Duke, especially since his counsellor Christian had not accompanied him, but had rather been dispatched elsewhere, to the King of Poland and the dukes of Prussia and Courland, so he had heard, to incite those rulers against him and set plans in motion. King Magnus explained that he had not dispatched Christian, but rather that he had deserted him, and matters rested there.[6] The king was invited to dine with the Grand Duke on several occasions and he and his men were shown honor and respect.[7] The two reached an agreement as to which castles in Livonia Magnus might lay claim to, all the others remaining the prerogative of the Grand Duke. Magnus was given the right to the city of Wenden and any other districts beyond the River Aa (Aah). If he should be unable to seize that city through peaceful means, then he was to inform the Grand Duke and he would send him the necessary artillery and soldiers. If other cities and castles wished to surrender to King Magnus, he was to inform the Grand Duke and await instructions before proceeding. After the Grand Duke marched from Pskov against Livonia, King Magnus also returned there and when he arrived at Ermes on August 1, Johann Ninegall came to him and told him that the city of Wenden had decided to surrender. The citizens seized the city and the castle on August 2, slaying a number of Poles, and on August 3 they jubilantly swore allegiance to King Magnus.[8]

 

          The Grand Duke and his assembled forces marched from Pskov (Pleßkaw) against Livonia on July 11, first going to Ludsen (Liotzen) and Rositen. Those castles quickly surrendered to him and all the Germans, along with their wives and children, were taken prisoner and brought to Pskov. But as soon as the Grand Duke returned, [62a] they were all released, aside from those who voluntarily wished to remain in his service. There were no more than four or five of these, not counting their families.

 

          Then he advanced to the Düna and captured the castle of New Dünaburg, allowing the Lithuanians to leave there unmolested. At Schwanenburg and Soßwegen he began to commit atrocities. At the latter castle he hung a number of Germans who were in the service of Baron Johann Taube from a very high gallows. He did this to repay them for their attempt to seize Dorpat, as mentioned above.[9] At Berson he allowed the von Tiesenhausens[10] and others who were in the castle to leave unharmed. But at Erlen he led the people off as prisoners and also had several sabered and piteously slain, among them a Tiesenhausen of Jemmedhal, a Fromholt, a Schwarzholt and Bertholt von Ölsen. While he was occupied with the above‑mentioned castles, the people of Kokenhausen were preparing for a assault, fearing it would soon be their turn, as was unfortunately the case. So they, along with the people of Wolmar, sent their legates to King Magnus with piteous entreaties, begging him to take them under his protection and to send some of his horsemen to their castles and cities, hoping in this way to be spared and saved. King Magnus, possibly concerned about the agreement which he and the Grand Duke had made at Pskov regarding the castles, immediately sent the interpreter Jasper Hoper with letters to the Grand Duke who was said to be at Rositen. But Jasper Hoper first went to Karx to visit his bride and thus he did not reach the Grand Duke in time. Nonetheless, Magnus was finally persuaded by the legates and he not only sent a number of his men to Kokenhausen, where they were joyfully received and taken in, but he also sent a general missive to a number of castles warning them of the enemy and promising them that whatever he did with them would be in the best interests of the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, to which said castles were subject through sworn oaths of fealty. And so those good people, who were totally abandoned in the face of direst peril and danger, perched on the razor's edge,[11] as one says, and who had nowhere else to turn for aid and reinforcements, [62b] trusted his assurances and allowed his troops to enter their castles and they then proceeded to go to Wenden to Duke Magnus himself. I would like to see how the cleverest fellows in the world would have handled matters differently had they been there, in such desperate circumstances with everything hanging by a silken thread.

 

                              This is the text of King Magnus' missive:

 

We, Magnus, by the grace of God chosen King of Livonia, heir to Norway, Duke of Schleswig, Holstein, Stormarn and Dithmarschen, Earl of Oldenburg and Delmenhorst, etc., herewith make open proclamation to all who receive this our letter or are informed of its content, be they of whatever status, spiritual or secular, of high or low estate: the Grand Duke and his mighty army is now invading this poor, oppressed province of Livonia, hoping to finally bring it under his control. He has already captured a number of important fortresses and is at present ravaging and devastating various districts and their inhabitants. We, as a German, Christian prince, would like, with divine assistance, to take under our rule the remaining districts and inhabitants, along with their own and subject cities, castles and lands, now hard‑pressed and abandoned, and in this way save them from the great oppression, peril and destruction which threaten them. Before such action is undertaken, they shall be allowed to state their reservations and provisos and thus nothing will be done to the detriment of the Kingdom of Poland or the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, under whose protection and sovereignty they presently are. Rather, this action will be in the best interests of those two countries and will be directed, as mentioned above, toward the salvation of the districts and their inhabitants. We have signed this document with our own hand and have had our seal affixed below. Done at our castle of Wenden, August 24, 1577.

 

                                                                                   (Magnus' own signature)

 

          [63a] Soon afterwards the Grand Duke arrived with his army before Kokenhausen and demanded entry into that town.[12] The situation was desperate and the good people were at a loss as to what to do.[13] But what other choice was left them but to yield to such a mighty force, reluctant though they were, because the footsteps terrify me.[14] They hoped to minimize their losses by granting him entry. As soon as the Lithuanians withdrew, he immediately made prisoners of the citizenry, but he piteously sabered, slew and slaughtered all those who were subjects of King Magnus, with the exception of a clerk. He spared his life and let him live so that he might bring his lord news of the tragic and bloody affair at Kokenhausen. King Magnus and his men at Wenden at first did not believe him, but rather regarded everything he said as fables and fairy tales, until finally they accepted what he said as true.

 

          At Kokenhausen the Grand Duke went in person to a pastor and asked him what he preached and believed. The pastor answered that he preached what Luther had preached and when the Grand Duke asked what Luther had preached, the pastor said he had preached what Paul had preached. Once again the Grand Duke asked what Paul had preached and the pastor replied that man would find salvation before God not through good works, but rather through faith in Christ alone. The Grand Duke then hit him over the head with his whip and said, "You are a filthy, whoring devil, you with your Paul and Luther!"[15]

 

          At this time Ascheraden was held by the former landmarshal, Jasper von Münster, and his cousin Johann von Münster, a canon. The King of Poland had graciously bestowed this castle upon him as a demesne for life. The Duke of Courland had done the same with a number of adjoining manors. After Ascheraden surrendered to the Russian, the Germans were seized, bound and led away, but the landmarshal was unable to go with them on account of his infirmities and advanced age and so the Russians struck him dead outside the walls and left him lying there. Thus his troubled life ended in a piteous death. Everyone, be he of high or low estate, would do well to regard and consider that whatever has happened to one person can happen to anyone.[16] In the time of the Order he had been a high official, second [63b] only to the master, and as he rode about for pleasure or on the business of his office he was accompanied by three hundred horsemen and a number of trumpeters. Then he later fell into such poverty that he appeared once at Kaunas plagued by lice and worms appealing to the good people for help. Once when the Lithuanian senate convened he appeared among them unannounced wearing on the front of his garment a paper sign with "Ecce homo" in large letters, to remind them of the human condition in which they might also conceivably find themselves and to encourage the lords to have compassion with him, to open up their generous hands and to extend him further aid.

 

          During this Muscovite invasion and devastation King Magnus sent his men to Riga, doing everything he could to gain control of the city.[17] When news arrived in Riga of the atrocities committed at Kokenhausen and of how the Lithuanians had withdrawn across the border, the people of the city became quite cautious. The Duke of Courland travelled to the estates of Lithuania, not without danger from the Russians, and the Muscovite turned his march from Kokenhausen back toward Wenden and he did not so much as harm a chicken in the Duchy of Courland south of the Düna. Whether he desisted for some personal reason or whether some of the duke's subjects acting independently had an audience with him at Dünaburg and requested an armistice, promising that negotiators would be dispatched, is known to God alone.

 

          Here mention should be made of a remarkable episode, one which should be preserved and not allowed to pass into oblivion. Once, in replying to a letter from the duke, the Grand Duke wrote back saying that this time he would spare "God's little country"[18] and would do no harm or damage to it. This so encouraged and comforted the duke in the midst of his great distress and sorrow that he jumped up for joy and said, "If this my poor duchy is 'God's little country' as I myself believe it to be, then I am now convinced that God looks after his own, that He has reined in the enemy, and that He will not allow him to further oppress me or my people." And, praise God in eternity, this is just what happened during this mighty campaign.[19]

 

          [64a] During this entire period the duke was with his dear wife at the castle in Riga and he was in considerable danger of losing his lands, his subjects and his own life. It could have easily come about, through God's providence or some other chance, that he might have either fallen into the hands of the Muscovite or been forced to leave under a white flag, should he have been so lucky. And so it was considered advisable to send the duchess, along with the children they both dearly loved, both sons and daughters, farther inland to Goldingen to better insure their safety. But tongs could not tear her away from her lord. Rather, she stayed with him the entire time and was so confident and bold that she was also able to comfort and encourage the others. In a word, she was resolved to live and die with her lord and to risk every peril just as she had promised him as her husband, whatever good or ill fate the dear Lord might have in store for them, whatever might happen to the children, country or subjects according to His will. Not to mention how she had willingly and gladly offered and contributed everything she had brought with her into the country and all the other things she had been presented with at weddings and baptisms toward coping with the emergency and these possessions were by no means inconsiderable, but rather quite substantial. Later, during her lord and husband's long illness and until his death, she showed him complete love and devotion. It is thus quite appropriate that she be described as a true and living example and repository of all matrimonial and Christian virtues. All people living in matrimony, whoever they might be, should follow her example. It was for this reason that the dear God so richly blessed her with such tender and beautiful fruits of marriage, some of whom died and are with God, others are still alive, may God preserve them so that they might honor Him and insure the well‑being of the entire ducal family. These are the beautiful gifts which God bestows upon people who hold Him in reverence and love Him. You will see "thy children like olive plants round about thy table."[20]

 

          After committing his atrocities at Kokenhausen, the Grand Duke moved from there back toward Wenden, as mentioned above, and he sent dispatch after dispatch demanding that his subject Knez Alexander Polubinski,[21] whom Magnus' men had taken prisoner [64b] on August 28 after the capture of the castle and fortress of Wolmar, and his treasure be turned over to him and that Duke Magnus send some of his men out to speak with him. The latter was done with great reluctance and the lot fell to Andreas Friedrich Senffteberger and Christopher Kurssel. The Grand Duke heaped biting censure upon them, distorted the tragedy which had taken place at Kokenhausen, and said that King Magnus had not behaved at all well toward him: he had sent his man Christian[22] to the two traitors Taube and Kruse; he had not honored the Pskov agreement, but had rather taken over virtually the best fortresses in Livonia; and he had taken his subject Knez Polubensky prisoner and seized his treasure. It was the latter above everything else which he wished returned. The legates placed the blame for the delayed communications on Hoper[23] and promised to report all these matters to their lord, which they did. Little attention was given the matter until Andreas Friedrich and several other men were finally persuaded to return to the Grand Duke with gifts of a golden chain, silver caussen [24]which had originally come from the Grand Duke, and all manner of silver and gold jewelry from the ladies and maidens, in an attempt to still or at least mitigate his rage and anger.[25]

 

          How much all this helped can be seen from the siege of the castle of Wenden: when the Muscovite appeared before it, that poor little town was unable to resist him for long, but rather, may God have mercy, quickly fell to him.[26] The husbands of a number of honorable noblewomen were in the castle and, since the latter were about to be led away, they pleaded in God's name that they be allowed to speak a word with their husbands and bid them farewell. The tyrant agreed to this. They were led up to the castle and in the presence of the Russians they spoke with their husbands through the shut gates. They touched hands through the gap at the bottom of the gates and said farewell. One says, "parting is painful," but what an anguished parting this was, especially for those husbands who had dear children and would not know whither they had been scattered.[27] Every honest married couple can easily imagine the sorrow for themselves.

          In light of the situation of the city of Wenden and in response to the impassioned pleas and entreaties of those besieged in the castle, [65a] King Magnus summoned up his courage and decided to go out from the castle to the Grand Duke with twenty‑three men in order to intercede on behalf of the besieged. As soon as he caught sight of the Grand Duke, he and all his men fell to their knees and he begged for mercy and for his own life and the lives of his men. The Grand Duke and his son and chief general dismounted. The Grand Duke bade Magnus rise, for he was, after all, the child of a great lord. He returned his sword to him (earlier he had had the swords taken away from Magnus and all his men) and, after rebuking him most severely, promised to forgive him, to do him no harm, and to spare his life.[28]

 

          Just then a shot came flying from the castle and it whizzed right by the Grand Duke's head. He then remounted and was so enraged that he swore by St.Nicholas that not a single person in Wenden would be spared death, even though he be a prince. And so he began a bombardment and determined assault on the castle. Abject despair and utter hopelessness arose, especially among Magnus' subjects. Whenever someone, standing in a window for example, was struck and killed by a shot from the heavy artillery, another would take his place as soon as he had been dragged away, hoping to meet his own end in the same fashion. Thus did they attempt to save themselves.[29]

 

          After the Grand Duke had departed in great rage and anger, his chancellor, Sollican Vasilii,[30] remained with King Magnus near a roofless peasant bathhouse. The chancellor requested a translator who could write Russian and he dictated to him and he wrote down that King Magnus owed the Grand Duke forty thousand Hungarian guldens because of the treasure which had been seized from Polubensky in Wolmar. This sum was due by the following Christmas and if this deadline was not met, then King Magnus was to stay in Moscow until twice that amount was paid, in Arabian gold or jewels. King Magnus, as well as Andreas Friedrich and Wilhelm the scribe and translator, had to together sign this promissory note. Then Magnus' men were stripped of all they had and taken to the bathhouse where they were held prisoner along with the twenty‑three men mentioned above.

 

          The provost of Suckau, a von Enden, a brave, esteemed and courageous man from Prussia, had come to the country a short time before on account of his dead brother. He had laid down his [65b] priestly vestments, taken up a spear and become a volunteer soldier. He managed to speak to some of them and embolden them, but they were very few. It was to no avail. One man is no man and the hand of one man offers a weak contest.[31] So everyone began to despair and they resolved that rather than be captured, along with their wives and children, by the Russian and fall into his hands, they would seek death by some other means.

 

          They were all of one accord in this matter and they wished to make their peace with God, receive the Blessed Sacrament and then leave the outcome and conclusion of all their troubles to Him. But as they, several hundred in number, were preparing to put their plan into effect, they discovered that there was no wine and this made them even more downcast and sick at heart. It was all the pastors could do to console them and bolster them with the saying of St.Augustine, "Believe and you have partaken."[32] The provost of Suckau, a Catholic, reputedly said that he was now curious to see how the Lutherans would receive the sacrament since they had no wine. Now, whether they liked it or not, they would have to receive communion in the Catholic fashion, in the single form. After all, he said, there is no flesh without blood.

 

          But the dear, ever‑faithful God, Who never sends us trials we cannot bear and Who is the true Helper in time of need, brought it about in miraculous fashion that King Magnus' chamberlain found a small flask of Rhine wine among the clothes as he was going through them and sorting and packing them so that they might be saved. Not a single living person in the castle had known the wine was there. He placed it at the service of the pastors and thus the desperately needed spiritual succor was provided and the poor, hungering, souls were rescued and revived with the flesh and blood of the Lord Christ in the form of bread and wine. Truly a divine miracle!

 

          After this had been done, i.e., after each had received his provisions for the journey, they all unanimously decided to blow themselves up, along with their wives, tiny infants and children, and to give themselves unto the dear God. There were a few exceptions among them and these people [66a] let themselves down over the walls at night when everyone else was sleeping. Crawling on hands and knees, they hoped to slip through the Russian encampment. But they failed and then thanked God that they were drawn back up into the castle by a rope. One should have seen this sorrow beyond all sorrow as the good people knelt in the room beneath which the gunpowder had been placed. Man and wife held each others' hands, children gathered around their parents, some still nursing at their mothers' breasts, all awaiting blessed St.Simeon's hour. Nor, as the Muscovite soon hereafter began to storm and invade the castle, was it long delayed. The gunpowder was ignited and all were blown up, aside from those who had hidden elsewhere in the castle and two other noblemen who survived through the special providence of God, just as the Apostle Peter escaped the prison and Daniel, the lions' den.[33] They only managed to live after surviving direst peril, because during the night they had to crawl through the encampment, often brushing against the clothes of sleeping and snoring Russians. During the day they immersed themselves up to their necks in the stinking waters of the marshes, doubtlessly because they, as men who had witnessed everything that had happened in the castle and had themselves intended to be blown up with the rest, wanted to inform others of the great sorrow and suffering and to compare their recollections of the event. "Truth lies in the accounts of two or three."

 

          One rightly marvels at the obedience toward God demonstrated by Abraham, the patriarch of all believers, and that which his son Isaac, who was to have been sacrificed on Mt.Moria, showed toward his father Abraham. What a piteous and moving scene that was! But dear God, whoever recalls and contemplates this piteous event, the husbands and wives, the parents and children, will be no less moved. Whoever reflects that such a thing actually took place, will feel as though his heart might break a thousand times over and burst forth from his breast.

 

          Since the Grand Duke had earlier proclaimed that all who were in Wenden castle should pay and die, even though they be princes, so now [66b] he was bound to fulfill his imperial oath and promise, just as King Herod, his sworn brother, did toward John the Baptist. And so he had everyone who survived the explosion or who had not escaped during the capture of the city piteously sabered, hacked to bits, mutilated and then left unburied as food for the birds, dogs and other wild beasts. Among the slain was also one who invoked the protection of the King of Poland.[34] In the seventy‑ninth Psalms the brutality of the foes of Christians[35] is condemned: "The dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the heaven, the flesh of thy saints unto the beasts of the earth."[36] O Lord God, show us Thy strength!

 

          In a word, the tyrant dealt with the mightiest just as he did with the most humble. It was just as when that poor man in Moscow supposedly said to a nobleman who was lamenting his imprisonment as something ill‑befitting his noble status, "Dear junker, you must accept your being here with and among us. What is happening here is just as it happens in heaven where no regard is given to person." The first and the last are equals in honor.[37] 

 

          While these tortures were being carried out, several virtuous captive ladies took pity on the men and gave them a refreshing drink of cold water. The men were then immediately dragged away, acknowledging and invoking the name of our one Savior and Redeemer Jesus Christ, and ending their lives in a state of grace, singing the beautiful Christian hymn, "Lord Jesus Christ was man and God". But the Muscovite had one of them, Jasper Unninghausen,[38] the secretary to Fürstenberg and castellan of Wenden, flayed before his very eyes until all his flesh fell from his ribs and one could see the intestines in his body. Finally he gave up his spirit in the midst of this pain, anguish and torment.

 

          Dear God alone knows why it was chiefly at the important castles of Kokenhausen and Wenden where the archbishops and masters had had their courts that these dreadful and monstrous atrocities were committed.[39]

 

          He dealt in no less severe fashion with the people at Wolmar who were subjects of King Magnus, ordering Knez Bogdan (Bucdan) Belsky to slay them.[40] And yet, after he captured the castles of Ronnenburg, and the splendid fortresses of Schmilten [67a] and Trikaten, he allowed all the Poles who had been there to leave unmolested and he made prisoners of the Germans and took them away with him. [41]

 

          Thus this splendid and beautiful province along with thirty cities and castles, excepting only the cities of Riga, Dünamünde, Treiden and the Duchy of Courland and Semgallia, fell into the hands of the tyrant without resistance during this single campaign. Many of the junkers who had been driven out of Transdüna along with their wives and children had, next to God, the Duke of Courland to thank for providing for them. His castles and manors were full of them and there would have been nowhere else for them to stay.

 

          After the above‑mentioned catastrophes had taken place, the Grand Duke, when he learned of the approach of the Lithuanians, withdrew toward Ronnenburg and Wolmar and from there went on to Dorpat.[42] He brought King Magnus, whom he had captured before Wenden, along with him and at Ronnenburg he housed him in a peasant's shack. At Wolmar Magnus was led closely past some sixty of his men whom the brutal Knez Bogdan Belsky had sabered and who had been left lying stark naked. Once again he had to take his lodgings in a peasant's hut. He was treated the same at Dorpat, which the Grand Duke entered on September 18. The next day the Muscovite summoned Magnus to appear before him and once again he delivered a long and harsh reprimand. He reminded him that he and his forbearers had been close and cordial friends with the Holy Roman Emperors and kings for over one hundred years. He knew this to be true from extant histories. He himself was born of German blood and line.[43] (This, no doubt, was as true as the legend about Pontius Pilate's being from Forchheim in Franconia.) He had also had important dealings with the Salt King (by which he meant the King of Denmark) and it was for this reason that he had so loved and honored King Magnus and given him his close blood kinswoman for his wife. Now, as previously, he harshly censured him for the actions of Christian Schraffer. Finally, however, promising to show him new and great favor, he released him and allowed him to join his royal wife at Karx. But soon afterwards he wrote demanding the Arabian gold or jewels and instructing that they be forwarded to Helmede with a prominent boyar. King Magnus explained that it was quite impossible [67b] for him to raise such a large sum in this country. He thus asked that he be granted leave and permission to go to Germany and Denmark to his lords and kinsmen to see if they might be able to help him in this matter. The Russian legate returned to the Grand Duke with this message and with a splendid golden chain and other jewels.

 

          That same fall, soon after the Grand Duke's withdrawal, a number of Germans and Lithuanians surprised and recaptured Dünaburg.[44] Sir Mathias Dobinsky likewise took Suntzel, Erle and other minor castles in that region. Later Johann Büring, a man of the pen and one whom fortune did not always favor (for, as the blessed Dr. Luther said, there were some who were loath to see an humble Christ‑bearer become a knight of St.George) and the fine men he had with him at Treiden, obtained accurate intelligence reports and then took the city and castle of Wenden by night.[45] They slew many Russians there, but took two of the leaders, Knez Daniel, the former governor of Pskov, and Ivan Quasin, and sent them as prisoners to the King of Poland.[46] In the same fashion and soon afterwards they also captured the two castles of Lemsal and Burtneck from Duke Magnus' men.

 

          At Wenden he had the stone rubble and debris cleared from the room where the people had blown themselves up.One found both husbands and wives with their children, lying close to each other. In great sorrow they took them away from there and buried them in the earth. They likewise buried the limbs and bones of those who had been sabered, insofar as there remained any which the dogs, birds and other beasts had not dragged away.

 

          Although Wenden was besieged again that same winter and subjected to a heavy assault bombardment and although the besieged were forced in their plight to eat their horses, those Germans, Poles and Lithuanians remained valiant and steadfast and were eventually relieved by Sir Alexander Chodkiewicz, the Lithuanian commander‑in‑chief.[47] And so the Russians abandoned the siege and were forced to withdraw in great defeat and disgrace.[48]

 

          This same year the Swedes seized the castle [68a] of Oberpahlen from King Magnus, but the Russians subsequently retook it from them by force.[49] After King Magnus lost Oberpahlen he saw that as time went on his great good fortune in Livonia, bound as it was to the Grand Duke, was beginning to change. He considered his imminent plight and recalled that "dogs tend to bite the hindmost." And so, after receiving reports from his forerunner, Christian Schraffer,[50] whom he had sent on ahead to the King of Poland and the Duke of Courland, he and his wife went to his Courish diocese. From there he went to Bauske, to the plenipotentiary of the King of Poland, the lord palatine of Vilna. There he placed himself and all the castles he still controlled in Transdüna, as well as the Courish diocese, under the sovereignty of the King, while nonetheless preserving the rights and prerogatives of the King of Denmark in regard to the diocese.[51] And, after some urging, those rights were again acknowledged in spite of everything the people of the diocese and their lord Duke Magnus had done against the Duke of Courland and his eldest son, Duke Friedrich, both earlier and subsequently.[52]

          There are sayings: "Grand designs cause people to weep," "Often the best of intentions turn out for the worst,"[53] and "Many a plan becomes unraveled in the course of a year." This is also what happened in the case of Duke Magnus, who allowed himself to be enticed to this dance through the sweet pipings of those who had been driven off their lands, in particular the two baronized lords Taube and Kruse, as well as others who hoped in this manner to quickly grow rich and prosperous. Each person is the artisan of his own fortune.[54]

 

          The Grand Duke, that vain and puffed up tyrant, was sorely distressed that a clerk and not one of his equals, a mighty potentate, should have taken away from him and out of his hands the castle and city of Wenden, the most important castle in the land where the masters had always and inevitably had their residence and court, just as the Pharaoh of Egypt had been greatly mortified and distressed when, as part of the Ten Plagues, he was beset with flies, frogs and lice and not with bears and lions. And so it was that Augustine properly said, [68a] "God sent flies and frogs upon Pharaoh and his servants and not bears and lions, so that by the vilest means arrogance might be subdued."[55]

 

          And so he decided to repay like with like and in October of this year he sent two of his chancellors, or sollicans as they are called, with 20,000 men not counting the baggage train, and twenty‑four heavy artillery pieces to Wenden. They besieged it and subjected it to very heavy bombardment, but the Poles, Swedes and Germans banded together and relieved the besieged on October 22.[56] During the battle to relieve the town the Grand Duke lost several thousand of his men, as well as the artillery, which was then taken to Dünamünde and then on to Vilna as spoils of victory in a great triumphal procession. When the King of Poland paid his first visit to Vilna the following year, the lord palatine of Vilna presented him with the artillery.[57]

 

          In summation, the King of Sweden and his army did much to aid the country, not only before Wenden, but elsewhere as well, and he restored all those who had not crassly deserted the Crown to their hereditary and patrimonial holdings. He treated those who had sold their castles differently. However he maintained his sovereignty over those honorable people living there, the contained rather than the container,[58] for he would be little or not at all served if he had but the land itself and not its living inhabitants, even though others might think differently, looking only at territory and not at people.[59]

 

          Here I must not neglect to mention the prophetic meaning of Wenden.[60] It was above all before Wenden that the Grand Duke's fortune took a remarkable turn. From times of old the Russians had had their emporium and trading depot at Wenden. They had brought their goods there, deposited them and from there made their return journey. But, praise and thanks to God, during this Muscovite war in a single year the Grand Duke's army was twice turned back before Wenden and had to withdraw in defeat and disgrace. It is thus quite appropriate that Wenden has the name it does. Names are often appropriate to their objects.[61]

 

                                                [69a] The year 1579

 

          During the winter Duke Christopher Radzivil,[62] the field commander of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, invaded the diocese of Dorpat with several thousand Poles, Lithuanians, Tatars and also a thousand German horsemen from Livonia and Courland. He wreaked great havoc there, plundering and burning, and he eventually put the castle of Kirienpol to the torch, taking the Russians he captured there to Vilna.[63]

 

          This spring the king went to Grodno in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and then on to Vilna and he summoned the Duke of Courland to appear there in order to be formally invested with his fiefdom. But it could not be done there on account of all manner of legal complications and difficulties and also because of the mobilization against the Muscovite. Nonetheless all the details had been completely worked out between the king and the duke. And so, after the estates in the kingdom and in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania had fully considered the matter, the duke was enfeoffed with his duchy with all due ceremony and solemnity on August 4 at the royal encampment at Dissena.[64] Part of the proclamation of investiture reads as follows:

 

First, to his lordship and to his male posterity, legitimately descending from his loins by a direct line, we confirm the ducal title, like that of the illustrious duke in Prussia, with all dignity, insignia, and privileges of duke and anew in this investiture we grant that he be vassal and feudatory prince of ours and of our successors and a member of the Kingdom of Poland and of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and that his aforesaid posterity be the same. Furthermore, as by the deified Sigismund Augustus, our most serene predecessor, to his lordship and to his legitimate masculine posterity descending from his loins in a direct line jurisdictions, possessions, cities, towns, and specified castles were assigned by name without the solemnity of infeudation, so we by power of legitimate investiture, bestow, give, and confer upon the same first, that whole area of Courland and Semgallia, etc. [65]

 

          The king graciously reaffirmed then and for all time that which the blessed Sigismund Augustus had first promised him and he graciously honored the duke's royal coat‑of‑arms by adding to them the family crest of the Batorys', three wolf fangs, placing them next to the letters 'S.A.' in the pothook.[66] The king pledged and promised the Duke of Courland and his subjects, just as had the blessed Sigismund Augustus before him, that no one would assail their honor or possessions on account of this unavoidable transfer of fealty, nor would they be beset by any condemnation or proscription from the Holy Roman Empire, for the above‑mentioned proclamation of investiture also contained the following words:

 

Finally, since his lordship, for very necessary and just reasons, subjected himself to the authority and command of our most serene predecessor and the successors to the kingdom and to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, having been impelled by the extreme wrong wrought by the grand duke of the Muscovites and by enemy violence and oppression, the resource and aid of the Roman Empire and the emperors having been implored in vain through very many years, and since, although he was already treated as abandoned for a very long space of time, he remained under the authority of the kings of Poland, our antecedents, and under our authority with no objection, we truly judge that it shall be that to his lordship on this account no controversy or trouble will be offered. But, nevertheless, if any shall have been offered, which has carried with it any loss of name or detriment, we, in regard to him, by no means leave out of consideration doing through our royal office what we know that it, i.e., our royal office, did in defending our subjects in the case of his lordship Albert, formerly duke in Prussia, and we shall guarantee defense against every enemy, of whatever sort he shall have been, and our successors will make this guarantee as well.[67]

 

          In the meanwhile, while the duke was with the king at his encampment in order to be invested with his fiefdom, the Muscovite crossed the Düna and invaded Semgallia with several thousand Russians and Tatars, inflicting considerable damage in his customary brutal fashion. He soundly defeated the duke's horsemen in and around Newen, captured a number of them, and led them [70a] off to Pskov where he struck them over the head and let them drown.[68]

 

          On August 30 the king captured the mighty fortress of Polozk and wrested it from the hands of the enemy. He also seized splendid artillery and supplies adequate for any eventuality, supplies such as any castle in all of Christendom might have well envied.[69] Quickly thereafter he advanced on the castle of Sokal (Suckol) to which several thousand eminent Russians had been sent in order to effect the relief of Polozk. The king set fire to the town and bombarded it so heavily with fireballs that the Russians could find no haven from the flames. Rather, almost all of them burned and perished there. The same thing happened to several hundred Hungarians and Germans who had charged into the city under the command of Count Christopher von Penißdorf. The portcullises or gates had been shut behind them and they were unable to make their way back out again. The Russians in the castle were said to have comported themselves with such chivalry and valor that even when the clothes on their backs were in flames, they still turned their fronts toward the enemy and fought resolutely. The reader can find information on this episode, as well as the other events which took place during this campaign and the subsequent ones against Veliki Luki (Wellikilucka), Pskov, and the monastery of Petschur (Pietzschür), in Reinhold Heidenstein's Historia belli cum Moscho a Rege Stepheno gesti.[70] For we do not wish to dress ourselves in the plumage of another.[71]

 

                                                    The year 1580

 

          The Poles, in particular Meledoffsky, captured the castle of Schmilten and Duke Magnus in person. Matthias Dobinsky and Berthold Bütler, the officer in command, invaded the diocese of Dorpat with their horsemen and with foot soldiers from Riga and advanced as far as Neuhausen, almost up to the Russian border.[72] This fall a large number of Reval and Swedish forces again besieged the abbey of Padis, finally conquering it through starvation.[73] The Russian officers were so weakened by hunger that they could not even meet the Swedes at the gates. Their commander‑in‑chief[74] said, "May those soldiers forgive me who are still in the fortress and yet able to do something for their lord. I waged war against the enemy for as long as I could, but I cannot and must not defy God [70b] and Nature." He then handed over some Byzantine gold pieces and was spared. In the tyrant's lands possession of such gold was not unusual.[75]

 

                                                    The year 1581

 

          On the First Sunday in Lent Duke Magnus of Holstein had his young daughter baptized at Pilten since the child was over thirty weeks old.[76] He had also summoned approximately eighty godfathers to be present there. But soon after the baptism and the celebrations his Russian wife was sent to Dondangen.

 

          During the winter of this year a rather strong force of Swedish horsemen and foot soldiers invaded Russia by way of Finland and captured the castle of Korela.[77] On account of extremely heavy snow they were unable to advance farther into the enemy's country and do anything more and so they had to turn back. The commander‑in‑chief, Pontus de la Gardie, a Frenchman, crossed over to Wierland with a number of soldiers, traversing a hundred‑mile stretch of frozen sea before arriving before Wesenberg. Outside that castle he took by surprise and defeated approximately one hundred Russian musketeers who were on their way there from Dorpat. And then, on March 1,2,3 and 4, he recaptured the two castles of Wesenberg and Tolsburg.[78]

 

           On April 7 the city of Riga swore allegiance to Stephen, the King of Poland, may this be felicitous and salutary for the state.[79] May God grant that it serve the general well‑being and prosperity. The king's legates were the royal clerk and secretary Johann Demetrius Solikowski and Wenceslaus Agrippa, the chancellor[80] of Lithuania.

 

          Now that the King of Sweden had successfully captured the castles of Wesenberg and Tolsburg, as mentioned above, and withdrawn in triumph, he not only employed that same splendid army to forcibly retake the castles in Wiek, i.e., Hapsal, Lode and Leal, but also, after their capture, he ordered de la Gardie to advance on German Narva, which he bombarded, stormed and conquered. In the assault and capture many thousand Russians were slain.[81] During this same savage campaign he also advanced on the splendid fortress of Ivangorod or Russian Narva [71a] and captured it. The royal fortress of Weissenstein likewise surrendered to him, the Swedish commander‑in‑chief Pontus, forced to do so through starvation.[82] And so in the years 1581 and 1582 the two kings of Poland and Sweden took almost more lands and subjects away from the Grand Duke of Moscow than he had captured over a period of thirty years. There was one setback: Hermann Fleming, a Swedish commander, advanced with an army on Petrokrepost (Notheburg) in the absence of the commander‑in‑chief Pontus and without his permission. Fleming besieged the city and bombarded it heavily but to no avail and he finally had to withdraw, having accomplished nothing.[83] In this same year Sir Dibintzky captured Lennewarden (Linwart) and Ascheraden with the help of the Germans. (Those castles had been besieged earlier but without success.) Hans Büring also recaptured Purkel, and Thomas von Enden, Salis.

 

 

 The year 1582

 

          Through God's special providence peace regarding Livonia was concluded between the king and the Grand Duke of Moscow on January 15.[84] On January 30 the captain Sir Wilhelm Kettler, lord of Nesselrode and Amboten and the natural son of the Duke of Courland's brother,[85] along with Casper von Tiesenhausen of Odensee, was rescued from imprisonment at Petschur by an Osnian peasant in a quite miraculous fashion, defying all human reason, just as the Apostle Peter was freed from prison. A short time earlier these two, along with Reinholt von Tiesenhausen of Barson,[86] one of the von der Platens from Germany, and several foot soldiers, all bold young men with the best of intentions, fell into the hands of the enemy outside of Petschur. They were then imprisoned in a tower and after they had climbed up into it the ladder was broken and pulled down so that no one else could come up after them. After the peace was concluded, all the cities, castles, lands and subjects which the Muscovite had controlled in Livonia were turned over and yielded to Sir Jan (Johann) Zamoyski,[87] the king's appointed commander‑in‑chief and the lord high chancellor of the kingdom. Not included were the fortresses in Harrien, Wiek, Wierland, Jerwen, etc., which the King of Sweden [71b] had captured. The Muscovite garrisons were then quickly withdrawn from the country, for which one might well thank God from the bottom of his heart. This is the day which the Lord has made. Let us exalt and rejoice in it.[88]

 

          Immediately the Duke of Courland issued a proclamation decreeing that this day, January 15, was to be solemnly celebrated each year throughout his entire duchy. The dear God was to be thanked, honored and praised for having shown such great mercy and for having restored sweet peace. On this day the text from the Gospel, Luke 13, was to be read: "Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish," etc. In sum, it was due to the mercy of God that we were not destroyed.[89] And so it is truly proper that we give thanks and continue to implore His mercy. As St.Jerome says, Prayer mollifies and anoints God. A tear touches the same and pricks Him. Likewise, through the prayer, 'Pity me,' the ear of God is bent, and prayers and tears are the arms of the church.[90]

 

          After peace had been concluded, the King of Poland straightaway sent an Italian master of the kitchen, Dominicus, to Sweden and following closely after him, Christopher Warszewicki (Warsowizius),[91] a skillful and widely experienced Pole. They were to request the return of a number of places in Livonia, i.e., Reval, Harrien, Wierland, Wiek and Jerwen which of rights belonged directly to the Crown of Poland.[92] The commander Ernst Weyer was at Weissenstein to conduct similar discussions with Pontus. But since the master of the kitchen delivered requests which were not pleasing to the King of Sweden, he and his suit were summarily dismissed.[93] But Warszewicki, because of his intelligence and experience, was better received.

 

          Even so, no one in the Kingdom of Sweden was willing to accommodate the King of Poland's [72a] request. Rather, they insisted on repayment of the principal, along with interest, of the mortgages on the six previously mentioned castles. They also demanded a share of the personal possessions which the blessed Sigismund Augustus had left behind, for they belonged not only to the Queen of Poland, but also to the Queen of Sweden, her sister, both having been born of the same womb. For equality is the mother of harmony.[94]

 

          On March 12 the king came to Riga in person.[95] There the Livonians denounced the two barons Taube and Kruse before the king and accused them of having forged the seals of the Duke of Courland and a number of others, writing letters to the Grand Duke in which those men offered to place themselves under his sovereignty. They countered by saying that it had been for the good of the country that they had played such a trick on him, for it had caused him to pause and delay his military preparations. In sum, these accusations had no effect on them and they were neither embarrassed nor intimidated. They left many other accusations of dishonorable self‑interest go unanswered, no answer being an answer in effect. Indeed, they were even heard to say that although the accusations were aimed against them, they nonetheless had a good side, for they would turn back onto those who had made them.[96]

 

           The king remained in Riga for eight weeks and the following May he went from there to Kokenhausen and then on to Vilna in Lithuania. He had left the lord bishop of Vilna, Sir Gregory (Georg) Radzivil, Duke of Olica, who not long afterwards was made cardinal by Pope Gregory, behind as governor.[97] But many a saddened heart, especially those of the widows and orphans, knew little joy, for they grieved and longed for their former lands and holdings.[98]

 

          The following summer the lord bishop and the lord commissioner Stanislav Penkoslawski held a landtag on orders of the king. The bishop there used his office and power to protest against the king's allowing those above‑mentioned regions to freely observe the Augsburg Confession.[99] It was also proposed that the fiefs granted by the lord administrator, Jan Chodkiewicz, not be recognized as valid since they had not been personally confirmed by [72b] King Sigismund Augustus. Those granted by other noblemen, however, all the way up to but not including Margrave Wilhelm, were to be acknowledged. Secondly, the majority of the castles were to be razed since they were more detrimental than beneficial to the regions. The king himself had already begun doing this with his own castles, starting with Ruigen, but having as yet progressed no farther. Thirdly, the deeds and property titles of all inhabitants were to be reviewed.[100]

 

          The estates thanked the king most respectfully for freedom to observe their religion according to the Augsburg Confession and turned aside the objections of the lord bishop.But they most vehemently opposed the other two points regarding the acknowledgement of fiefs and the razing of the castles. They did, however, agree to the review of deeds and titles, which took place soon afterwards. And so little was agreed upon on this day, most of the issues being referred back to the king.

 

          The lord royal governor served his office faithfully and diligently and meted out justice to rich and poor alike. He felt a special compassion and pity for the widows and orphans and wrote letters on their behalf to the king asking that that which had been theirs be returned to them. But the thing which lay in the way of this and prevented it from being completely achieved is known to dear God. The governor also sought to bring about an agreement between the Duke of Courland and the city of Riga regarding control over the River Düna, but to no avail.[101]

 

                                                    The year 1583

 

          Above in Part One it was mentioned and described how the blessed Sigismund Augustus enfeoffed the Duke of Courland and his male issues and heirs with not only the Duchy of Courland but also with the diocese since the latter lay in the very heart of the former. God and Nature had made the two so indissolubly joined and linked to each other that any separation or division would be quite detrimental.[102] But in the interests of preserving good and cordial relations the Duke of Courland agreed that in exchange for the diocese Duke Magnus should receive the beautiful and splendid district of Sonnenburg on the island of Ösel, an area immeasurably superior [73a] to the former. The King of Denmark was not at all ill‑disposed toward this transfer and he had dispatched a grand delegation to Hasenpoten to conclude the agreement. But nothing more came of the matter at that time on account of Duke Magnus' stubborn opposition. The issue was thus laid to rest until some future opportunity presented itself, but the original terms of the agreement were to remain the same and the Duke of Courland continued to retain the lands and subjects for himself and his heirs since law and justice gave him legal claim to them.[103]

 

          But Jan Chodkiewicz, starost of Samogitia and Livonian administrator, ignored all this and when Duke Magnus later went over to the Grand Duke of Moscow, this country's ancient archenemy, he set about to invade said diocese in order to bring it under the control of the King of Poland. When the Duke of Courland learned of Chodkiewicz's hostile intents, he intervened and turned back the Lithuanian incursion, for it would have been most intolerable for him to have had such neighbors lodged in the very midst of his duchy, neighbors with whom he had had constant quarrels and disputes over borders and other matters.

 

          Most significant was the fact that the counsellors and officials who remained in the diocese proclaimed to the duke's legates at Pilten and swore on their honor and fidelity as noblemen that should they be released from their present lord through his death or any other means, then they would place themselves and the entire diocese under the sovereignty of the Duke of Courland and none other since they already had brothers, sisters, children and other close kinsmen living under his rule, acknowledging, however, the superior jurisdiction and direct sovereignty of the blessed and most serene King of Poland.[104] All this was later confirmed and accepted by all the assembled estates of the diocese in the presence of legates from Courland in the village near the church of Selburg (im dorf bei der Seldnischen Kirchen). Of one accord they all raised their hands and solemnly swore and promised to honor this pledge. All this was in addition to the fact that later at Mitau Duke Magnus himself proclaimed and confirmed, in the presence of his counsellors, [73b] the young lord of Courland, Duke Friedrich, his adoptive son and successor. This is to say nothing of what happened after Magnus' death when the people of the diocese and the Poles were at each others' throats.[105] The duke can well rest his claims on the above grounds and need look for no others.

 

          Nevertheless, later, in spite of all this, after Duke Magnus departed this life to join the Lord God on the Monday after Passion Sunday, which was March 18, at five o'clock at night at Pilten, the people of the diocese immediately sent a special dispatch to Johann Behr[106] and commander Jürgen Farenbeck who had gone to Germany while Duke Magnus was still alive, telling them of the demise of their lord and instructing them to respectfully inform the King of Denmark that the diocese wished to place itself under his sovereignty. Dear God alone knows the reason for this action.[107]

 

          It was said that in this year the Grand Duke of Moscow entered into a bitter dispute with his eldest son over the question of establishing and maintaining peace with the neighboring lands. The son was of the opinion that it was now time to cease waging war and to conclude peace with those lands since the Muscovite domains had been all but devastated by the Tatars, Poles and Swedes and the army had been decimated and the Grand Duke's successors and children would be little served if all their father left them was the hostility of all neighboring countries.[108] The Grand Duke became so enraged that, like the true misanthrope and parricide he was, he inhumanly slew his eldest son Dimitri (Demetrius),[109] stabbing him with an iron‑tipped staff. One would thus be fully justified in saying of him what Emperor Augustus said of Herod of Askalon, that he would sooner be his swine than his son, for he had piteously slain two of his sons, but was forbidden to eat pork by his religion. After committing this atrocity against his own flesh and blood, the Grand Duke never knew another happy moment, but rather ended his days the way tyrants often do and died.[110]

 

          Then rule passed to his second son, Fyodor (Theodorus) .[111] But everyone regarded him as a simple‑minded idiot and it is said [74a] that throughout his life his greatest passion was listening to church bells.

 

          The people of Pilten tried to keep the demise of Duke Magnus secret, but news of it spread immediately. The lord cardinal sent one of his junkers to them in Pilten with a message. In this way he would to able to determine in a discrete fashion whether the duke was actually dead or alive. The counsellors responded by saying that the duke could not receive him in person on account of his great infirmity. Indeed he was so ill that he had to lie in a darkened room, being too weak to stand sunlight on his eyes, much less long discussions or discourses in his ears. If he would reveal the message they would be happy to receive it and would faithfully refer it to their lord. Indeed, following an old custom, they drank a toast at dinner with the legate to their lord's health so that he might not realize that the duke had died. But the longer it went on in this way the more rumors sprang up."Once dead, dead forever."

 

          And so the lord cardinal immediately seized control of the castles in Transdüna and garrisoned them with new officers. He also sent legates to the people of Pilten urging them, in light of what had happened to their blessed lord, to turn the castles of the diocese over to the King of Poland, their immediate lord, and to place themselves under his protection and sovereignty through their oaths and promises. But they could not acquiesce to the lord cardinal's request since they had already made their appeal to Denmark.[112]

 

          Meanwhile Johann Behr returned to Pilten with a Danish legate, Matthias Budde,[113] who had been ordered to go to Poland. (Budde later became the royal governor of Arensburg on Ösel, but he was deposed soon thereafter.) Behr not only brought a favorable response from the Danish king, but also several artillery pieces, shot, powder, materiel, etc., with which to better preserve the arrangement. The people of the diocese were so emboldened that they most carelessly and rashly set out after the knight Oborsky, the commander whom the lord cardinal had already dispatched to the diocese with some troops. He had already departed from Goldingen and was approaching the Lithuanian border. The men of Pilten tried their luck against him but their attempt misfired and the good people [74b] came out the worst, having to yield the field and withdraw in defeat after suffering losses to their side. This took place not far from Amboten, on May 24 of the above year. After this battle and defeat of the men of Pilten, the Poles regrouped and captured Amboten on the last day of May. They also captured Neuhausen, etc.

 

          The lord cardinal was not only overjoyed at the above‑mentioned victory, but also decided to use this opportunity to further harass the people of the diocese. And so he and his men insistently demanded of the Duke of Courland that he, as a vassal prince of the king, contribute his share to the undertaking and dispatch his men to join the other forces. It was vexing to the duke and noxious to him and his subjects to acquiesce to the demands of a royal governor in the absence of clear orders from the king, to say nothing of the fact that he was most reluctant to undertake such actions out of consideration for the King of Denmark since territories he controlled bordered closely on the duke's own and the king would be the first he would have to call upon for assistance in the event of enemy invasion or attack. Nevertheless, he finally and with the greatest reluctance dispatched his commander Bertholt Bütler and two hundred horsemen to those regions after the lord Stanislaus Kostka,[114] the vice‑chamberlain of the royal holdings in Prussia, arrived with authentic instructions from the king. The duke instructed his men to do all they could to protect his poor people who were being severely mistreated and abused by the Poles, and to carefully guard the port and harbor of Windau. In the meanwhile the Poles were bivouacked among the duke's peasants or those of the diocese and they inflicted much harm by leading away great numbers of cattle. This went on until Oborsky's government came to an end when he was shot outside of Johann Behr's castle of Edwahlen. A short time before that castle had been gutted by fire as a result of neglect, but then it was quickly regarrisoned.[115]

 

          The subjects in Courland, both in the duchy and in the diocese, were all incensed, for they had all been treated the same, one spared no more than the other. Thus a number of the former, and men of no small standing, entered into very cordial and close contact with the people of Pilten. Both parties came together outside Pilten and deliberated and took counsel on how, through God's merciful assistance, they might prevent the dreadful internal war[116] from growing even worse, and on what might be done to get the Polish forces to leave the country. [75a] One then suggested to the cardinal in a friendly fashion that the castles of the diocese might be placed in protective custody[117] until an eventual settlement and agreement was reached between the two kings of Poland and Denmark. It is not true, however, as Dr. Müller writes,[118] that these men were sent by the duke or that he sought or desired custody of the castles. He was experienced enough in such matters so that he would not have willingly placed himself in such a tight spot.[119] At this gathering at Pilten all manner of plans were discussed and proposed as to what one thought would be the most appropriate and honorable thing to do in this matter. Thus the placing of castles into protective custody was suggested in the best interests of the people of the diocese themselves, for it was thought that this measure would lead to the speediest restitution of everyone's property. Since the majority of the junkers had their homes and manors in the Amboten and Neuhausen districts, a number of them were totally opposed to the plan, because in their view, they would be unable to defend such action to their lord, the King of Denmark. And so they all left Pilten and took leave of each other, having accomplished nothing. This took place on June 26 and 27.

 

          Thereupon the Polish commissioner in Livonia, Sir Stanislaus Penkoslawsky, the castellan of Marienburg and the appointed commander‑in‑chief of the army, immediately began to launch attacks against the people of Pilten, attempting to inflict as much damage upon them as he could. Meanwhile the fact that some of the Duke of Courland's horsemen were involved, as mentioned above, and especially the all‑too‑free accusations of spiteful men moved the King of Denmark to press the duke and emphatically demand payment of the 20,000 thalers which the Order had earlier received from his blessed father during the time of the Muscovite war. This demand was made regardless of how matters might turn out in regard to the diocese of Courland and Sonnenburg.

 

          During the time of the attacks against Pilten the people of the diocese intercepted and seized several letters which the archbishop had sent to the commander‑in‑chief Penkoslawsky with the cavalry master Claus Korff. From the letters they learned, among other things, that the King of Poland had ordered the army to withdraw from the diocese. Of course, it was to be done carefully, [75b] in such a way as to avoid the appearance of a retreat. This so emboldened and encouraged the men of Pilten that they pursued the withdrawing Polish army for several miles. They attacked them by surprise in their encampment and slew many of them. But their success was made short‑lived by the valor and bravery of the Polish commander‑in‑chief who was no ordinary man, but rather one of great skill and experience. They lost a number of their best men, some of whom were trapped while plundering and slain. The commissioner held the field and won the victory on July 29. Afterwards the Poles continued their withdrawal and the surviving men of the diocese fled back to Pilten.

 

          During this warfare in the diocese the two kings sent legates back and forth, making arguments pro and con, each of the kings lodging accusations against the other. We mentioned Matthias Budde above. He was sent to Poland to argue the case of the King of Denmark, namely that the king and his predecessors had had right and claim to the diocese in the time of the first settlement of the lands of Livonia.[120] The King of Poland for his part based his case on the right of possession and said that this right should not be challenged or disputed in spite of the fact that some subjects were in rebellion. He offered to submit the matter to arbitration, confident that he could justify his claim on the basis of the right of actual possession.[121] When the royal and illustrious Margrave of Prussia, Georg Friedrich, saw that nothing could be achieved through this dispatching back and forth, writing and rebutting, and exchange of hostile words,[122] since hard stones are rarely ground down, he intervened as a peace‑loving prince and offered to act as intermediary for the sake of the poor diocese and also so that these two mighty potentates not become further entangled in misunderstandings.

 

          Both sides agreed and, by the grace of God, the margrave settled and resolved the dispute through his legate, Levin von Bülaw, a man from a prominent Mecklenburg line who was well skilled and experienced in negotiations and whose decision both kings agreed to accept. At the same time Johann Behr, Wilhelm Kettler and Andreas Spillen concluded a cease‑fire at Durben and later the hostilities were completely ended. [76a] Truly the margrave spared no effort, diligence or expenditure of money in bringing about a settlement. The King of Denmark received 30,000 thalers from the margrave as settlement for all his claims. He then ceded the diocese to the King of Poland,[123] but at Pilten in the presence of the lord cardinal and the Danish and Prussian legates the Danes took possession of the artillery, shot, powder and everything else in the castle which had belonged to Duke Magnus and removed it. The subjects were directed to swear fealty to the King of Poland as their immediate sovereign, but they also took oaths to the margrave as their lord in recognition of his having provided the 30,000 thalers settlement money. Then every subject had his holdings restored. Johann Behr, a prominent nobleman from Germany, was left behind as the lord margrave's appointed governor of said diocese. The two castles of Dondangen and Amboten were excluded from his control for they were still held on behalf of the King of Poland. One was controlled by the chancellor von Unger, the other by the captain Wilhelm Kettler.[124] The abstract of this Pilten agreement reads as follows:

 

For nobles and townsmen, all and several, the rights of liberty and their privileges, lawfully held up to this point and enjoyed, will be confirmed by the aforesaid most serene king of Poland, the authority and consensus of his senators being added, and all these rights are to be preserved safe and unimpaired in perpetuity by all successors of his majesty to the kingdom. Nor will the loyalty exhibited up to this point to the most serene king of Denmark have been any detriment to them, but after this they will be received and considered as subjects faithful and esteemed of the most serene king of Poland, etc.[125]

 

          As a result of the above‑mentioned events and turn of affairs the people of the diocese and many others realized that their Danish king had never intended to become involved with the Poles in a damaging war, at sea or at land, over the diocese, since that diocese could never in all eternity make recompense for the expenses of such a war. Indeed earlier, when the King of Denmark had been offered Pernau, he was still reluctant to burden himself with such a serious and difficult war (and would still have been even had he been offered all of Livonia). Until the very end of that war His Majesty repeatedly explained his position through letters and [76b] legates. The people of the diocese had in their self‑interest and vanity gone on a fool's errand and this resulted in their losing their own brothers, children and close kinsmen and in the devastation of their lands and subjects as well as those of the neighboring regions. They had no one to blame but themselves, for no injury is done to a consenting party.[126]

 

          Throughout the length and breadth of all Livonia there was not a single corner of the land which had not been smitten by perilous war, punishment for our many and grievous sins. The country was especially subject to indescribable plundering and pillaging during the enemy's withdrawal. Erasmus of Rotterdam quite correctly observed "Soldiers always become worse at the smell of peace."[127] The same is true of the accursed, evil satan who even now rages even more dreadfully against the Christians, for he knows that his dominion can not long last but that it will soon fall to ruin, bringing in its wake his own everlasting damnation and that of all non‑believers.

 

          Duke Magnus' wife, whom was mentioned above, and her child had been summoned from Dondangen to Pilten to be with him during his illness and she remained there until the transfer of the diocese. She was then sent to the castle of Riga, having been granted money to provide for her and the child's maintenance. Finally, and with the king's consent, a number of the Grand Duke's legates took her away from there and brought her to Moscow at the request of a Tatar knez. She also took several Germans along as companions.[128]

 

          The King of Denmark took the castle of Arensburg and the island of Ösel back from the commander Jürgen Farensbeck. The latter, however, always spoke most reverently of the king with people of high and low estate and he praised and extolled him in many ways for the great favors he had shown him, doing all a servant should and could do in speaking most loyally of his lord. The court cats who lick with one end and scratch with the other give an example of just the opposite.[129]

 

          In this year the valiant hero and terror to the Russians, Pontus de la Gardie, and other Swedish commissioners had gone to the [77a] Grand Duke in an attempt to extend the armistice which had expired. On the return journey he, the mayor of Reval Bartholomeus Rottert, and several others drowned on the Narva. De la Gardie thus died most prematurely and the Germans of the districts had good cause to lament, for in him they lost a true patron and supporter at the royal Swedish court.[130]

 

          During this very time the King of Poland sent his esteemed commissioners to Pernau to settle the questions of borders and other matters between him and the King of Sweden. But the Swedish representatives had been somewhat delayed because of negotiations with the Russians. In addition to that the Pontus disaster had also intervened. And so the Poles grew impatient and returned home, nothing having been accomplished.

 

                                                 The year 1585 [131]

 

          In this year royal commissioners appointed by the two sides settled the border dispute between the Lithuanians and Semgallians in the Bauske district, which also included Mitau.[132] The Germans, however, were little served by the settlement. It was just as it had been during the preceding two years in the districts of Dünaburg, Selburg, and Ascheraden: the German holdings had been whittled down until they became the smallest portion of all, may God change it. Who the lord commissioners for the two sides were is included in the following document and in the oath sworn to it. The King of Poland appointed Jan Kistka (Johann Kiska),[133] the starost of Samogitia, chief of his commissioners because of the esteem the latter enjoyed and also because of the great importance of the matter. The king had himself kept constantly and faithfully informed of these important and complicated issues on which so many thousands had been spent both earlier and subsequently.

 

Therefore, already according to the public decree of the estates recently convened, we have sent off and dispatched our commissioners ‑‑ that is to say (one) very reverend, (one) magnificent and (two) nobles: Melchior, Duke of Gedroicz, Bishop of Samogithia; John Wolminski, Castellan of Polozk, Baron of Cremon; Stanislaus Narossouwietz, the great procurator of Volga; Wenceslaus Agrippa, [77b] our notary of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, estate manager at Nemonovena ‑ with fullest power to decide, erect and constitute definite and perpetual boundaries and limits between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Courland and Semgallia, the jurisdictions of your lordship.He, on his part, at Riga, when we were present, engaged himself to send as his commissioners, to meet with our commissioners and jointly finish this task of constituting boundaries, his own counsellors, that is to say, the nobles Wilhelm von Effern, burgrave, Gerhard Nolden, Michaelis von Bruneau, chancellor[134], and Georg von Tiesenhausen. For these commissioners of ours, having been appointed on both sides, we appoint as the fixed place of meeting, according to the old privileges, the said Kurozum and we fix as the time the feast day dedicated to St.Bartholomew in the present eighty‑second year.

 

                                     Oath of the Lord Commissioners

 

I, (name), swear that I, in these disputes which pertain to the matter and affair of the boundaries between the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and this province of Livonia, truly in order that the limits according to the rule of Radziwil, according to that which is the midpoint between these two outermost of the boundary stones of Schedebort and Wisquill ‑ may be investigated by diligent and faithful examination and by definite and perpetual signs and monuments may be marked anew and constituted ‑ that I will execute no part of this oath ‑ by which I have been bound to the most serene prince and my most clement master and to the commonwealth of his jurisdictions ‑ out of consideration for or for the sake of any person, with favor or with hatred, but that when a diligent investigation has been held of the aforesaid outermost of the boundary stones, I will faithfully mark the boundaries at the midpoint with conspicuous and perpetual markers. But when on account of the obscurity and uncertainty of these outermost markers, the midpoint cannot surely be ascertained as is promised according to the forenamed decree of Radzivil, I swear that I will judge on each side according to what is just and good and that concerning all points I shall so decide as I shall think fair and just according to my conscience. Nor will anything keep me from this duty undertaken by me except either adverse health or death itself, so help me God.

 

          [78a] The lord cardinal arranged a marriage between his brother, Duke Albrecht, Lithuanian grand marshal, and the elder princess of Courland, Anna. The marriage arrangements were concluded this fall at Mitau and the betrothal was celebrated.

 

                                                    The year 1586

 

          On January 2 the wedding between Radzivil and Courland was celebrated in Mitau, may God give His blessings.[135]

 

          On December 2 the King of Poland departed this life at Grodna at nine o'clock in the evening. During the lifetime of King Stephen Hungarian coats were at a premium for whoever did not have one of them could not, in his opinion, keep up with the others. O, the fickleness and inconstancy. But the coats will fall out of fashion and become uncommon again as soon as a new king is elected. Then something else will be in vogue. One questions whether the new mode of dress was more proper and elegant than the old. In my opinion the latter was a mark of independence, just as the former was a mark of servitude. One writes that the wise men prophesied to Darius that the Macedonians would soon rule over the Persians and so Darius, a year before war broke out between him and Alexander, had his sword, which was Persian, adorned and emblazoned in the Macedonian fashion. In a similar way, the fact that our people abandoned their customary mode of dress and adopted a foreign one is a sure sign that any nation from which such fashion is taken will eventually contribute to our destruction.[136] Experience has always proved it to be so. What the interregnum will now hold in store for us is known to God alone. One should pray to Him most fervently and sincerely, asking Him to instill unity among the worthy estates of the kingdom and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania so that they will again be able to elect a ruler by whom the best interests and well‑being of all Christendom be served.[137]

 

                                                    The year 1587

 

          Immediately after the king's sudden demise [78b] there were various assemblies in Poland and Lithuania. Then there was a general assembly at Vilna where a convocation was set for Warsaw where the time, place and manner of electing a new king were to be agreed upon. The Duke of Courland and other Livonian estates were also summoned to that convocation.

The queen, the widowed Lady Anna, was most anxious that her nephew, her blessed sister's[138] son, the Prince of Sweden, be given preference over all the other contenders and aspirants, and she strove to achieve his election as the new King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.[139] And so Her Highness sent dispatch after dispatch to the Kingdom of Sweden expressing her cordial and devoted disposition toward those lords, father and son. She also did everything she could to win the most prominent lords in the kingdom and in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania over to her side so that they might support and aid her with their votes.[140]

 

          During this same season, in February, Johannes Patricius,[141] Bishop of Wenden, died at Wolmar in February, thus following closely after his lord the king. To be sure he was never at all well‑disposed toward the poor Lutherans in his diocese, but there is no design against the Lord.[142] "Man proposes and God disposes." "Everything is in His hands."

 

          And on May 17, at sunset between eight and nine o'clock in the evening, lord Gotthard, the last Master in Livonia and the first Duke of Courland and Semgallia, ended his life in most Christian and blessed fashion after enduring a long and serious infirmity and illness. Shortly before his death he gave his eldest son, Duke Friedrich, fatherly instructions and entrusted him with the future rule of the duchy. On July 2 he was solemnly and reverently buried in the castle church at Mitau. An account of this is found in another book, Paraeneseos, and the reader is referred to it. In sum, to die well is the art of arts and the science of sciences.[143]

 

          [79a] The contenders for the crown were many and men of no mean importance in Christendom. And so several good people circulated appraisals of them far and wide.[144]

 

                                                     The Swede[145]

 

The Swede, a young man in age and a hero in mind, bears in his manners and spirit the dignity of manhood. He at the same time is beautifully polished in letters and skilled in many languages. He possesses many other gifts by which the person of a king is adorned. If God should be willing to give him to us as king, I would deny that a better person could be given.

 

                                                  The Muscovite[146]

 

As barbarism is a hydra of evils, so the Muscovite is a slave to vices.[147] He, inflated by his foolish mind, promises many grand things. He who himself is not wise enough for himself also snatches along others with himself, rushing headlong into circumstances ruinous and destructive to the entire country. The country is exposed like a prostitute, rent asunder as a garment is split. Thus the country itself may become prey since now it is in a state of foul discord. This indeed would be the harvest of the Muscovite, deadly wars and perennial mourning.

 

          And so after the proper election which took place on August 9 in Warsaw the prince and heir designate to the Crown of Sweden was solemnly crowned in Cracow on December 17[148] in the name of the Holy Trinity, whose special providence and guidance brought all this to pass, however strange and improbable it seemed. May the almighty and everlasting God Who dissolves and establishes kingdoms stand by Your Majesty during your royal reign so that it might redound to the everlasting glory and honor of God; to the well‑being and flourishing of Christendom in general and especially of these regions; and to Your Majesty's own everlasting fame and honor and that of your land and people. May you be praised for all time to come. Amen.

 

                                                    The year 1588

 

          Immediately after the coronation took place, the king had the estates and cities of the kingdom, the grand duchy and other provinces belonging to the crown render him their appropriate oaths of allegiance either in his presence on in that of his commissioners and all the estates far and wide did this willingly. At a landtag which was held in Wenden they not only readily swore their oaths to the royal commissioners, but also agreed to make a financial contribution to the newly instituted royal government. They did this to demonstrate their loyalty and obedience to the king, even though their resources were all but exhausted as a result of the long war.

 

          One would have liked the Duke of Courland and his noblemen [80a] to have joined the others in rendering such financial contribution, but he graciously declined the request and most respectfully asked the king to exempt him, citing his own prerogatives, privileges and freedoms, for he had nothing in common with the royal Livonian subjects in Transdüna who were bound directly to the king. Rather he, like the Duke of Prussia, enjoyed special status as an enfeoffed prince of the kingdom and the grand duchy.

 

          During this same year Sir Otto Schencking, formerly the provost of Wenden and Dorpat, was elected Bishop of Livonia as successor to the deceased Patricius. Schencking was a Livonian nobleman of distinguished family who, like a number of Livonians, had changed religion and become a Catholic. He was doubtlessly chosen over candidates from other countries because he was a native‑born inhabitant of Livonia who knew Latin, Polish, German and the native tongues. And so he was accepted more readily by his compatriots and had greater influence on them than would have had a foreigner. He was thus better able to serve and advance the Catholic Church.[149]

 

                                                    The year 1589

 

          In March and April a reichstag was held at Warsaw. On April 6 at this reichstag the two young lords of Courland and Semgallia, along with the Margrave of Prussia[150] and Prince of Pomerania,[151] received their fiefdoms with all due ceremony from His Royal Majesty. Duke Friedrich, the duchy's actual ruler, was present in person,[152] while his younger brother, Duke Wilhelm, was represented by deputies.[153] The two received their fiefdom with the complete right of simultaneous investiture.[154] May almighty God grant His grace and blessing so that the reign of their royal highnesses now and in the future redound to the glory of His divine name, to the honor of their royal line, and to the well‑being of their lands and subjects, all of this in accord with the advice and counsel which their father of blessed and Christian memory left them. The following is an abstract of the investiture proclamation:

 

[80b] In return for which, since, after the same illustrious Prince Gotthard died a little before the beginnings of our reign, the sons of his lordship, the illustrious princes and lords, Friedrich and Wilhelm, first toward the beginning of our felicitous inauguration through letters, then indeed in this present general assembly of our kingdom, the illustrious Prince Friedrich, in the name of each, in person, as masculine descendants of the mentioned illustrious Prince Gotthard, descending in a direct line legitimately from his loins, had demanded from us also by the most diligent entreaties confirmation of the same rights and ducal enfeoffment on the sixteenth day of the month of April, in this same general assembly of our kingdom, proclaimed by us here at Warsaw, after their lordships had asked for investiture from us and had offered an oath of fidelity and subjection to us and to our successors as supreme, direct, natural, and perpetual lords and to the kingdom and to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, we, according to the advice of our senators sitting at our side, invest the same illustrious princes Friedrich and Wilhelm as dukes of Courland and Semgallia, the illustrious Prince Friedrich indeed being present, but the other illustrious prince, Wilhelm, taking the proffered title through one of the councilors of his brother, to lands, cities, towns, castles and possessions ‑ which first the illustrious Duke Gotthard, their illustrious father, had as grants from Lord Sigismund Augustus, our predecessor and uncle, but especially from our most serene predecessor Lord Stephen, the king ‑ and preeminences and rights, all and several, the title having been handed over by us by solemn feudal right, each prince in full possession of his property, nevertheless without dismemberment of this duchy, and we invest them by the authority and purport of these our present letters, holding as pleasing and confirming and conferring anew by solemn investiture all those things decreed by our aforesaid most serene predecessor, Lord Stephen, the king, by diploma on the fourth day of the month of August in the year of our Lord, 1579. Under the hand of His Serenity and with the seals of the kingdom and by grant of our Grand Duchy of Lithuania, these grants were already previously given, conceded, and conferred upon the parent of the same illustrious dukes.[155]

 

          Before being elected king, his royal majesty had, in the statement of conditions he had submitted, proclaimed to all the estates [81a] in most regal and gracious fashion that even though he himself was of the Catholic faith, having been brought up in same, he nonetheless had a natural abhorrence of harassing members of other denominations with rancor and persecution. Thus his royal majesty reaffirmed and solemnly guaranteed to the two above‑mentioned dukes of Courland their right to complete observance of the Augsburg Confession, in keeping with his royal proclamation and in accord with the religious truce to which all the estates had sworn and subscribed, namely, that no one party was to be molested, persecuted or harassed by another for his religious convictions. The king reaffirmed this right for the dukes even though they had received ample guarantees from the two previous kings.[156] Earlier the illustrious and blessed emperors Charles V, Ferdinand and Maximilian II had likewise proclaimed such religious freedom and thereby preserved peace and unity in the empire. Would to God France and Holland had done likewise. If they had, then those most noble lands would never have found themselves in such a piteous and lamentable state of devastation. Even so, the Christian church is not to be eradicated or destroyed through water, fire or sword. The Church is overwhelmed and indeed oppressed, but it is not sunk or crushed.[157]

 

          As regards the diocese of Courland, in the first two parts it was mentioned how the previous most blessed kings Sigismund Augustus and Stephen had conveyed it to the ducal house of Courland, in exchange for the district of Sonnenburg on Ösel and the two manors of Adzel and Leal in the Pernau region. Later and unexpectedly Poland and Denmark became involved in a serious dispute over the diocese and actual hostilities broke out between Poland and the people of the diocese. Poland then reached an agreement with Denmark, thanks to the transaction whereby the illustrious royal prince of Prussia, the lord Margrave Georg Friedrich, paid the latter 30,000 thalers, in addition to other expenses incurred by the war, in exchange for its ceding its claim to the diocese.[158] But then the illustrious King Stephen considered himself no longer bound to the earlier promise and grant to the Duke of Courland and so he gave the diocese as a fief to his brother's son, Sir Balthasar Batory. [81b] It was over this that all manner of disputes arose between the duke and the above‑mentioned Batory during the reichstag which was held at Warsaw. The present reigning king, Sigismund III, and the estates agreed that the issue be referred to the next reichstag in Poland where it would be heard and settled. In the meanwhile both claims were to be held in abeyance, as can be seen from the following document:

 

Since, in the midst of all other things and this, it was agreed between our most serene predecessor and uncle, Lord Sigismund Augustus, and the illustrious parent of these that the illustrious duke be content to receive the diocese of Courland in exchange for the castle of Sonnenburg and the manors of Leal and Adzel and the aforesaid most serene uncle, just as also the most serene King Stephen our predecessor turned their attention to this matter so that his lordship may possess, together with the rest of Courland, the diocese of Courland also; but afterwards when, while the duke was alive, this exchange was not completed and a very severe controversy arose over this diocese between our predecessor of divine memory, Stephen, and the most serene King of Denmark and finally when the most serene late King of Denmark yielded through agreement and on specific conditions to our most serene predecessor and to the kingdom the right which he thought that he had in the case of this diocese, we felt that concerning this matter we could decide nothing at this time without the agreement of all the estates. Since, on account of the mass of our other very great items of business, we shall not have been able to put the question on this matter before the assembled estates, we leave the entire matter in that state in which it was previously, nor do we close the way to his lordship so that he may not after this treat concerning this matter with the estates.[159]

 

          Supposedly, matters would be somewhat clarified at the next reichstag (where the Livonian noblemen from Transdüna anticipated a much different and more advantageous decree regarding the final disposition of Livonia). During this same year the royal Swedish governor in Livonia, Sir Gustav Banner, received orders from the king to meet with the men of Harrien at a landtag at Weissenstein, where all manner of issues were discussed. For his royal majesty wanted to learn about his subjects and to be able to distinguish between the good and the bad, the loyal [82a] and the disloyal, so that virtue might receive its well deserved reward and the faithlessness and evil of those who had violated their oaths and fealty might be punished.

 

          Almost every few years it had been common for there to be a rebellion or hostile undertaking of some sort in Riga and at the reichstag in Warsaw the people from Riga spoke so harshly and rashly that it appeared that a serious war might result. But the king was a praiseworthy, Christian potentate who let justice give way to mercy and who attempted to do all he could through diplomacy before resorting to force of arms,[160] as the saying goes, and so he once again assigned commissioners to settle the matter. Under orders from the king and as his plenipotentiary representatives, Sir Severin Bonar, the castellan of Biesky, and Sir Leo Sapieha, the grand chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, were to hear the issues in the city of Riga and eventually render a decision. On July 17 these commissioners, one Polish and one Lithuanian, were received at Riga with pomp and splendor. It was primarily the Lithuanian grand chancellor who took part in the welcoming celebrations, however, since his Polish colleague was ill and remained in the castle. On July 22 they rode to the city hall and, after delivering their credentials, began the discussions. Doubtlessly others will write and publish true and detailed accounts of those negotiations and the issues pertaining to them. On the 27th of this month the city swore oaths of fealty to the royal commissioners, may God bestow His grace and blessings upon this action so that it might redound to the general well‑being of the country, etc.

 

          On the 8th of this month the King of Poland had entered Semgallia with several thousand horsemen, with the consent of all the appropriate estates of the kingdom and the grand duchy, planning to go on from there to Reval to see his father. Earlier the king had sent the commander Jürgen von Farensbeck to the reigning Duke of Courland to tell him that, although there had been no immediate resolution of the question of his fiefdom at the reichstag in Warsaw, the king would like his ducal highness [82b] to escort him into his duchy and accompany him, should this be convenient for him. Aside from the fact that it was his duty as a royal subject, the duke gladly and willingly received his royal majesty at his border and escorted him toward Kokenhausen. Before arriving there they most cordially visited each other at Setzsen. They then continued along separate roads on account of the large number of soldiers mentioned above.

 

          As also mentioned above, the Duke of Courland had been continually involved in serious quarrels and disputes with the people of Riga over the issue of control of the River Düna. He had brought numerous complaints regarding this before the king and had also entered into negotiations over the issue on several occasions, but nothing productive had resulted from this. Now his majesty sent orders to those commissioners, instructing them to consider and settle the dispute and quarrel. Thereupon the duke also dispatched several of his counsellors to the town. But the lord commissioners demurred on account of the large number of other issues involved in the negotiations with the people of Riga and postponed consideration of the dispute until the king's safe return from Reval, when he or his representatives would give the matter the attention it deserved.

 

          Also, after repeated requests, especially from the city of Riga, the Duke of Courland's blockhouse on the river Düna was demolished. This accommodation cost the people of Riga several thousand gulden.

 

          On August 28 the King of Poland arrived before Reval and was splendidly received and escorted to the castle by his father, the King of Sweden, and the Swedish princess.[161] At Reval both kings were amply provided with men and other materiel and the King of Sweden in particular was given troops, horsemen and foot soldiers, since the armistice with the Muscovite had now expired and His Majesty wished to be prepared for either of two eventualities, either a lasting peace or further war.

 

          The commissioners assigned to the Russian negotiations were Duke Gustav of Saxony, Engern and Westphalia; Count Achsel;[162] Clas Bielke (Claus Belike);[163] Claus Henriksson [164][83a] and Hans Wachtmeister,[165] field marshal. May the dear God grant that these Swedish and Russian negotiations be successful and that the meeting of the two kings result in the well‑being of these regions.

 

          The King of Poland left Reval on September 30, the Tuesday after Michaelmas, after remaining there for over four weeks with his father, the King of Sweden. He returned by way of Pernau, arriving there on October 3, from whence he continued on toward Riga. Perhaps he was in such haste because the Turks and Tatar cossacks were said to have attacked Russian Leuenburg and to have inflicted considerable devastation upon the districts surrounding it.[166]

 

          His majesty left Pernau on October 7 and arrived on the 12th of that same month at the castle in Riga, where he remained for nine days. None of the issues involving the Duke of Courland and the noblemen of Transdüna were settled, nor were those involving the city of Riga and the church which were still hotly disputed. Rather everything was postponed until the next reichstag in Poland. It was for this reason that the king refused to come down into the city and tour it even though the people of Riga had prepared fireworks, triumphal arches, and other things in his honor.

 

          On October 21 his majesty departed from Riga and crossed over the Düna into Courland where he was immediately received by the Duke of Courland and escorted to Mitau.[167] There, as earlier when he arrived in Semgallia, he had a most cordial and joyous visit with both dukes, the elder and the younger. On October 24 he bade them farewell, left, and made his way toward Samogitia. May God grant his majesty success and good fortune in all his undertakings. So much for the events which took place in Livonia from 1577 to 1590.

 

          Just as during the Age of the Apostles there were many who scoffed when Judgment Day did not come, so now there are some who rant and rave and do all they can to revile the predictions which many good people, and in particular Johann Regiomontanus, made regarding the year 1588. The latter said, "when we write eighty‑eight that will be the time when the [83b] world shall either come to an end or at the least many fearsome and miraculous things shall come to pass." The scoffers babble about how 1588 failed to bring more changes and wondrous events with it.[168] But, dear friend, you have not seen the last of it nor is the end in sight. Just think of the momentous events and changes of these past two years: the king's death in Denmark; the sea battle between the King of Spain and the English;[169] in France, the assassinations of the de Guises and others and indeed of King Henry himself; in Poland, the attack and invasion of the Turks and Tatars. Elsewhere in Christendom as well momentous events took place and are still taking place. You cannot be so blind that you do not see that up to now the portentousness of the year 1588 has become manifest. That which is delayed is not removed.[170] You must also realize that Judgment Day will all too quickly descend upon you, bringing eternal damnation for you and all godless people unless you turn toward God from the bottom of your heart, correct your sinful life and mend your ways. Come Lord Jesus, come, do not delay.[171] Come, Lord Jesus, with Your Judgment Day. Save Your Church from all fear and dismay. Amen.


 

Notes to Part III: 1577-1590

 

[1]..... For a review of the situation and listing of the literature, see Jürgen Petersohn, "Zum Problem der polnischen Ostpolitik unter König Stephen Batory (1576‑1586)," ZfO, 10 (1961), 659‑64.

[2]..... See above, 1566, for the city's resistance to incorporation into Poland.

[3]..... Russow, pp. 168‑80; Nuntiaturberichte (3rd), I, 175, for vain requests for imperial help.

[4]..... Therefore Chodkiewicz sought a truce with Ivan and withdrew the Polish forces south of the Düna. For Danzig, see Stämmler, pp. 55‑59. Danzig was by far the largest city in the Polish Commonwealth and could easily imagine itself strong enough to defy the king.

[5]..... Henry Huttenbach, "Anthony Jenkinson's 1566 and 1577 Missions to Muscovy Reconstructed from Unpublished Sources," Canadian‑American Slavic Studies, 9 (1975), 179‑203, indicates that England was sending shipbuilders, engineers, metallurgists, and war supplies to Russia.

[6]..... Magnus had sent Schraffer to Kettler to discuss changing sides, as he later did. As will be noted later, Schraffer sent word back that he would be safe in Pilten.

[7]..... As was Possevino. See pp. 15‑18, 47, for a description of the banquet.

[8]..... For Magnus' double game, see Stämmler, p. 66.

[9]..... p. 52b.

[10]..... Our correction of "Liesenhausen," an obvious misprint.

[11]..... in acie novaculae.

[12]..... Description in Tuulse, Die Burgen, pp. 35‑38.

[13]..... Prov. "Like oxen standing in front of a mountain." Als stunden allererst die Ochsen recht am Berge.

[14]..... quia me vestigia terrent.

[15]..... "Blediuoky puddu diabole mit Paul und Luther." Blediuoky is possibly an adjectival form of Russian blyad, "whore." Puddu, likewise Russian, from pud, "the basest sort of lust." For Possevino's debates with Ivan on theology, see pp. 47f., 56f., 67‑70. Kurbsky, pp. 267‑69, says that Ivan dealt far more harshly with Lutheran heresies in Russia. Avraham Yarmolinsky, "Ivan the Terrible contra Martin Luther," Bulletin of the New York Public Library, 44(1940), pp. 455‑60. In 1579 Ivan burned the two Protestant churches in Moscow which had been used by the prosperous Livonian exiles. Jacques Margaret, The Russian Empire and Grand Duchy of Muscovy, a 17th‑Century French Account (trans. Chester Dunning. Pittsburg: University of Pittsburg, 1983), pp. 23‑24.

[16]..... quod cuiquam contigit, cuiuis contingere posse.

[17]..... Letters in Codex, pp. 295f.; discussion in Lenz, pp. 76‑78, about this being a decisive moment ‑ Riga having finally realized that it could depend only on Poland for help against Ivan.

[18]..... Gottes Ländichen.

[19]..... Kettler, as Duke of Courland, had been a neutral after 1562! Only as the Polish representative in Livonia was he involved in the war against Ivan.

[20]..... Psalms 128:3.

[21]..... Aleksander Iwanowicz Polubinski (d. 1607/8), starost of Wolmar and Trakai and later castellan of Novogrodek. Staden, p. 101, says Polubinski revealed Magnus' projected treason to Ivan. As a reward, Polubinski was sent to Poland with messages.

[22]..... Christian Schraffer, court chaplain.

[23]..... See p.62a, above.

[24]..... Estonian, "drinking bowls."

[25]..... Russow, pp. 182‑83, says that Magnus was plotting to hold the castles for himself and seek Polish help.

[26]..... Russow, p. 184; the town lay outside the castle.

[27]..... wor sie gestorben oder geflogen sein. The first (1590) edition has gestoben instead of gestorben. I consider the former the correct reading since it fits into the formulaic expression gestoben oder geflogen.' The image is of flocks of birds suddenly taking wing and scattering.

[28]..... Russow, p. 184.

[29]..... I.e., from the more dreadful death awaiting them should they be captured by the Russians.

[30]..... Henning explains later that 'sollican' means 'chancellor', which is somewhat inaccurate. The person is Vasilii Iakolevich Shchelkatov (+1611), secretary‑counsellor 1571‑77. His brother Andrei was foreign secretary 1571‑94, and identified as chancellor in 1581. Possevino, p.11.

[31]..... Unus vir nullus vir et unius manus est imbecillis pugna.

[32]..... Crede et manducasti.

[33]..... What remained is described in Tuulse, Die Burgen, pp. 188‑93.

[34]..... Henning's informant must have been Magnus or a member of his retinue. See below.

[35]..... Sic.

[36]..... Psalms 79:2.

[37]..... Ultimus et primus sunt in honore pares. Horsey, p. 182, praising the richness of Livonia and the fairness of the women, remarks on the number of prisoners, some of whom he ransomed for small sums.

[38]..... Russow, p.183, says this was Caspar (or Jasper) von Münster. He is probably correct, this being the same man Henning mentions above, p.63a.

[39]..... See Russow, p. 183, for an account of the events.

[40]..... I read 'umbspringen' as a misprint for 'umbbringen.' Bodgan Iakovlevich Bellski (+1611), one of the tsar's most bloodthirsty hangmen, had risen from obscurity and was not related to the prominent Belski family of the previous generation; his only political connection was his cousin, Maltuta Skuralov. As chancellor, he was constantly in Ivan's company.

[41]..... Russow, p.185.

[42]..... He left behind strong garrisons: 1,060 men in Kokenhausen, 664 in Wenden, 475 in Wolmar, etc. Angermann, Livlandpolitik, p. 30.

[43]..... Russow, p. 118, cites this claim as well, adding "and of Bavarian extraction." Eduard Pabst, Balthasar Russow's Livländische Chronik (Reval: F.J. Koppelson, 1854), p. 335, suggests Russian boyar ("lord," "member of the old nobility") is identified with "Bavarian," or, in its South German form, Bojoaren. Possevino, p. 27, quotes Ivan's claim to be descended from Prus, a brother of Augustus Caesar.

[44]..... Russow, p. 194.

[45]..... February 2, 1578.

[46]..... Russow, p. 194.

[47]..... The son of Gregory and cousin of Jan.

[48]..... Russow, p. 195, says that Wenden was almost starved into surrender before Büring could bring reinforcements from Riga. The Germans were not strong enough to pursue the Russians.

[49]..... According to Russow, p. 195, Magnus' men requested the Swedes to help defend it against Ivan's forces. Ibid., p. 197, the garrison surrendered on time, but was massacred as it moved out of the castle.

[50]..... Renner disliked Schraffer also and blamed him for Magnus' policies. For his further career and death, see Renner, p.481.

[51]..... Codex, pp. 298ff; Editiones, XXIX, 35‑80, for Polish‑Danish correspondence which completely ignores Magnus.

[52]..... Russow, p. 195. The nobles and burghers of Pilten did not want Kettler or the king as their ruler.

[53]..... Saepe optime cogitata pessime cadere.

[54]..... Unusquisque faber suae fortunae.

[55]..... Muscas et ranas, non ursos et leones Deus Pharaoni et servis suis immisit, ut rebus vilissimis superbia domaretur. Russow, p.200, says that plague ravaged Riga this summer.

[56]..... Russow, p. 199, says October 21, with Russian losses of 6,022.

[57]..... Russow, pp. 198‑99.

[58]..... Contentum pro continenti.

[59]..... Russow, pp. 216‑23, has a long passage of praise for the Swedes.

[60]..... The German verb wenden means "to turn," "to turn about."

[61]..... Conveniunt rebus nomina saepe suis.

[62]..... Nicholas Christopher Radzivil (1549‑1616), oldest son of Nicholas the Black. He had studied in Paris and Rome and fought in the 1568 campaign. Unlike his father, he was a religious fanatic who burned his father's 1564 Bible and brought the Jesuits into Lithuania and Livonia.

[63]..... There had been a three‑year truce signed in March of 1578! A complete listing of royal troops and a brief account of this attack is in Editiones, XXVI, 151‑53.

[64]..... Henning was present. See Cruse, Courland, p. 66; Codex, pp. 300‑305. Jan Chodkiewicz died at this ceremony.

[65]..... Quoted from Codex, p.301.

[66]..... Codex, p. 304. The literal meaning of "Kettler" is "kettle‑maker" (cf. High German "Kessler", from Kessel), hence the significance of the pothook, or more precisely, trammel. The "S.A.", of course, stands for "Sigismund Augustus." Although we have been unable to find a contemporary depiction of Kettler's coat-of-arms for this period (1579-1590), our schematic schematic representation of these heraldic elements (drawn by James D. Lavin) is based on earlier and later attested coat-of-arms of the Kettlers and of Batory.

[67]..... Quoted from Codex, p. 303.

[68]..... This was the first invasion of Kettler's lands since the truce of 1562. The previous invasions had hardly crossed the Düna. Russow, pp. 200‑201, notes another outbreak of the plague in Riga and the disastrous defeat of "Hannibal's" army from Reval.

[69]..... Russow, p. 202; Renner, p. 482; Stämmler, p. 67; Otto Laskowski, "Les campagnes de Batory contre la Moscovie," Etienne Batory, pp. 380‑91.

[70]..... Heidenstein's book, alternatively entitled Commentariorum de Bello Moscovitico libri sex (Cracow, 1585 (title page says 1584) and Basel, 1588) is supplemented by  Rerum Polonicarum ab excessu Sigismund Augusti (Frankfurt am Main, 1572).

[71]..... Nolumus enim nos alienis plumis ornare.

[72]..... Russow, p. 204. This was part of the general Polish advance under Nicholas Radzivil the Red. The Polish role in the offensive of the following pages is greatly underplayed. Possevino follows the political situation better, pp. 6‑8, 59, 106ff. See Laskowski, pp. 391‑98, for the capture of Veliki Luki on September 4 and the diversionary attack on Smolensk. Batory used over 50,in this offensive, outnumbering Ivan's forces significantly. The papal nuncio sneered at Magnus, "magno di nome, ma non di forze." December 1579. I.A. Caligarii, nuntii apostolici in Polonia, Epistola et Acta 1578‑1581 (ed. Ludvig Boratynski, Cracow, 1915) (Monumenta Poloniae Vaticana, IV), p. 347.

[73]..... Russow, pp. 205.

[74]..... Michael Sitski.

[75]..... Possevino, pp. 8, 26, remarks on Ivan's lust for gold.

[76]..... Eudoxia. Horsey, p. 192, visited Pilten in 1580, remarking, "he used me but rufflye, by reason I could not drencke excessivlie with him."

[77]..... November 4, 1580. Russow, p. 205.

[78]..... Russow, pp. 206‑8.

[79]..... quod foelix atque salutare sit Reipublicae. This was on the basis of the Corpus Privilegorum Stepheneus of January 14. Codex, p. 306; Lenz, pp. 80‑83. There is a brief description of the country by the papal nuncio in I.A. Caligari, p. 653.

[80]..... Protonarius. This word is apparently the same as protonotarius, meaning the first notary, the chief of the chancellery. See Stämmler, pp.69f., 74f., for Riga's original agreement and Stephen's subsequent appointment of the fanatical Solikowski as curator of the Church.

[81]..... Russow, pp. 212‑14; Horsey, p. 182. The Swedish troops carried out a thorough massacre of the citizenry.

[82]..... Russow, p. 215. Batory was angry at this, having hoped to take Narva himself and guarantee his Hanseatic subjects access to the Russian market. He is alleged to have said, "I set the snare. My brother takes the game." The Swedish commander was probably Clas Fleming (1530/40‑1597), operating out of Finland.

[83]..... Russow, p. 225. Henning deliberately omits discussing the protracted siege of Pskov, where Stephen Batory was frustrated by Ivan Petrovich Shuisky. The Polish king, finding his advance into Russia blocked, agreed to an end to hostilities on terms acceptable to the tsar. Schuisky became governor of Pskov only to die in the struggle with Boris Gudenov in 1587. Fabricus, p. 483. Laskowski, pp. 400‑403, for the siege of Pskov and the ravaging of the Novgorodian territory; also, I.A. Caligeri, pp. 719‑39.

[84]..... See Possevino, pp. 106‑139, for a detailed account of the deliberations; and the "Misso Moscovitica" (ed. and trans. Hugh Graham), Canadian‑American Slavic Studies, 6(1972), 437‑77; Russow, pp. 227‑28.

[85]..... Johann Kettler came from Jülich to take a fief near Amboten, married Agnes Anna Schenk von Nydegg and had two sons, Johann and Wilhelm.  Wappenbuch, p.57.

[86]..... Wappenbuch, pp.207‑8.

[87]..... Jan Zamoyski (1541‑1605), the power behind the throne since the death of Sigismund Augustus. He became chancellor in 1576 and hetman in 1580. From these positions of strength he dominated the political scene until his death.

[88]..... Haec est dies, quam fecit Dominus, exultemus et laetemur in ea.

[89]..... Summa, Misericordiae Domini quod non consumpti sumus.

[90]..... Lenit Deum oratio et ungit: lachryma eundem tangit et pungit.  Item per misere mei flectitur ita Dei, et preces et lachrymae sunt arma Ecclesiae.

[91]..... Krzysztof Warszewicki (1524‑1603), member of a prominent family and canon of the Cracow church, he was Stephen's private secretary and had been Hungarian chancellor. His brother, Stanislaw, was a Jesuit priest at the Swedish court. Possevino, p.106, wanted him to obtain the surrender of the Swedish castles in Livonia to Poland and win Sweden back to Roman Catholicism.

[92]..... When Johan married Catherine of Poland he received these castles in lieu of a dowry. She was also to have received 50,000 ducats from her mother's estates, but Sigismund could not persuade Phillip II to turn them over. Also Johan had loaned Sigismund 120,000 thalers which were never repaid.

[93]..... There was a great likelihood of a reunion of the Swedish Church and the Roman Catholic, if only some concessions (such as the form of communion) were conceded. Johan was the best educated monarch who ever sat on the Swedish throne, at least as far as theology is concerned, and he reacted so violently to Possevino's report of papal stubbornness, that the poor man fainted.

[94]..... Aequalitatem enim esse matrem concordiae.

[95]..... Russow, pp. 223‑24; Renner, pp. 483f.

[96]..... Kruse, p. 266.

[97]..... Gregory (1556‑1600), son of Nicholas the Black, was converted by the Jesuits in 1572, studied in Leipzig, Vilna and Rome, then was consecrated a priest in Riga in 1583. He provoked riots in Riga by introducing the Gregorian calendar. Horsey, p. 210, who met him in 1585, called him "a bousinge princly prellate, lovinge the companye of the Livonian ladies, the farest weomen of the knowen world." Gerhard Kleeberg, Die polnische Gegenreformation in Livland (Leipzig, 1931), pp. 14‑37.

[98]..... Russow, p. 223‑24, notes the Rigan displeasure with Stephen Batory removing the Protestants from St.James and installing Roman Catholic priests there.

[99]..... Eius regione, eius religione. "The land is to follow the religion of the ruler." Codex, p. 307. Under this formula the Polish authorities established a bishopric at Wenden with a Pole, Johann Solikowski, as Bishop of Livonia.

[100]..... Kleeberg, Die polnische Gegenreformation, pp. 49‑51.

[101]..... Dec. 4, 1582. Codex, pp. 303f., 310f.; Schiemann, pp. 105‑117, reflects 19th‑century nationalism in characterizing this as a broken promise. See Polska a Infanty (ed. Stanislaw Kutrzeby. Gydnia, 1939) and Stämmler, pp. 77‑90. A contemporary report by an Englishman, "A Relation of the State of Poland and the United Provinces to the Crown," is found in Editiones XIII, 3‑165.

[102]..... Henning's argument that Pilten cannot be separated from Courland is highly biased in favor of the Kettler dynasty. The reference is to the years 1560‑61.

[103]..... Codex, pp. 320‑24. Sonnenburg was vulnerable to Swedish attack, whereas Magnus felt safe in Pilten. Moreover, the bargain was not as good as Henning suggests. This passage is propaganda for the Kettler dynasty.

[104]..... Salvo tamen iure superioritatis et directi Dominii sacrae ac serenissimae Regiae Maiestatis Poloniae.

[105]..... The Poles invaded Pilten and tried to annex it. Under the Augsburg Convention Pilten would then become Roman Catholic. See below.

[106]..... Johann, son of Dietrich Behr, had been a member of Magnus' council. In 1578 he received Pilten in exchange for other property.  Wappenbuch, pp.123‑24.

[107]..... They did not want to be under either the Kettlers or the Poles. This attitude was noted earlier in the chronicle in December of 1561. Farenbeck led troops into Pilten in 1584 to restore order.

[108]..... A three‑year truce had been signed in July of 1583. Russow, pp. 227‑28.

[109]..... Dimitri, Ivan's eldest son, was born in 1552 and died in 1553. It was his second son, Ivan, born in 1554, whom he struck on November 14, 1581. The tsarevitch died five days later. Possevino, pp.12‑14, spoke with eyewitnesses of this event which occurred immediately before his arrival in Moscow. Horsey, pp.194‑95, 209f., 218f., was there as well, to negotiate for Ivan's marriage to Queen Elizabeth. Also Massa, pp.8, 21.

[110]..... March 17, 1584.

[111]..... Fyodor was actually Ivan's third son. Born in 1557, he became Tsar in 1584 and died in 1598. Other sons died in infancy. As a result of Fyodor's incompetence, his wife's brother, Boris Gudunov, became the actual wielder of power.

[112]..... Karl von Busse, Herzog Magnus (Leipzig: Duncker u. Humblot, 1871), pp. 154f.

[113]..... Son of Henning Budde of Rügen and founder of an important Danish family.

[114]..... Kostka (1550‑1602), son of Christopher and castellan of Marienburg (Malborg).

[115]..... Russow, p. 226, notes briefly. See Tuulse, Die Burgen, p. 249, for a description of the castle, a typical Courish noble's fort.

[116]..... Fladen(?) Krieg.

[117]..... Sequester. I.e., of the Duke of Courland.

[118]..... Laurentius Müller, Septentrionalische Historien (Frankfurt/Main, 1585), alternately titled Polnische, Liffländische, Moschowiterische, Schwedische und andere Historien. Müller was a fervent German Protestant who went to Poland in 1580 on a mission of Kettler. He became a Courland counsellor but was soon dispatched on royal business to Denmark. He returned to Livonia in 1583 to serve as the foreign representative of the two‑man commission reviewing all land titles and was especially active in Pilten. He returned to Poland in 1584 and wrote a sixty‑page manuscript filled with hearsay and rumor.

[119]..... Lit.: "between the door and the hinge" (zwischen Thür und Angel gesteckt).

[120]..... in prima terrarum Livoniae fundatione. This would be true for Estonia (hence, Sonnenburg) but not Pilten.

[121]..... This type of dispute over estates became common since many nobles had acquired estates outside their original territories and many titles were contested ‑ thanks to multiple grants by various sovereigns and the frequent change of residence during the war. For one example, see, Vallo Helk, "Zwei Öseler Kleinadelsfamilien in dänischer und schwedischer Zeit," ZfO, 34(1985), pp. 506‑7.

[122]..... Antipalis logis. Georg Friedrich had been appointed duke of Prussia in 1577 by Stephen Batory to govern on behalf of the feeble‑minded Albrecht Friedrich. His reign was marked by tumultuous resistance to his centralizing policies.

[123]..... June‑August, 1585. Codex, pp.324‑26.

[124]..... On August 29, 1583, King Stephen awarded him Amboten as a fief. Wappenbuch, p. 52.

[125]..... Pilten continued to be discussed until 1597, when the king awarded possession to the Elector of Brandenburg for his lifetime. It came to the Kettler dynasty only after an additional legal struggle, 1611‑1615.

[126]..... Volenti enim non fit iniuria.

[127]..... Milites ad odorem pacis semper fieri deteriores.

[128]..... Maria (1560‑13.6.1597). She and her daughter died in Moscow in the Holy Trinity cloister. Horsey, pp. 210‑213, 218, delivered money to her in 1585 and was present in Moscow in 1586 when she arrived.

[129]..... Henning has reason to flatter Farensbeck, a Polish commander who had restored order in Pilten in 1584 and who was ready to intervene again should it seem necessary. He entered the service of Sigismund III in Poland and died in May of 1602 as a result of injuries received in a battle at Fellin.

[130]..... He had married Elizabeth Sophia Gyllenhielm, the illegitimate daughter of Johan III and Catharina Kansdotter, and established himself as governor of Estonia. His children married into the leading families of Sweden and left numerous offspring.

[131]..... There is no title heading for 1584.

[132]..... Codex, p. 327.

[133]..... Kistka (d. Dec. 12 NS, 1592) was the leader of the Unitarian party in Lithuania, but Batory's trusted lieutenant. He was the son of Stanislaus Kistka, Palatine of Samogitia, and Anna Radzivil. Educated in Basel, he became Palatine of Samogitia in 1579 and castellan (or palatine) of Vilna in Jan. 1588.

[134]..... von Brunow, an immigrant from Pomerania, 1559‑1561.  Wappenbuch, p.132.

[135]..... Anna (April 29, 1571, in Riga ‑ 1619) and Albrecht Radzivil (1558‑1592), duke of Olica, marshal of Lithuania, son of Nicholas the Black. Henning was present. Cruse, Curland, p. 66; the next day there was a riot in Riga, the Protestants objecting to Roman Catholic innovations, especially the Gregorian calendar, Renner, p. 484. Schiemann, Historische Darstellungen, pp. 231‑33, notes that Anna Kettler had become Catholic in order to marry Albrecht Radzivil. This had presented certain problems, since she spoke only German and none of the Lithuanian Jesuits knew the language well enough to indoctrinate her into the faith. The nuntius' report is in Vetera, III, 37‑38.

[136]..... So‑called Sarmatian dress (actually Polish) remained high fashion for a long time, reflecting the popularity of Polish noble culture. Many nobles, especially Lithuanians, began to speak Polish and were loyal subjects of the Commonwealth.

[137]..... The use of the future tense is confusing here since Henning describes the election of the Prince of Sweden below. It is as though he were recording events as they happened toward the very end of his chronicle and omitted a final editing.

[138]..... Catherine, died 1583.

[139]..... Sigismund III (1566‑1632). The immediate problem was a demand by fanatic Catholics for the cession of Estonia to Poland, which Johann III was unwilling to grant; Horsey, pp. 248f., had an interview with Sigismund and Anna in 1590 (which he mistakenly writes as 1589).

[140]..... Renner, p. 485; Vetera, III, 18‑19, 39‑40.

[141]..... Bishop 1583‑87.

[142]..... sed contra Dominium nullum consilium.

[143]..... Bene mori est ars artrium et scientia scientiarum.

[144]..... Foremost was Maximillian of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor. Renner, p. 485; an analysis of the possibilities is in Editiones, XXVI, 167‑74, 199‑206; and Vetera, III, 32‑34.

[145]..... Sigismund III. He was also King of Sweden from 1592 to 1600, but was removed from the throne because of his efforts to restore the Roman Catholic Church.  His letter concerning the election is in Vetera, III, 28‑30.

[146]..... Fyodor (1557‑1598); for the troubles of this era, see Fletcher, pp.35‑39, 46‑48; for Fyodor, pp.140‑144; Horsey, pp. 218f., was present at court.

[147]..... It is not possible to preserve in translation the word play involving the phrases malorum lerna and vitiorum verna.

[148]..... Old Style. Properly, December 27, 1587; coronation described in Editiones, XXVI, 209‑15.

[149]..... The Jesuits had been driven out of Riga in 1588. Thus, Wenden became more than ever the center of Catholicism north of the Düna. Schenking was bishop from 1587‑1621. See Vetera, III, 6‑8, for his nomination and Radzivil's description of twelve men of both parties who journeyed to Vilna in bad weather to seek a resolution of the religious crisis, November 28, 1587. A description of this diet is in Dohna, pp. 127‑35.

[150]..... Albrecht Friedrich (1553‑1618).

[151]..... Probably Johann Friedrich (1542‑1600).

[152]..... Friedrich (1569‑1642) was just twenty.

[153]..... Wilhelm (1574‑1640) was just sixteen and studying at the University of Rostock.

[154]..... cum toto iure simultaneae investiturae.

[155]..... Quoted in Codex, pp. 331‑32.

[156]..... Codex, pp. 330‑36.

[157]..... Mergitur et premitur quidem, sed non submergitur vel opprimitur Ecclesia. The religious freedom pertained to the princes in the empire under the Augsburg Convention, not to the subjects in Hapsburg lands. The Augsburg Convention was meaningless in united monarchies such as France and Holland.

[158]..... 1585. Codex, p. 326.

[159]..... Quote from Codex, pp. 332‑333.

[160]..... Omnia prius consilio, quam armis tentanda.

[161]..... Renner, p. 486, in a brief note.

[162]..... Löwenhaupt or Löwenhielm, an immigrant from Liege.

[163]..... Clas Nilsson Bielke (1544‑1623).

[164]..... Probably Carl Henriksson Horn, commanding the forces based in Hapsal.

[165]..... Served in Livonia since 1570, ennobled in 1578.

[166]..... The Turkish sultan had little control over the Tatars, just as the Tsar could not discipline his Ukrainian cossacks. There was a civil war among the Tatars from 1584 to 1588, after which the losing faction fled to Russia for protection. Meanwhile, the various cossack brotherhoods had been attacking the Tatars and such targets of opportunity as presented themselves. In 1588 Zaporozhien cossacks established a base in the upper Donets valley near Livensk to prey on traffic between Moscow and the Crimea. To the east, the Kazakhs rebelled in 1590 and in 1591 the Tatars advanced on Moscow but were repulsed by Boris Gudonov.

[167]..... "into Courland...and escorted" is in the 1st and 2nd editions but (intentionally?) deleted from the final revision of 1595.

[168]..... Fletcher, p. 9, remarks that it was a "dearth" year in Russia, thanks to the nobility seizing the harvest and, pp. 106‑8, that the patriarchate of Constantinople was transferred to Moscow.

[169]..... The Armada.

[170]..... Quod differtur, non auffertur.

[171]..... Veni Domine Jesu, veni et noli tardare.