De victoria fratrum contra regem Lethowinorum.
The Ambush and Vengeance at the Villages
In 1305, Teutonic brothers raid Lithuanian villages, are ambushed by the king's forces, suffer losses including four brothers, but rally and rout the enemy, killing many of the Lithuanian nobility.
In the year of our Lord 1305, around the feast of the Assumption of the blessed Virgin, brother Philippus de J[…]. JAugust of Bolandia, the advocate of the bishop of Sambia, and twelve brothers with two hundred men burned three villages of the king of the Lithuanians, having captured and killed the men. In the middle of all this, the king had gathered around himself virtually all the more powerful men of his own kingdom in a certain district or parliament, and while he was learning of these things, he followed with fifteen hundred men. The brothers, however, had already come to a place where they thought themselves to be without any danger, and with their arms set down, while two hundred men went ahead with one brother, they themselves followed at a distance with a few. Then the king rushed upon them unexpectedly with his men, and in the first encounter brother Bolandus the Younger, nephew of the aforementioned advocate, was pierced through by the lance of a certain Ruthenian. When the advocate saw this, his heart was moved, and throwing his shield behind his back, seizing his sword with both hands he cut off with a single blow the head of his nephew's killer. In this battle four brothers — namely two from Bolandia, brother Bernardus of Hoensten, and brother Joannes Monachus — and six men fell, slain. After this, the two hundred men who had gone ahead returned with a great noise and crash and came to the place of battle, and they struck such terror into the enemies that the king and all his men, the moment they saw them, threw away their weapons and turned to flight. Then the brothers struck down their enemies in their wrath, and killed fifteen of the more powerful men of the kingdom of Lithuania and a great multitude of the common people.
The Storming of Gartha's Suburb
In 1306, Brother Albert leads a force that exploits a great storm to capture and destroy the populous suburb of Gartha castle, killing the men and seizing plunder.
On the destruction of the suburb of the castle of Garthe. In the year of our Lord 1306, Brother Conrad, the master, having learned from reliable report that a large army had advanced from Lithuania and from the castle of Gartha toward Poland, sent Brother Albert from Indagine, along with several other brothers, with four hundred men from Natangia, to storm the aforementioned castle. As they approached the castle, so great a storm arose in the air that one person could scarcely hear or see another, and while the storm was still raging, they entered the suburb of that castle, which at the time was large and populous, like a city. After capturing everyone, killing the men, and burning the suburb, they returned with as much plunder as they could carry off. Likewise concerning the same matter.
The Siege and Repulsed Assaults on Gartha Castle
Brother Eberhard attacks Gartha castle with a large force, but the Lithuanian garrison, reinforced by the king, fights back fiercely in prolonged combat before being put to flight.
After the return of this army, Brother Eberhard, the commander from Königsberg, having learned what they had done, and hoping that with the suburb destroyed he could more easily storm the castle, attacked the aforementioned castle of Gartha with one hundred brothers and six thousand horsemen. But the king of Lithuania, having heard of the destruction of the suburb of this castle, sent chosen men — very many of them equipped and ready in arms — for its defense. And so it happened that while the brothers were attacking the castle, the garrison soldiers, manfully opposing them from the opposite side, went out to battle, which lasted a long time between them. At last the brothers put them to flight.
The Fierce Battle Before Gartha's Walls
The battle before Gartha rages from sunrise to midday with repeated sallies and counterattacks, resulting in heavy Lithuanian casualties and the mortal wounding of Brother Hartmann of Elsterberg.
So they fell back to the fortress, and after a short hour, having recovered their strength and boldness, they went out to battle again — and this was done many times, from sunrise all the way to midday. At times these men drove those back; at other times those drove these back. In this fighting many of the unbelievers were fatally wounded, and more of them fell dead. As for our men, however, twelve brothers and thirty soldiers were wounded, and Brother Hartmann of Elsterberg, shot through the neck by a weapon, died shortly afterward.
Read the original Latin
Anno domini mcccv circa assumpcionem beate virginis, frater Philippus deJ?' JAugust Bolandia, advocatus episcopi Sambiensis, et xih fratres cum cc viris, tres villas regis Lethowinorum incenderunt, captis hominibus et occisis. Medio tem pore, quo hec agerentur, rex quasi omnes pociores regni sui habuit circa sea congregatos in quodam tractatu, seu parlamento, et dum hec perciperet, cum mille et quingentis viris sequebatur. Fratres autem jam ad talem locum venerant, ubi ise sine omni periculo putabantb, et depositis armis, dum cc viri cum uno fratre precederent, ipsi cum paucis a longe sunt secuti. Extunc improvise irruit in eos rex cum suis, et in primo congressu frater Bolandus junior, nepos dicti advocati, lancea cujusdam Rutheni est transfixus, quod videns advocatus, commota fuerunt viscera sua, et projecto clypeo suo ad dorsum, arreptoque gladio, ambabus manibus occisori nepotis sui caput uno ictu amputavit. In hac pugna quatuor fratres scilicet duo de Bolandia, frater Bernardus de Hoensten, et frater Joannes Monachus, et vi viri ceciderunt interfecti. Hoc facto, cc viri, qui precesserant, reversi cum magno strepitu et fragore venerunt ad locum certaminis, et tantum hostibus terroremc indiderunt, quod rex et omnes sui statim visis eis arma reicerent et in fugam converterentur. Extunc fratres percusserunt peccatoresd in ira sua, et occiderunt xvne pociores de regno Lethowie et de populo communi multitudinem copiosam.
De destructione suburbii castri Garthe. 292 (285) Anno domini mcccvi frater Conradus magister intelligens relacione veridica, quod de Lethowia et Castro Gartha magnus exercitus versus Poloniam processisset, misit fratrem Albertum de Indagine, et quosdam alios fratres cum cccc viris de Nattangia ad expugnandum castrum predictum. Qui dum appropinquarent Castro, tanta intemperies aeris orta est, quod unus alium vix auclire potuit, vel videre, et durante adhuc tempestate hac, intraverunt preurbium ipsius castri, quod tune magnum fuit et populosum ad modum civitatis, et captis omnibus et occisis hominibus, et combusto preurbio cum preda tanta, quantam deducere poterant, sunt reversi. (286) Jiem de eodem. Post reditum hujus exercitus, frater Eberardus commendator de Kunigsbergk, intellecto, quid egerit, sperans, quod destructo suburbio castrum facilius expugnaret, cum centum fratribus et sex milibus equitum dictum castrum Gartham est aggressus. Sed rex Lethowie audita destructione suburbii hujus castri, misit preelectos viros et in armis expeditos plurimos ad defensionem. Ende factum est, quod dum fratres castrum impugnarent, castrenses, ex adverso se viriliter opponentes, exierunt ad prelium, quod diu inter eos duravit. Tandem fratres fugaverunt eos.
Reversi igitur ad castrum, post modicam horam resumptis viribus et audacia iterum exierunt ad pugnam, et hoc factum fuit pluribus vicibus ab ortu solis usque ad meridiem. Quandoque isti illos, aliquando illi istos represseruntb In isto certamine multi de infidelibus letaliter sunt vulnerati, et plures mortui ceciderunt. De nostris vero fratres xii et xxx viri fuerunt vulnerati, et frater Hartmannus de Elsterbergkb, telo per collum sagittatus, postea expiravit.
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