De combustione duarum villarum in territorio Medenicke.
Raid into Medenicka
Brother Hugo leads a raid into Medenicka, burning villages and taking captives, but the premature breaking of ambushes allows the pursuers to escape.
That same year in summer, Brother Hugo, the advocate of Sambia, at the Marshal's command rode out with eight hundred men toward the territory of Medenicka. After setting ambushes in a suitable place, the brothers from Raganita entered that territory with their own men, and after burning two villages, killing the men, and capturing the women and children, they quickly withdrew, though two hundred Lietuvians were pursuing them hostilely. But when they saw the army of the Christians, the ambushes having been broken open too prematurely, they escaped by fleeing.
God's Miraculous Deliverance
A brief reflection on how God miraculously freed the brothers from mortal danger.
How God miraculously freed the brothers with their great army from the dangers of death.1
The Storm at Waykinamc
A violent winter storm scatters over five hundred horses, forcing the marshal's army to abandon its campaign and return home.
In the year of the Lord 1317, in wintertime, Brother Heinrich the marshal and brothers and warriors from Sambia and Natangia, when they had come before the territory of Waykinamc, in the first sleep of night, a horrible and unseasonable disturbance of the air was heard, because the winds roared as horribly as thunder, so that beyond the fear which was struck into men by this, more than five hundred horses, their bridles and baskets broken, scattered by fleeing ran through the forest.234 As a result, it happened that after all the horses except a few had been gathered with great labor and weariness by the brothers, the army returned.
The Hidden Ambush Revealed
It is later discovered that a large armed Prussian force had waited in ambush for three days, meaning the army's retreat saved them from certain destruction.
Afterward it was discovered in truth that a great multitude of the infidels, armed and ready, had waited for the brothers and their army for three days, and if the Christians had entered to plunder their land, never would any of them have returned with a sound head.
Read the original Latin
Eodem anno in estate frater Hugo advocatus Sambiensis 2 de mandato Marscalci cum octingentis viris equitavit versus territorium Medenickam, et ordinatis insidiis in loco competenti, fratres de Raganita cum suis intraverunt illud, et combustis duabus villis, occisisque viris et captis mulieribus et parvulis, celeriter recesserunt, quos cc Lethowini hostiliter sequebantur. Sed dum viderent exercitum Cristianorum, ruptis nimis mature insidiis fugientes evaserunt. Quomodo deus fratres cum magno exercitu mirabiliter a mortis periculis^ssiisw liberavit. Anno domini mcccxvii tempore hyemali frater Henricus marscalcus etfratres et pugnatores de Sambia et Nattangia dum venissent ante territorium Waykinamc, in primo somno noctis tempore, audita fuit horrendad intemperies aeris et insolita, quia venti in modum tonitrui tarn horribiliter mugiebant, quod preter timorem, qui per hoc hominibus fuit incussus, equi plures quam quingenti fractis frenis et canistris fugiendo discurrerunt per silvam. Unde factum est, quod equis omnibus preter paucos cum magno labore et tedio recollectis fratrum exercitus est reversus. Postea compertum fuit in veritate, quod magna multitudo infidelium parata in armis fratres et eorum exercitum per tres dies expectavit, et si Cristiani intrassent ad depredandam terram ipsorum, nunquam aliquis ipsorum sano capite rediisset.
Notes
- 1 ↩The word 'ssiisw' after periculis is corrupt or uncertain in the source; the translation omits it as unintelligible.
- 2 ↩'etfratres' in the source is likely a scribal error for 'et fratres' (and brothers); translated accordingly.
- 3 ↩'horrendad' appears to be a scribal variant of 'horrenda'; translated as 'horrible'.
- 4 ↩'tarn' is likely a scribal error for 'tam' (so); translated accordingly.
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