A Coalition Army on the Prussian Battlefield
On 15 July 1410 the armies of King Władysław II Jagiełło of Poland and Grand Duke Vytautas of Lithuania defeated the Teutonic Order in Prussia. Known as Grunwald in Polish, Tannenberg in German, and Žalgiris in Lithuanian, these names refer to the same battle. It formed part of the war of 1409–1411. Victory on the battlefield and the later arrangements ending the war must be examined separately.
Neither side was homogeneous. The Lithuanian force also included Ruthenian and Tatar troops. Alongside its knight-brothers in the Order’s habit, the Teutonic army employed visiting combatants, mercenaries, and contingents supplied by Prussian towns. Grand Master Ulrich von Jungingen was both a military commander and a territorial ruler, so casualties among key personnel affected combat command and administration alike.
Retreat, Pursuit, and the Order’s Defeat
A central disagreement in accounts of the battle concerns the meaning of the retreat by Vytautas’s troops. The early Cronica conflictus, compared with other evidence by Ekdahl, states that the Lithuanians withdrew after fighting and that some of the Order’s troops broke away from their banners to pursue them. The pursuers were then driven back and intercepted by Polish troops as they returned to their own lines. A temporary advance thus became a breakdown of formation.
The continuator of Johann von Posilge’s chronicle likewise describes an initial Lithuanian retreat, Polish intervention in support, and a subsequent attack on the grand master’s troops by Lithuanians together with mercenaries and visiting combatants on the Polish side. Ekdahl uses this to challenge accounts attributing victory to the Polish army alone. The grand master’s death and the defeat of the Order’s army are clear outcomes, but later diagrams alone cannot establish the precise movements or numbers of individual units.
A Letter Warning against the Risks of Pursuit
In the summer of 1962, while organizing the Order’s archives in Göttingen, Ekdahl noticed an unsigned, undated letter offering military advice. He published his study the following year. The letter is now catalogued as No. 2024 in the Ordensbriefarchiv. Its author warned the grand master that an enemy might withdraw one or two banners to lure pursuing troops out of formation, as had happened in the “great battle.”
The letter urges commanders to restrain their men, observe the enemy formation behind the retreating troops, and only then decide how to act. Even a pursuit by twenty or thirty men could disrupt a larger formation. Ekdahl treats it as evidence that some Lithuanian troops feigned retreat. Since the writer’s identity, the date, and whether the author witnessed the battle remain unknown, the letter cannot prove that every retreat by the entire army followed a predetermined plan.
Personnel Losses and the Retention of Marienburg
Jähnig’s study of personnel notes that a memorial book from the Order’s house at Maastricht records 203 knight-brothers killed in the battle. This is not a total of all soldiers killed on both sides. Of the thirty-two senior officeholders he examined, twenty-one died, roughly two-thirds. Alongside the grand master, experienced officials responsible for military affairs, finance, and local administration were lost together, leaving too few successors familiar with their work.
The Polish–Lithuanian army subsequently besieged Marienburg, the Order’s headquarters, but withdrew after several weeks without capturing it. Heinrich von Plauen organized its defense and assumed the grand mastership at the electoral meeting of 9 November 1410. The Order’s government survived, but had to promote less experienced members to fill vacancies. Defeat on a single day imposed continuing costs on governance.
References: [3]
Treaty Provisions and Unresolved Conflicts
On 1 February 1411 the parties concluded the First Peace of Thorn. Szweda’s study distinguishes the preliminary instruments of that day from the formal texts subsequently exchanged. The settlement was intended as a perpetual peace without an expiry date, rather than another short truce. Article thirteen provided for a mixed arbitration body with six members from each side, with disagreements referred to the pope.
Yet serious disputes emerged at the first arbitration meeting in September 1411. Polish representatives raised conflicts over land, mills, and ponds dating from many years before the war, while each side accused the other of violating the treaty. The meeting failed to remove tensions, and the Order subsequently reinforced its border castles. Grunwald changed the balance of power, but did not automatically resolve every territorial right or political demand.
References: [4]
The Costs Borne by Towns and Their Political Participation
Prussian towns supplied soldiers and also faced postwar financial demands. Tandecki notes that after 1411 the fiscal burden on smaller towns increased relative to their economic capacity. Amid a broader economic crisis, their market and craft functions weakened. Not every town benefited in the same way from the Order’s decline.
At the same time, the need to secure support for taxation created opportunities for smaller towns to enter territorial politics. Their representatives appeared at the assembly in Ostróda in 1411 and subsequently attended other meetings. The territorial council established at Elbląg in 1412 included townsmen from Brodnica, New Toruń, and other places. The battle’s long-term consequences thus concerned not only boundaries but also who paid for war and who could participate in deciding public affairs.
References: [5]