Ideology and Holy Landscape in the Baltic Crusades

This book examines how the military orders and the ideology of crusading gave rise to a new sacred landscape in the medieval Baltic region, an outpost of Latin Christianity. Drawing on a wide variety of sources and international scholarship, the book discusses the paganism of the landscape in writte...

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Bibliographic Details
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: Arc Humanities Press 2022
Series:War and Conflict in Premodern Societies
Subjects:
Online Access:Open Access: DOAB: description of the publication
Open Access: DOAB, download the publication
Description
Summary:This book examines how the military orders and the ideology of crusading gave rise to a new sacred landscape in the medieval Baltic region, an outpost of Latin Christianity. Drawing on a wide variety of sources and international scholarship, the book discusses the paganism of the landscape in written sources pre-dating the crusades, in addition to the narrative, legal, and visual evidence of the crusade period. It draws out the key sacralizing elements as expressed in those sources, which structure the definition of sacred landscape, particularly martyrdom, the manifestation of the sacred, and use of relics in battle. By analyzing these aspects with Geographical Information Systems (GIS), a map of the Baltic campaigns emerges that provides a fresh approach to studying contemporary views of holy war in a region with no initial links to the loca sancta of Jerusalem or Europe.
Physical Description:1 online resource (224 p.)
ISBN:9781641894548
WCP-9781802700596
Access:Open Access