VIRGIN MARY FOR THE SAKE OF LIVONIA - NATURE AND IMAGE OF THE VIRGIN MARY IN THE
CHRONICLE OF HENRY
BY
TORBEN KJERSGAARD NIELSEN, AALBORG UNIVERSITY
PAPER READ AT THE CONCILIUM LATERANENSE IV. COMMEMORATING THE OCTOCENTENARY
OF THE FOURTH LATERAN COUNCIL OF 1215, NOVEMBER 2015
This paper deals with the ways in which the figure of the Virgin Mary was
adopted and put to use in the Baltic crusades as these are related in the
chronicle of Henry of Livonia. In the second part of my paper, I shall then seek a
tentative answer to the question of how such adoption of the Virgin would
possibly have been received by the crusader pope par excellence, Innocent III.
I will start by relating one of the incidents in Henry’s chronicle in which the
Virgin plays an essential role in the unfolding of events. I hope with this to also
present at least an impression of the crusading warfare that formed the
backdrop to Henry’s writing and thus also informed his appropriations of the
Mother of God.1 First, however, it is necessary to offer some basic information on
Henry’s chronicle.
It is written in the 1220ies as probably the earliest piece of Christian literature
to be produced in the Baltic. The chronicle covers the Christian warfare and
mission to Livonia and Estonia from 1184 until 1227. Its author came to Livonia
around 1205 as a young priest to serve under the third bishop to the region,
Albert of Riga. Henry was probably born around 1180. It is likely that his
Crusading and Chronicle Writing on the Medieval Baltic Frontier. A Companion to the Chronicle of Henry of
Livonia, ed. Marek Tamm, Linda Kaljundi and Carsten Selch Jensen (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2011) will be an
indispensable tool in future research into Henry and his chronicle.
1
ecclesiastical training and his spiritual outlook were established in the
Augustinian convent of canons-regular at Segeberg.2 Consecrated in 1198, Albert
von Buxthövden, a canon from Bremen, had arrived in Livonia in 1200 with a
fleet of twentythree ships3 and soon established himself firmly.4 Occasional
papal crusading bulls buttressed Albert’s efforts to convert and subdue the
pagan tribes of Livonia and Estonia, often in direct competition with other
crusading powers in the region.5 Henry’s chronicle is first and foremost the
history of Albert and the city of Riga and its missions.6
***
In the summer of 1215 a band of travellers embarked from Riga in nine cogs. At
least some of the travellers would surely have been looking forward with
pleasure to be reunited with family and friends when revisiting their homes in
northern Germany after having served a year of military pilgrimage on the
Cf. the biographical arguments put forward in James A. Brundage, ”Introduction: Henry of Livonia, The Writer
and His Chronicle”, in Crusading and Chronicle Writing p. 1-19, especially p. 1-7. See also Vilis Biļķins, ”Die
Autoren der Kreuzzugszeit und das deutsche Milieu Livlands und Preussens”, Acta Baltica 14 (1975), 231-54 and
Paul Johansen, ”Die Chronik als Biographie: Heinrich von Lettlands Lebensgang und Weltanschauung’,
Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas N.S. 1 (1953), 1-24. Knowledge of Henry’s biography must be deduced from
his chronicle alone, and it is wise to be aware that some of the allegedly biographical details discussed in the
literature listed above are somewhat speculative.
3 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae. Editionis quam paraverant L. Arbusow et A. Bauer textum denuo imprimendum
curavit Albertus Bauer (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellsschaft, 1959) IV, 1 p. 16. English translation in
James Brundage, trans., The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia, 2. ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003).
References below will be given as Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae and Henry of Livonia respectively with the
numbers of chapters, subchapters and pages.
4 The first bishop to the region, the Augustinian monk Meinhard, arrived from Saxony in Germany around 1184
and soon established a church in Üxküll (Latv. Ikšķile). Before Meinhard, German merchants to the area may
have brought their own priests along. When Meinhard died in 1196 he was replaced by Bertold, a Cistercian
abbot from Loccum who was killed in a pagan attack only two years after his arrival. Cf. Gisela GnegelWaitschies, Bischof Albert von Riga. Ein Bremer Domherr als Kirchenfürst im Osten (1199-1229) (Hamburg: A. F.
Velmede Verlag, 1958).
5 For a thorough analysis of the relationship between the Baltic and the papacy, see Iben Fonnesberg-Schmidt,
The Popes and the Baltic Crusades 1147-1254 (Leiden: Brill, 2007)
6 Cf. Henry of Livonia p. 237. Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXIX, 9, p. 326: “Et ne laus eadem sibi de factis tam
gloriosis debita per negligenciam pigrorum oblivioni in posterum traderetur, placuit eam rogatu dominorum et
sociorum humili scriptura conscribere et posteris relinquere, ut et ipsi laudem Deo tribuant et ponant in eo spem
suam et non obliviscantur operum Dei et mandata eius exquirant.” Henry’s exordial topos here is obviously quite
traditional, even if placed at the near end of his text.
2
crusading frontier in Livonia under the command of Bishop Albert. Others in the
company, like the two bishops Philip of Ratzeburg and Theoderich of Estonia,
hoped to be able to travel further. Philip had been in Livonia since 1211, when
he was hand picked by bishop Albert of Riga in his search through the Northern
parts of Germany for new pilgrims and military assistance to his bishopric in
Livonia. Philip arrived in Livonia in 1210, and he would perhaps have preferred
to return to Germany after the ordinary one-year-pilgrimage/military service.
He was hindered in doing so by the sentence of excommunication put upon Otto
IV on November 18, 1210 and because of his former associations with the
excommunicated emperor. 7 Theoderich, the former abbot the Cistercian
monastery at Dünamünde outside Riga was named bishop of Estonia in 1211 by
Albert of Riga, with the promise that a province would soon be established for
him from the conquests to be awaited from the military strengths in the bishop
of Riga.8
At least one of the two bishops would eventually make it to Rome to join the
Fourth Lateran Council.
Tensions were high at the time of departure. Since Easter of that same year, the
German crusaders based in Riga had been engaged in a full-fledged war against
neighbouring pagan tribes, who had formed yet another alliance to rout the
German camp. To no avail, however: Many of the pagan armies that had
assembled for battle eventually fled from the German strength, only to find
themselves haunted down by the retaliating Germans and their Lett allies.9
Philip had been ‘among the chief men at the court of the emperor’. Henry of Livonia p. 120; Heinrici Chronicon
Livoniae XV, 12.
8 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XV, 4.
9 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 1.
7
Henry’s account of the events from spring and early summer of 1215 is in fact an
account of the crusading warfare in the Baltic - en miniature. So, please, allow me
a lengthy quote just to give an impression of the scenery:
/…/ Rameke and Drivinalde, the sons of Thalibald,10 seeing that their
father was dead, were greatly angered at the Esthonians. They and
their friends and relatives collected an army of Letts, and the
Brothers of the Militia from Wenden and other Germans went with
them. They entered Ungannia, despoiled all the villages, and
delivered them to the flames. They burned alive all the men they
could capture /…/ They took them out of the forests and killed them
and took the women and the children away as captives. They drove
off the horses and flocks, took many spoils, and returned to their own
land. As they returned, other Letts again met them on the road and
they marched into Ungannia. What the former had neglected, the
latter performed. / …/
Some they burned, while they cut the throats of others. They inflicted
various tortures upon them, until the Esthonians showed them all
their money and until they led them to all the hiding places of the
woods and delivered the women and children into their hands. /…/
They did not have any rest themselves, until during that same
summer, devastating the land with nine armies, they made it so
deserted and desolate that now neither men nor food were found
there. Their aim was to fight long enough so that either those who
were left would come to seek peace and baptism or they would be
completely wiped out from the earth.” /…/ by now the sons, in order
A neophyte leader martyred by the pagans: ‘they roasted him like a fish, until he gave up his spirit and died’.
Henry of Livonia p. 144; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae CL XIX,3.
10
to avenge their father, had killed over a hundred men, either by
burning them alive or by various other tortures. 11
This killing spree had resulted in the Estonian tribes from Ungannia and Sakkala
asking for peace and baptism. Thus, at the time when the two bishops were
hurrying towards the papal city, priests had been sent out in the Sakkala region,
only to return soon, however, since ‘they were not able to live in those parts
because of the hostility of the other Estonians’.12
Consequently perhaps, the seafarers in the nine cogs were soon to realise that
this would be a hard journey. Having left the harbour in Riga, the travellers were
soon met by contrary winds, thunder and storm forcing the ships to seek shelter
in a port on the pagan island of Ösel (Est. Saaremaa). However, the Ösilians soon
discovered the troubled sea-farers and struggled to block the narrow harbour
with wooden rock-filled structures, making it near to impossible for the
Germans to escape to open sea. Caught inside the harbour area, the Germans
now witnessed how the Ösilians launched floating fires ‘kindled from dry wood
and animal fat’ against the German ships, kept close for better defence. When the
flames of the floating fire, ‘taller than all of the ships’, was getting alarmingly
near, the travellers found it wise to call the bishop of Ratzeburg from his cabin,
where he had been praying night and day.
Bishop Philip quickly realised ‘that there was no counsel or help save in God’
and raised his eyes and hands in prayer. Miraculously, the wind shifted and bore
the floating fire away. Danger was still imminent, however, since the enemies in
their small pirate ships rowed around the German ships throwing lances and
11
12
Henry of Livonia p. 144-7; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 3.
Henry of Livonia p. 147; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 4.
arrows. Thus, when a cunning escape trick, involving the pulling of the cogs by
their anchor ropes, seemed on the verge to failure, another miracle was needed.
And it came: One pirate ship ran into another, split down the middle and quickly
filled with water, drowning the men on board. The Germans made it into open
sea and from here they could see the pagans on the shores raging ‘violently at
one another with a good deal of noise and blows too’ before they ‘dispersed on
the sea and each of them went away by his own route.’13
What had happened? Who was the force behind this new miracle? As it turned
out, in the face of renewed danger Bishop Philip had turned to praying again.
This time he directed his pledges to the Virgin Mary by repeating lines from the
Breviary hymn Ave Maris Stella: “Monstra te esse matrem, monstra te esse
matrem” – ‘show thyself a mother, show thyself a mother’. This was a hymn
normally sung at vespers on the feasts to the virgin, making it plausible that this
event took place on 2 July, the original feast day of the Visitation of the Blessed
Virgin Mary.14 To Henry there was no doubt: “The blessed Virgin freed us that
day, as She has freed the Livonians from all their troubles up to the present
day.”15
The German travellers would have to stay around the harbour for another three
weeks before finally favourable winds could take them to Gotland and from
there further down towards Rome. In Verona, however, the ‘steadfast and
Henry of Livonia p. 150; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX 6.
This feast day is known at least from 1263 and was championed by St Bonaventure and the Franciscans.
15 Henry of Livonia p. 150; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 5. Another Marian ‘miracle’ is related from 1211 in
Henry’s chronicle. Here we learn that Bernhard zur Lippe, the later abbot to the Cistercian monastery in
Dünamünde and first Bishop to the Semgalls (1218), was initially punished by God with ‘a debilitating disease
the feet’ on account of his partaking in many ‘wars, burnings and assaults’ while in ‘his own land’. By his own
account his ‘limbs were immediately made firm and his feet became sound’ when he vowed to go to Livonia, ‘the
Land of the Blessed Virgin’. Henry of Livonia p. 113; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XV, 4.
13
14
constant’ Bishop Philip ‘commended his spirit to the Lord’ when he fell ill and
died.16
Obviously, in a warlike environment like this, the crusaders were in need for
special protection and aid. Consequently, Henry throughout his chronicle strives
to establish the Virgin Mary firmly as a celestial champion and a protector of the
crusaders in Livonia.17 Henry highlights how the Germans in Riga fought and
converted under Her banner,18 he made Her feast days mark important events in
his chronicle,19 and he made duly notice of the many religious buildings
dedicated to her.20
Henry of Livonia p. 153; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 6.
See Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XII, 6 and XXVIII, 6 for prayers to Her aid. Occasionally She is even held up as
protector of the neophyte Livonians against too heavy burdens and exploitation by their new masters. Cf. e.g.
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXV, 2.
18 Cf. Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae e.g. XI, 6; XII, 3; XVI, 4; XXIII, 10 and XXIV, 2.
19 Cf. e.g. Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae VIII, 2 p. 32 seeing the later bishop of Estonia, Brother Theoderich, and the
neophyte local leader Caupo returning from a visit to Rome in 1204 on the Virgin’s nativity (8 September) and
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XX, 2 p. 202, where fighting commences on 15 August 1216, the feast of Her
Assumption. After 1219 – following the observations of Linda Kaljundi: Waiting for the Barbarians: The Imagery,
Dynamics and Functions of the Other in Northern German Missionary Chronicles, 11th-Early 13th Centuries
(unpublished MA-thesis, Tallinn University - http://dspace.ut.ee/bitstream/handle/10062/576/kaljundi.pdf) p.
200: “Henry starts to emphasise Virgin Mary as the patroness of the Rigan mission especially after the year 1219,
when the Danish mission started in Northern Estonia, and during the 1220s, when also the Swedish and Russian
interests were present in Estonia” – many battles were fought on Marian feast days; cf. Heinrici Chronicon
Livoniae XX, 2; XXVII, 2; XXVIII, 5; XXVIII, 6.
20 Albert’s new cathedral church in Riga and an earlier convent, founded by bishop Meinhard, were both
dedicated to Her, the cathedral even consecrated on the feast day of Her Assumption, 15 August. Cf. Anu Mänd,
“Saints’ Cults in Medieval Livonia”, in Alan Murray (ed.), The Clash of Cultures on the medieval Baltic Frontier
(Farnham: Ashgate, 2009) 191-223 refers to H. v. Bruiningk, Messe und kanonisches Stundengebet nach dem
Brauche der Rigaschen Kirche im späteren Mittelalter (Riga, 1904), p. 226 and 327. Mary was the patron saint of
the cathedral in Reval and the chapter in Curonia (albeit this is later than Henry’s chronicle); other churches
sporting Mary as a patron were located in Dorpat (Est. Tartu), Narva and Wesenberg (Est. Rakvere). Kersti
Markus argues convincingly for a development in church architecture, that would see inspirations and artistic
loans from churches in Northern Germany in firstly Visby on Gotland and slightly in Riga, mirroring the
travelling route of German merchants. A large number of these important religious buildings were dedicated to
Mary. Cf. Kersti Markus: “The Church on the Borderland: The Impact of Crusading on the Architecture of Gotland
and Livonia”, in Torben Kjersgaard Nielsen and Iben Fonnesberg-Schmidt (eds.), A Storm against the Infidel.
Crusading in the Iberian Peninsula and in the Baltic Region (Turnhout: Brepols, 2016 - to appear).
16
17
The Virgin as an object for devotion and prayer is supplemented by another role:
Fighting under Her banner also meant that the spoils of war and the lands
conquered would often fall to the hands of the bishop and church in Riga. Henry
relates from 1219 how the elders from the province of Vironia ‘accepted
baptism and gave themselves and all of Wirland to Blessed Mary and the
Livonian church’ and from the same year comes the claim, raised against
demands from the Danish king, that ‘all of Esthonia had been subjected to the
Christian faith by the Rigans under the banner of the Blessed Virgin’.21 The
Virgin appears here like a feudal lord, first conquering land and then offering it
back as a fief. Naming the Virgin as ‘warden’ or ‘custodian’ of Livonia obviously
adds further to this legalistic and feudal element in Her.22
This brings us back to our sea-farers from earlier, some of which reached the
Fourth Lateran; probably even our chronicler. At the council, still according to
Henry, the travellers would have heard Bishop Albert address Innocent III and
perhaps the entire solemn council with what reads like a simple, yet striking
condensation of the different appropriations of the Virgin that were in use in the
Baltic. It is worth quoting Henry here:
The bishop spoke: “Holy Father,” he said, “as you have not ceased to cherish the
Holy Land of Jerusalem, the country of the Son, with your Holiness’ care, so also
ought you not abandon Livonia, the Land of the Mother (‘terra matris’), which has
hitherto been among the pagans and far from your consolation and is now again
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXIII, 7 and 10 from 1219. See also Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIII, 4 from 1209
and XVI, 4 from 1212.
22 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXI, 1 displays Livonia in ’the custody of the Lord Jesus Christ and His Mother.”
(‘hac vice custodiendam’)
21
desolate. For the Son loves His Mother and, as He would not care to lose His own
land, so, too, He would not care to endanger His Mother’s land.23
Are we to believe Henry, Innocent III replied in the affirmative: He would indeed
lend his help to the land of the Mother as well as to the land of the Son, hereby
apparently buying into this concept of a special - ‘topophilic’ - relationship
between the Virgin and Livonia.24 And from this point on in Henry’s chronicle it
seems like this idea of the Virgin as patroness of Livonia only grows in
importance.25
Henry’s concept of the Virgin as the ardent champion of Her Land in Livonia
culminates in a long, frenzied passage in his chapter 25. The virulent passage is
preceded by Henry’s relation of the story of a Danish royal emissary, Gottschalk,
sent to take over the city of Riga and place it under Danish royal rule in 1221.
According to Henry, the (German?) merchants refused the demands from the
Danish king and sent Gottschalk back, but denied him a pilot for his ship.
Consequently, the Danish royal emissary ”was tossed about by a contrary wind”
because he had come to Livonia against “the will of Him Who rules the winds”
and because he had offended Mary Herself.26
The sermon-like character of the passage and an amassing of Scriptural quotes
and allusions make the passage stand out clearly from the rest of the chronicle
and hence the passage begs a closer consideration.
Henry of Livonia p. 152; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 7.
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX,7.
25 Henry has for instance the papal legate William of Modena ”commending Livonia to Mary, the Blessed Mother
of god, and to Her beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, to Whom is honor and glory, world with out end” when in
1225 he planned to return from his legation. Cf. Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXIX, 8.
26 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXV, 2
23
24
The passage starts off with an immediate reference to the story in the Gospels of
Matthew (8:16) and Luke (8:25), in which Christ sooths the seasick and
frightened disciples by commanding the winds and the sea to calm. Henry here
names the Virgin Mary as both the ‘star of the sea’ (“maris stella”), ‘Lady of the
World’ (“domina mundi”), ‘empress of all lands’ (“imperatrix terrarium
omnium”) and ‘queen of Heaven’ (“regina coeli”) before once again invoking
Mary’s protection of Her special land, Livonia.27
The Virgin is further held up as highly vindictive, an avenging champion of the
Rigan cause. Henry directly lauds the Virgin for Her hand in the affliction of all
the enemies of the Rigan church, pagan and Christian alike. She is believed to
have been instrumental in Russian princes being struck with sudden death,
deprivations, death by proxy or humiliation; the Virgin had the Swedes
slaughtered by pagans when unlawfully entering lands subjected to the “banner
of the Blessed Virgin”, while the Danish king suffered captivity for wishing to
trouble Livonia with his rule. Numerous pagan leaders were killed through Her
servants.28
Henry hammers home his points:
Consider and see, you princes of the Russians, or the pagans, or the Danes, or you
elders of whatever people. Fear this gentle Mother of Mercy. Adore this Mother of
God and give satisfaction to Her, Who takes such cruel revenge upon Her enemies.
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXV, 2: ”Sic, sic maris stella suam semper custodit Lyvoniam; sic, sic mundi domina
terrarumque omnium imperatrix specialem suam terram semper defendit; sic, sic regina celi terrenis regibus
imperat.”
28 Henry of Livonia p. 198; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXV, 2. Besides the references to Matthew 8:26 and Luke
8:25, Henry’s chapter 25, 2 may be said to contain references to Malachias 4:2, Judith 1:11, Psalms 103:25, 1
Maccabees 3:7, Samuel 31:1, 1 Kings 20:7, Exodus 23:22, Isaiah 10:2, Acts 9:15, Matthew 23:4 and 11:30, John
17:3, 5:20 and 20:31, 1 John 5:13 and Romans 1:25 plus a number of references to the missal and offices in the
breviary.
27
Do not wish henceforth to attack Her land, so that to you She may be a mother,
Who has hitherto been an enemy to Her enemies, She who has always more
afflicted those who afflict Her people in Livonia. Give heed and see, you who hold
dominion and magistracies in Her land. Do not unduly oppress the poor /…/
Livonians and Letts, or any other converts, servants of the Blessed Virgin, who have
hitherto borne the name of Christ Her Son to the other peoples and who still bear it
with us. Give deep, fearful consideration and recall to your mind’s eyes the cruel
death of some who were harsh to their subjects.29
Obviously, Henry offers an understanding of the Virgin Mary as blatantly
militant and violent; even if named Mother of Mercy, She shows the enemies and
opponents to the church in Riga neither mercy, nor forgiveness. Only to Her
land, i.e. the rightful possessors of Livonia, i.e. the Rigan church and its allies,
would the Virgin act motherly.
An image of tender motherhood – albeit offered only to the right people - may
however also be found in Henry’s chronicle. Motherhood is obviously connected
with fertility and genealogy, and Henry touches in two other passages upon both
of these elements, mixing ideas of providential history and celestial
championship with a topophilic localism.
In 1224 Bishop Albert summoned a large force for what was to be a final attack
on the city of Dorpat (Est. Tartu), held by the Russian prince Vjacko (Vetseke)
and to which the German forces had earlier laid siege.30 The attack on Dorpat,
Henry of Livonia p. 199-200; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXV, 2.
Vjacko had been bishop Albert’s vassal. However, in 1208 Vjacko had a band of the Bishop’s knights killed and
allied himself with the Russian grand prince of Pskov. (Cf. Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XI, 2, 8-9) Accordingly
here Henry names Vjacko “the old root of all evils “ - radix antiqua malorum omnium in Lyvoniam fuerat”. Heinrici
Chronicon Livoniae XXVIII, 3.
29
30
taking place on the Day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin (August 15), is
explained as a defensive act by the Livonian church mother to free her daughter,
the Estonian church.31
The passage in Henry’s book XVIII, 4 is noteworthy because of the prominence
and the symbolic weight of the Scriptural references used. Henry refers to the
Gospel of John 16:21, where Christ has just announced his own death; he uses
Revelations 12:13, in which the woman gives birth to the man child and where
the dragon threatening her offspring is later overcome. A further reference to
Job 40:10, where the dragon is identified as the Behemoth that swallows up the
river Jordan, may be interpreted as a general warning against questioning God’s
overall plan. Another important reference in this passage goes to Pauls letter to
Titus, in which the Apostle warns of false teachers. Finally, Henry uses Exodus
23:26, where God promises the fertility of the Israelite women, but where the
gist of the chapter clearly is God’s promise to strike the Israelite enemies with
terror and destruction.
Henry’s exposition goes something like this: The Livonian church has conceived
a daughter in the Estonian church. Because an infant, the Estonian church (and
daughter) was in need for protection. Not just against pagans, however, but also
against other, false, mothers, who strived to snatch the baby away from her real
mother. So far, this seems a fairly clear and consistent allegorical reasoning.
Henry’s continuation is, however, more confusing than convincing. Thus, while
still “infant” the Estonian church at the same time is “like a woman in labor” and
”exposed”. A dragon comes for her offspring and thus she needs protection from
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXVIII, 5 p. 306: ”Ut ergo Lyvoniensis ecclesia filiam suam Estiensem ecclesiam,
quam genuerat in Iesu Christo, liberaret de presentibus malis”.
31
her true mother, the Livonian church who is the true and original mother of the
Estonian church through the “labour of conquest” and by giving birth to the
Estonian church “by the washing of regeneration in the faith of Jesus Christ.”
Many “false” mothers deceitfully claim the Estonian church for their daughter.
One of the false mothers pursuing the Estonian daughter/mother is “the Russian
mother, always sterile and barren” – ‘semper sterilis et infecunda’. Apparently
her sterility did not prevent the Russian church from being – at least a kind of –
mother.32
Other elements of this fertility discourse appear throughout Henry’s chronicle.
New plantations and the sowing and harvesting in God’s own vineyard are
common imagery that appears in many missionary accounts, and such
metaphorical language also appears in Henry’s text. This imagery normally
serves generically to describe a young and often struggling missionary church in
the midst of adversities.33
The most prominent element of Henry’s fertility discourse, however, is very
much local and specific. It involves a pun on the city of Riga and the Latin verbs
rigare or irrigare, which means ‘to moisten’ and ‘to water’. This pun appears
several times throughout the chronicle and at the very end as well. This
wordplay works very well in connection with the other appropriations of the
Virgin: Like a true Mother She would protect the new plantation on her own
land and see it prosper and thrive through the watering done by Her church in
Riga.
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXVIII, 4. See my analysis in Torben Kjersgaard Nielsen, “Sterile Monsters?
Russians and the Orthodox Church in the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia” in The Clash of Cultures pp. 227-252.
33 Cf. Kaljundi, Waiting for the Barbarians p. 210.
32
Henry closed his chronicle by relating the story of the subjection of the people of
Ösel in 1227. With a reference to the drowning of the Pharaoh in Exodus 14:2329 (15:4) and again to Joshua 15:19, Henry finally finishes his chronicle with a
statement that breathes a militant crusading spirit, alludes to feudal notions of
servitude and vassalage, and overall honours the assistance of the Virgin:
Thus does Riga water the nations. Thus did she now water Oesel in the middle of
the sea. By washing she purges sin and grants the kingdom of the skies. She
furnishes both the higher and the lower irrigation. These gifts of God are our
delight. The Glory of God, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the Blessed Virgin Mary
gives such joy to His [Her, TKN] Rigan servants on Ösel! To vanquish rebels, to
baptize those who come voluntarily and humbly, to receive hostages and tribute, to
free all the Christian captives, to return with victory – what kings hitherto have
been unable to do, the Blessed Virgin quickly and easily accomplished through Her
Rigan servants to the honor of Her name.34
It is now time to ask: How would Henry’s appropriations of the Virgin have
played out with Innocent III?
Henry tells us that Innocent, having heard Albert’s speech at the Lateran Council
in November 1215, willingly ‘renewed’ privileges to preach the crusade and
enlist pilgrims to go to Livonia - for the ‘remission of their sins’.35
Henry is right in stating that such privileges were renewed after the Council.
Innocent III had granted privileges to the Livonian mission and crusade in 1199
and 1204 on the requests of Albert of Riga. In these letters the pope focused on
34
35
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XXX, 6.
Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae XIX, 7.
voluntary conversion and the defence of the newly converted from pagan
neighbours.36 In his Alto divine from December 1215, addressed to the Christians
in Denmark but possibly also directed to other church provinces, Innocent
promised the remission of sins to pilgrims and crusaders who due to ill health or
poverty could not go to the Holy Land, but chose to go to Livonia in stead.37
As Iben Fonnesberg-Schmidt has convincingly shown, “Innocent regarded the
Baltic expeditions as less important than the crusades to the Holy Land.”38
Apparently, the Land of the Son was more important to Innocent III than the
Land of the Mother. Christopher Tyerman has put it more bluntly: “The Livonian
cult of the Virgin cut little ice in Rome.”39
But what do we actually know of Innocent III’s thoughts on the Virgin? Could he
perhaps have acknowledged the Livonian focus on Mary in other ways than by
privileges and in politics?
It is actually rather difficult to ascertain Innocent’s views on the Virgin. None of
his many letters display a mariological interest, and none of his theological
works deal with Her at any length. The most promising place to look for a papal
attitude towards the Virgin is via the pope’s sermons. A book of sermons is
mentioned in the Gesta Innocentii, and John C. Moore has argued that such
collection may have been produced sometime between 1201 and 1205.40 More
than sixty manuscripts in over thirty repositories throughout Europe confirm
Diplomatarium Danicum 1:3 (Copenhagen, 1977) no. 254 and Die Register Innocenz’ III, vol. 7 (Vienna, 1997),
no. 139. Cf. in general Fonnesberg-Schmidt, The Popes and the Baltic Crusades p. 91-131.
37 Diplomatarium Danicum 1:5 (Copenhagen, 1957) no. 61.
38 Fonnesberg-Schmidt, The Popes and the Baltic Crusades p. 111.
39 Christopher Tyerman, ”Henry of Livonia and the Ideology of Crusading”, in Tamm et al., Crusading and
Chronicle Writing on the Medieval Baltic Frontier, pp. 23-44.
40 John C. Moore, ”The Sermons of Pope Innocent III”, Römische historische Mitteilungen 36 (1994), pp. 81-142.
36
that Innocent’s sermons enjoyed some popularity. Perhaps also by protagonists
in the Baltic crusades coming from the Land of the Virgin, even if no manuscripts
containing the Innocentian sermons have been found in the Baltic.41
Among the Innocentian sermons printed in the Patrologia Latina, are six
sermons that deal directly with the Virgin Mary.42 I have not yet found time to
investigate these sermons myself. Consequently, for this paper, I rely on
Wilhelm Imkamp, who, in his investigation of these sermons, detects a slight
aloofness, a reservation on Innocent’s part towards the Virgin. Imkamp
concludes that Innocent remained true to his Christ-centred theological outlook,
most often simply discussing - and diminishing - the role played by the Virgin in
Incarnation.43
This conclusion notwithstanding, some details from Innocent’s Marian sermons
merits a closer look.
In a sermon to the Assumption of the Virgin (15 August), Innocent deals with the
story of Martha and Mary. Innocent here interprets the place where the sisters
lived as simply the Virgin: ‘castellum illud, quod intravit Jesus est Virgo’. 44 The
outer wall in this spiritual castle is Her corporal virginity while the tower is Her
heart’s humility. To avert the ‘insults of lust’ and ‘the assaults of pride’ one must
According to J. B. Schneyer, Repertorium der lateinischen Sermones des Mittelalters, Heft 4 p. 48-49.
PL 217.
43 Wilhelm Imkamp: ””Virginitas quam ornavit humilitas”. Die Verehrung der Gottesmutter in den Sermones
Papst Innocenz’ III”, Lateranum n.s. 46 (1980) 344-378. Imkamp names the Incarnation, the Eucharist and (the
powers of) St Peter as the three main elements in Innocentian theology and ecclesiology.
44 PL 217, 575D.
41
42
approach this spiritual castle, i.e. one must pray to the Virgin Mary. 45 ‘Who has
ever called upon Her without being heard?’ - Innocent asks rhetorically.46
In another sermon to the same feast, Innocent likens the Virgin to ‘the dawn’ in
Song of Songs 6:10.47 The Virgin is the dawn, because She ended the ‘night of
damnation’ by carrying Christ. The dawn has three qualities – it is ‘as fair as the
moon, as bright as the sun and as frightening as an army under banners’.
Consequently, the beauty of the moon is likened to the virginity and fertility in
the Virgin; the splendour and warmth of the sun is likened to Her wisdom and
love; and the army under banners is likened to the Virgin, because She houses
the ‘plenitude of virtues’ fighting – and winning – the battle against the
multitude of vices.48
In these sermons, the Virgin appears in a salvific role as intercessor and helper
of sinful man, because of Her role as carrier of the Incarnate Christ. Innocent
summarizes that whoever shall face the enemy, ‘in the world or in the flesh’,
should plead Mary that ‘She may offer help through Her Son’.49
In a sermon for the feast of the Nativity of Mary (8 September), the Virgin is
likened to the ‘star that shall rise out of Jacob’s staff’ and the sceptre (virga) that
shall spring from Israel and strike the chiefs of Moab and shall waste the sons of
Quaeramus ergo si tale fuerit hoc castellum. Sane in hoc spirituali castello, quod est Dei genetrix Virgo Maria,
murus exterior est virginitas corporis, turris interior est humilitas cordis” /…/Habet ergo castellum istud murum
virginitatis contra insultum luxuriae, habet turrim humilitatis contra incursum superbiae. /…/ Sic quando te
luxuria carnis impugnat, ad hoc castellum procede, muro virginitatis adhaere, deprecare Mariam.” PL 217, 577D.
46 ”Quis unquam invocavit eam et non est exauditus ab ea?” PL 217, 584D.
47 PL 217, 582C.
48 ”Acies ergo castrorum, id est plenitudo virtutum ita fuit in virgine ordinata ut de se vere dicere possit:
Introduxit me rex in cellam vinariam et ordinavit in me charitatem, ut postquam in ea plenitudo divinitatis
corporaliter habitavit, vicit ex toto malitiam.”
49 ”Quicumque entit impugnationem ab hostibus, vel a mundo, vel a carne, vel a daemone, respiciat castrorum
aciem ordinatam, deprecetur Mariam, ut ipsa per Filium mittat auxilium de sancto et Sion tueatur.”
45
Sheth’ in Numbers 24:10. – “id est Maria, qui stella maris interpretatur”. This
takes form as part of the Pope’s overall discussion of the sacral genealogy in the
root of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1), where the Virgo is designated as the fertile twig
(virga) on the root that will eventually bring forth the flower that is Christ.50
Another sermon, this one on the Nativity of Mary, brings forth a well-known
creature, namely the Behemoth (from the book of Job), also used in Henry’s
chronicle: God has thrown his Son into the world to catch the Behemoth, i.e. to
overcome the devil. The Behemoth must be caught using a good (fishing) hook,
which is Christ. The fishing rod, however, is the Virgin. Using yet again the
wordplay virga-virgo, Innocent establishes how the Virgin is temerarious
without being hard, holds unbent rectitude and a fitting length – just like a good
fishing rod.
[– Please, don’t ask me to explain this…]
Fishing rods and Behemoths, roots and twigs and towered spiritual castles. Even
if Innocent’s sermons obviously do not display much of the militancy in the
Virgin that is so significant in Henry’s chronicle, issues of virginal fertility, sacred
genealogy and celestial protection do actually seem to present themselves in
Innocent’s sermons.
- While I am pretty sure that Albert of Riga would not have been granted even
remotely the time that I have had today to develop his thoughts on Livonia and
the Virgin for a plenary session at the Lateran council, I guess it is not all too
50
PL 217, 599C.
fanciful to imagine that his designation of the Virgin as the Land of the Mother
could in fact have raised some interesting discussions in the after session bar.
I hope that we could do the same. I thank you for your - well, patience.