Teutonic Order surives to the present day/until Nationalism?

Zioneer

Banned
I don't think there's been discussion of this for a while, so let's discuss. How could the Teutonic Order as a state survive to the present day, or at least up until nationalism kicks in?

What changes would have to be made to the Order's neighbors, how would they have to be reformed, etc?

(And yes, I have been playing EU3 recently, why do you ask? :p)
 
Well, Prussia arguably formed from the order. There's a pretty nationalist and Teutonic state.

Anyway, you'd have to make it survive the reformation, which is hard to do. By the time nationalism sets in, most Germans are protestants and the world has no place for a state founded by crusaders. The Monastic State would have to be secularized fairly early on (which at the time was nigh impossible) for it to lose the target on its back. Of course, as soon as it does that, the entire order shrinks in size and then Poland can just invade.

Solutions:

*Make Poland go protestant.

*Catholicize Lithuania earlier, make it a vassal state. Ends crusades, the state can actually form.

*Have the Monastic State "secularize" sometime in the late 1400s, allowing the reformation to not destroy its leaders' will.
 

Zioneer

Banned
There's no way to keep the monastic order aesthetic, then? To survive, it has to become Prussia?
 
The problem with the Teutonic Order IOTL was that after christianization of Lithuania the Order lost its purpose - at least for being in Prussia. Na pagans to fight anymore. So, to save the Order at least for some time you need a pagan Lithuania - or perhaps an Orthodox one. Also, eliminate Polish-Lithuanian alliance. Perphas if the Order seeks some kind of settlement with Poland and concentrates its efforts on still pagan Lithuania... OTOH Poland was really pissed off with the Order. King Casimir the Great didn't fight them on battlefield, but in courts. He made peace with the Knights, but it usually believed it was more an armistice, to gain time for preparations to war. So the Order would have needed to make some big gesture to Poland. But what? They would have never given up Danzig and Pomerania, or Culm land, and that was what Poland wanted.
 
As stated above, the Teutonic Order lost its purpose. It lost most of its land to nations tired of it and ended up as Ducal Prussia. Either give it a new purpose, turn it into a differently-named Prussia earlier on, or have it retain its old purpose.
 
As stated above, the Teutonic Order lost its purpose. It lost most of its land to nations tired of it and ended up as Ducal Prussia. Either give it a new purpose, turn it into a differently-named Prussia earlier on, or have it retain its old purpose.

How much of a purpose did the Knights of St. John have?

Picked for comparison.
 
How much of a purpose did the Knights of St. John have?

Picked for comparison.

They did sort of fight/defend Christiandom against muslims, didn't they?
Anyway...
[nitpick mode]
Teutonic Order actually exists to this very day.
[/nitpick mode]
 
The Hospitaliers? Well. The Hospitaliers's purpose was to care for Christian people. They exist now, in Rome, actually. the hospitalier purpose were expanded to everybody.

Well, they moved away from that pretty quickly before returning to it. So I should have been clearer - the Knights of St. John in this period, when they're playing pirates out of Rhodes or Malta.

Or fighting pirates. I can never tell which.
 
Well, they moved away from that pretty quickly before returning to it. So I should have been clearer - the Knights of St. John in this period, when they're playing pirates out of Rhodes or Malta.

Or fighting pirates. I can never tell which.

Well, they did both.
 
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