WI Teutonic Order Polish-friendly?

KaiserCorax

Banned
Is it possible? What would happen if the Teutonic Order/Teutonic State made friends with the Poles at any time in history?
 
Since from the beginning of their expansion in the Baltic they were out for themselves, that would have a substantial (yay butterflies) change to events.
 
The problem is the Order started to mess with Poland pretty much since its arrival to the land of Kulm. They forged documents giving them that territory forever and got pope's blessing for keeping it and conquering pagan lands in Prussia. The Order's guest (Margrave of Meissen) even captured and burned the capital of Masovia - Płock.
Since the order used the internal divisions between Polish duchies it would be good if Poland got stronger - let's say the Henry the Bearded (duke of Silesia) was not kidnapped by Konrad of Masovia - instead he managed to defeat him and unite Poland. His son, Henry II the Pious mannages to organize stronger defence against Mongolian invasion. He calls all Christian forces for help and the Teutonic Order responds. They do not want to anger a stronger Polish ruler and after all, it is their duty to fight pagans. A stronger army of Polish dukes, supported by the Teutonic Knights, Knight Templars,d Knights Hospitallers and some troops of Moravia manages to defeat Mongolian forces. Victorious Henry is proclaimed the King of Poland with full belssing of the Church which sees in him the defender of the Christian world while Polish people consider him the saviour of their country. The authority gained by Henry after his victory helps him to stabilize his power in Poland.
Strong, united Poland with excellent relations with the Church is not someone the Teutonic Order would like to make enemy of. Therefore the Order concentrates its effort in expanding to the east. Eventually Henry and his successors take conbtrol of Pomerelia, which gives them ability to cut off the Order from reinforcements from Germany. Another reason why the Order should not anger the Polish King.
Meanwhile eastern Poland is troubled by Lithuanian raids. Poland and the Order decide to eliminate this pagan threat together and launch a series of joint crusades against Lithuania. The deal is - the Order takes lands in the north, Poland in the south. The alliance is rather successful...
 
The main conflict of interest was that the Order wanted to build big, strong state, in best case with connection to HRE, since it was their main source of recruits and financial support. They didn't care what lands they would need to take to achieve it. The Order began to steal pieces of Polish lands pretty much since its arrival. It was relatively easy, since Poland was weak - divided into many duchies, usually in conflict with each other. Now, strong and united Poland is not an easy prey, so the Order would probably turn all its attention to the east. By doing so the Order has no quarrel with Poland anymore and even some common interest - fight against the pagans and possible expansion.
Anyway it was to the Order to decide if they wanted to end/avoid conflict with Poland.
 
One way to do it is to have the Teutonic Order open itself to Polish knights. The Templars were dominated by Franks but let others in and while it ended badly for them for other reasons they managed to have good relations with most Western European states for a long time. There are simply more Germans Knights around so the Teutonic Order is probably always going to be German dominated and as such German is going to be the operative language but if they had some Polish Knights then I suspect that would do a lot to improve things.
 
One way to do it is to have the Teutonic Order open itself to Polish knights. The Templars were dominated by Franks but let others in and while it ended badly for them for other reasons they managed to have good relations with most Western European states for a long time. There are simply more Germans Knights around so the Teutonic Order is probably always going to be German dominated and as such German is going to be the operative language but if they had some Polish Knights then I suspect that would do a lot to improve things.

Since the Teutonic Order was founded to be a German order, that may be problematic. But even if it has Polish members, that doesn't translate into its policies suddenly being ones that any self-respecting wannabe bigshot in the Polish duchies (or later, any self-respecting king of Poland) would find compatible with Poland's interests.
 
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