Bishop Albert of Riga
Bishop Albert of Riga — Albrecht von Riga in German, Albertus Rigensis in Latin — was the principal founder of the Latin church in Livonia and the first great organiser of the German settlement of the eastern Baltic. He arrived in Livonia in 1200 at the head of a substantial fleet of German crusaders, and over the following thirty years laid the institutional, ecclesiastical, and political foundations of the Latin presence in the region. He founded the city of Riga in 1201, established the Brotherhood of the Sword in 1202, and presided over the slow Christianisation of the Livs, the Latgalians, the Estonians, the Curonians, and the Semigallians. He resigned his see in 1229, by which time the basic framework of the Latin church in Livonia was in place. He died in 1229 and was buried in the cathedral of Riga.
Origin and Early Career
Albert was, in all probability, born in the closing years of the twelfth century, although the exact date and place of his birth are not recorded. The principal source for his career — the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia — gives no information on his family or his early life, although it does refer to him, on several occasions, as a civis of Bremen, a citizen of the city. Later tradition, of uncertain reliability, identifies him as a member of a noble family from the Lower Rhine.
The earliest documented event in Albert’s career is his consecration in 1199 as Bishop of Livonia. The ceremony took place in the cathedral of Bremen and was performed by the Archbishop of Bremen in his capacity as papal legate. The bull of consecration identifies Albert as a canon of the Bremen cathedral chapter and entrusts him with the missionary bishopric of Livonia, founded in 1186 with the establishment of the see of Üxküll. The mission to which Albert was consecrated was, in 1199, an institution in serious difficulty: the first two bishops of the see had been unable to secure the Latin church’s position in Livonia, and the conversion of the native populations had been partial and reversible.
The Founding of Riga
Albert arrived in Livonia in 1200 at the head of a substantial fleet that had been assembled in Lübeck. The fleet carried not only Albert and his ecclesiastical entourage but also a substantial number of German crusaders.
The first consequence of Albert’s arrival was the founding of the city of Riga in 1201. The new city was established on the site of an older Liv settlement at the mouth of the Daugava and was granted the law of Hamburg — the customary law of the principal German commercial city of the north. Riga was conceived from the outset as a German mercantile settlement under episcopal protection, and it was the principal instrument of the Latin church’s political and commercial presence in Livonia.
The second consequence was the launching of a substantial campaign of conquest against the Livs and the Latgalians. The campaign was the principal business of the first years of Albert’s episcopate and was conducted, by the German crusaders that Albert had brought with him. By 1207, the Livonian and Latgalian chieftains had acknowledged the suzerainty of the bishop and had accepted baptism.
The Founding of the Brotherhood of the Sword
The third consequence of Albert’s arrival, and the most consequential in the longer term, was the establishment in 1202 of the Brotherhood of the Sword. The new brotherhood was, in effect, a corporate military body under the patronage of the Virgin Mary, charged with the defence of the Latin church in Livonia. The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia records that Albert, recognising that the Latin church required a permanent military force, established the brotherhood as a fraternitas militiae with the privileges of a militaris religio.
The brotherhood was modelled on the Templars and the Hospitallers, and it was given, by papal grant, the privileges that the established orders had acquired. Its initial complement was, however, no more than a few dozen knight-brothers, and its resources came initially from the bishop and the German merchants of Riga. The first Master, Wenno von Rohne, was appointed by Albert himself, and the principal base of operations was the city of Riga. The tension between the brotherhood’s nominal autonomy and its actual dependence on the bishop was, from the outset, a constant theme of its history.
Consolidation of the Latin Church
The years from 1202 to 1227 were the period of consolidation of the Latin church in Livonia. The principal events were the conquest of Livonia, completed in 1207; the conquest of Estonia, completed in 1227 after a serious reverse in 1223, when the Estonian uprising destroyed most of the Latin settlement in northern Estonia; the establishment of the territorial bishoprics of Dorpat, Ösel-Wiek, Reval, and Courland; and the construction of the first stone castles, including Wenden, Segewold, Ascheraden, Kokenhusen, and Dünaburg. The later years of Albert’s episcopate were marked by a series of conflicts with the Brotherhood of the Sword, which, having grown in size and self-confidence, began to assert its independence of the bishop. The conflict came to a head after Albert’s resignation and was resolved, in 1230, by a series of agreements that confirmed the brotherhood’s dependence on the bishop. Albert himself, an aging man by the 1220s, was more concerned with the consolidation of the Latin church’s position in Livonia than with the resolution of these disputes.
The Resignation and the Legacy
Albert resigned his see in 1229, in favour of his nephew, Hermann of Buxhoeveden. He died in 1229 and was buried in the cathedral he had founded. His legacy is, in the modern historiography, an important chapter. He was the founder of the Latin church in Livonia. He was the principal architect of the working partnership between the bishop, the Brotherhood of the Sword, and the German mercantile community of Riga — a partnership that would persist, in modified form, for the next three and a half centuries. He was the founder of the city of Riga, the principal commercial centre of the eastern Baltic and the capital of the Livonian Confederation.
Sources
- Benninghoven, Friedrich. Der Orden der Schwertbrüder: Fratres Milicie Christi de Livonia. Cologne: Böhlau, 2005.
- Favreau-Lilie, Marie-Luise. Die Ritterbrüder im livländischen Zweig des Deutschen Ordens. Cologne: Böhlau, 2003.
- Hjorth, Poul, ed. Henrici Cronicon Lyvoniae. Copenhagen: Copenhagen University, 1962.
Related Reading
For the foundation of the brotherhood that Albert established, see the article on the founding of Livonia and the Sword Brothers. For the broader context of the Latin church in the eastern Baltic, see the parent overview of the Livonian branch and the cluster on the Livonian Confederation. The brotherhood that Albert founded is treated in detail in the cluster on the Sword Brothers. The German settlement of Livonia, of which Albert was the principal architect, is examined in the history of the Teutonic Knights.