If you like counting, subtracting and gaining, here’s another historical yearbook. 738 years since the event in which the Let flag played a special role – “red with a white cross in the middle” (mit wize durch gesniten), which is also mentioned for the first time in the Livlandische Reimchronik on this very occasion.
The newly appointed Fogot of Kuldīga, Johann Ohtehausen, summoned his companions, including four Brothers of the Order, and after a difficult defeat, set out to plunder Dobele with more than 50 companions, most of them Curonians. In a prolonged skirmish at the gate, Johann is caught and knocked from his horse by a Zamgal man with a powerful blow to his armour-covered head. The orphans and defenders continue to hurl spears, but in the afternoon the people of Kulda move to a meadow near the castle to rest. Fogt Johann is able to move slowly on his own, while the rest of the wounded, mainly Curonians, are moved in a horse-drawn stretcher. The other brother knights take the warriors home safe and sound.
Nameus learns of the disaster in Dobele and, when he arrives in town, “…he chose the best of the people who were in Dobele..” and sends to follow Fogt and his companions.
The Dobelians do not sleep at night and soon catch up with Fogt’s regiment, which manages to organise itself for defence. On the battlefield, cavalry led by Namej appears, but when they see the enemy’s closed defensive formation, they dismount and attack on foot, but lose “50” members and quickly retreat or flee. The “200” shields remain on the field.
This solo invasion was followed by the invasion of Zemgale by the Fogt AND the Komtur of Kuldīga, the burning of Dobele “this beautiful town”, the slaughter of “300” husbands and wives.
“but the Zemgalians did not like it,
that it was often
from Kurzeme to Dobele.”
“Then Nameus, the leader in Tērvete” decides to take revenge and sets off along the Daugava, avoiding Mītava, in the direction of Riga “with heroes brought with him / well armed as it happens”.
Alerted in time, Gerhard Katzenellenbogen, Marshal of the Order in Riga, prepares, war regiments are called up and sent “to where the battle was to be fought”.
On a winter evening, while waiting for the enemy on the left bank of the Daugava, a regiment of 100 Lettish Home Guard from Cesis, led by a brother knight (ein bruder was in houbtman), arrives at the Marshal. The Marshal sends this unit forward, ordering them to take up position and shelter in a farm in an open field.
During the night, the Let regiment, freezing in and around the farm, sends out scouts, who are surprised early in the morning and one of the Let scouts is also captured by the Samogalians under the leadership of Namej himself. As it turns out, Namejs personally knows the captured man and interrogates him about his brothers and the troops in front of him. As the light fades, Nameus and the Semigallians, taking the captured steward with them, begin to move towards Riga. But with the light they see the flag of SARKANI BALTI SARKANO, stop and question the prisoner, release him alive and, dividing the regiment into two groups, retreat – one on the mainland, the other on the ice of the present Bulyupe (then Lielupe) River. What did the leader of the Semigallians, Namejs, learn from his captured acquaintance?
Straight talk:
“…when he saw the flag
Then he had a lot to ask
It was no longer a sin to question him,
How great is our army
I said, stand opposite them
The host of the Letts, the Estonians
Is gathered. They did not like it,
They had me bitten already,
But when Nameus objected,
They let me go.”
The author of the chronicle carefully prepares his audience for the intriguing development by describing the colours of the flying unit’s flag, its area of origin, so that the listener/reader is prepared for the sudden turn of events caused by the visual contact between the Zemgalians and the flight at dawn on the day of the battle. It was this circumstance – the presence of reinforcements, the real size of which could not be truly assessed in the morning light, as well as the prisoner’s words – that forced Namej to realise that the advantage of surprise had long since disappeared and to turn for home.
This is also the end of the Flag’s story, as Marshal Gerhard comes to the fore in the ensuing events, as he is caught up in the heat of the chase, breaks away from the rest of the troops and, in the second half of the day, after an unexpected attack by the Lowlanders, together with another survivor of the 9-man entourage, is taken to Tervete to be sent with his brother of the Order as a gift to the Leysian ruler Treydenis to Kernava, where the two end their lives in mutual duel, to the delight of the Leysian noblemen.
Andris Geidāns
All quotes by Livlandische Reimchronik
