Lake Peipus 1242: Battle of the Ice

The complaints in some of the other reviews about this title are a bit like executing the messenger. The battle of Lake Peipus is obscure, poorly known in the west (but of epic importance in Russia). The battle of Lake Peipus ended the Eastern Crusader's aspirations of expanding the anti-pagan crusades to a larger crusade against Russia and the Eastern Orthodox. There are only two primary sources - each giving only a couple of paragraphs to the battle. The fact that the original source material is so thin guarantees that any attempt at a detailed analysis of the strategy and tactics of the battle will be mainly conjecture. History is full of such situations. It doesn't make the effort worthless by any means. The battle of Lake Peipus made the reputation of Alexandr Nevskii - a Russian national hero in the vein (if not the magnitude) of El Cid, Arthur, or Roland. The Teutonic Knights and Sword Brothers were involved too. This little book provides a lot of information about the tribes and political background to the medieval baltic states, Russia, Scandanavia, and Eastern Christian lands. This information is presented in a fairly rushed and, I feel, disorganized way (the organization sacrifices narrative flow to fit the typical Osprey structure of breaking things up into sections looking at each of the armies). This "lay of the land" stuff about this part of Europe was really entertaining to me - since so much of it was new to me. The Baltic was still partly pagan at this time - this was the frontier of Europe. The polar areas were hunter-gatherer. Russia was emerging out of the melting pot of Slavic, Scandanavian, and Turkic cultures and ethnicities. There are Finn tribes, the Danes, Swedes, Poles, and Germans are involved. It's fascinating. Once we get into the battle itself it gets a little thin. This event happened near the edge of the world 3/4ths of a millenia ago. There is so little known you just can't say that much about it. Other than the political context the main thing going for it is the great atmosphere - medieval knights battling on (or at the edge of) a frozen lake. This image was make famous through the great Russian silent movie of 1938 by Eisenstein, "Alexander Nevsky". More recently 2004's King Arthur movie featured a frozen lake battle scene - a distinct "homage". The original sources don't mention anyone falling through the ice - but in the "gaming the battle" section at the end it mentions that cavalry would have broken the ice at the edge of the lake and following infantry would have had to avoid areas of open water or fell and drowned. Not quite the stuff from the movies - but a great setting no matter how you slice it. Nicolle has visited the site and has taken lots of photos. There's a ton of illustrations of knights of the period from mid 13th century manuscript and sculptures from relevant German, Scandanavian, and Russian sources. This might not be the best Osprey title and maybe the antiquit

For any passionate about eastern crusades and 12th-13th century, this is a good overview on eastern/northern europe of the time. I recomend it.