Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Teutonic Poland

I was standing in the hall of a moving train, watching the Mazovian plain wisp by. Intermittently a red pine forests would obscure my view, and then, in the blink of the eye, it would go back to the long yellow grain fields. In Mazovia there’s not much variation in the landscape, but you can tell you’ve entered Mazury when that changes. The terrain starts to softly undulate and the energy begins to localize in the towns between the hills.

A friend of mine was leaving for his home back in Sweden. He spent 2 years in Poland, and at this point he felt like he hadn’t dropped anchor here, so he bought a new flat back in Stockholm and started contemplating his next step. As a going away present, his colleagues asked him if he would like to visit anywhere. He said, “castles with sword fighting.” They searched the internet and found the Teutonic castle at Nidzica. After hearing about it, I decided to join him for the day, because I too wanted to see castles and knights.

Poland has an astounding amount of Teutonic heritage. Nearly all of the well-preserved castles associated with the brotherhood are located within the Polish borders, with a few exceptions in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad to the north. One of the most profound battles in European and world history happened between the Kingdom of Poland and the Teutonic Order in 1410. Called the Battle of Grunwald by the Poles and the Battle of Tannenberg by the Germans, the Teutonic loss was a humiliation that simmered in European politics for centuries and even influenced German propaganda in WW1 as well as the ideology of Hitler and consequently the German extermination tactics in Poland in WW2 through ‘Operation Tannenberg.

All of the Teutonic castles in Poland are located in the north, in a region known as Mazury, more commonly called the Lake District. It’s an area that is traditionally considered the most underdeveloped part of Poland. Historically Mazury belonged to East Prussia, but this region of the Prussian empire was broken in two after Germany’s loss in WW2, and subsequently divided between the newly established communist People’s Republic of Poland, and the burgeoning Soviet Union. Suddenly, Poland had control over land it had never had direct control over before. Left behind in this stunning yet undeveloped region was the legacy of the Teutonic Order in the form of many gothic red brick castles.

Arriving in Nidzica, we were immediately greeted by the most communist brutalist train station I’ve seen so far in Poland. It was an eerie cement structure with a seemingly permanently closed cashier. Passing through the inside gave you a dusty chill down the spine. Exiting onto the street side there was an old red brick building that signified that we were now in former East Prussia. We caught site of a tourist information sign, and started to head off in that direction. Each sign turned us around another corner and pulled us towards the center of the small town of 15,000 inhabitants. In minutes we were passing through the main square where they were setting up a stage for a local summer concert. It’s amazing, when you’re living in Warsaw, you assume that there is no other activity going on anywhere around in Poland.

Another sign for the tourist office now pointed us around the castle, which we saw the towers of when we first entered the square. We thought it was best to get some information on our return train as well as other ideas on what we could do around Nidzica before we dived between the castle walls. We walked around the castle and found a sign pointing us back towards the castle. We walked up the hill and found another sign pointing us directly into the castle. Finally we realized that the tourist information office was situated in the middle of the castle courtyard.

We were greeted between the walls by costumed knights and medieval village folk, and an Egyptian snake charmer carrying a 10 foot yellow python. The Egyptian man asked us in Polish whether we would like to hold it for 15 PLN or not. In the center of the courtyard a number of the costumed villagers were dancing and singing, and on the other side of the courtyard we took a seat on a raised wooden pavilion and watched the show.

My friend and I ordered a couple of beers, and we started to talk. He told me the story about his Swedish origins, and about how was actually part German. His grandfather came from Germany and eventually set up a business in Sweden where he collected and sold hardened moose droppings to eccentric German tourists. Soon after, we were invited inside the museum by the helpful tourist information clerk.

We walked around the castle for a while and admired the shockingly sadistic medieval weapons and torture devices. The castle was not heavily guarded so we got into parts that were apparently closed to normal tourists. We stumbled upon a darkened room at the top of the castle filled with preset checkerboards that seemed ready for a tournament to begin soon. Laying on a table was the grand prize, an authentic forged sword.

Just outside the castle walls another kind of tournament was taking place. Knights in unique and different armors were hacking at each other with more real swords, and referees were deciding who hacked best. We watched as new knights would enter the ring to challenge the winner, but we couldn’t understand the scoring standards. The knights would bash each other with the sword, and the referees would yell stop when they saw fit, and then point to who they thought was the winner. Some moments seemed downright dangerous as the referee stood less than a meter away from a swinging sword that would easily lodge itself an inch deep into his face. The event was enthralling and especially with the dramatic music from the Lord of the Rings and Star Wars the Phantom Menace playing over a PA system.

My friend explained that these kind of events never gain so much attraction back in Sweden, especially from the older population, and that’s one thing he liked about Poland. Poles love to get involved with reenactments and they take them seriously. From the knights of the middle age to the soldiers in WW1, you can find a lot of dedicated Polish enthusiasts.

As the day went on we enjoyed our time in the small town, a carefree breath of fresh air away from the troubles of the big city. Around the courtyard were some pictures hanging, about the Russian and German soldiers in Nidzica during WW1, and I noticed in one of them a cemetery that had been built for the fallen during those battles. It was easy to guess the location of it in the picture, and we were curious, so we made our way to see if it still existed. On our way there we realized that if we continued we probably wouldn’t have enough time to catch our train, so we turned away from it and instead headed towards the station.

While on the way back we came across another cemetery, the town cemetery, and decided to take a quick look. The first graves I saw all had German names. All the Germans were expelled when this land became Polish, so I assumed that they came back here just to be buried. I looked at one of them, his name was Bernard Ludwig Otello, and he was born in 1897. He had lived in Nidzica, it was called Neidenburg when he was living there, for 48 years before being forced to go somewhere else. He died in 1985, a good 40 years after he left. It’s hard to imagine being expelled from your land after almost 50 years of memories.  The German graves highlighted the German past, and revealed that this Polish land is close to the hearts of more than just its current inhabitants.