ABSTRACT
Henry of Livonia’s Chronicon Livoniae (HCL),1 a narrative of the mission to Livonia2 between the last decades of the twelfth century and ca. 1227 (when Henry wrote), and the Livländische Reimchronik (LR),3 covering Baltic history until ca. 1290 (when the chronicle was probably composed), are the sole contemporary, locally written narrative works for the history of this region during this period. Henry’s chronicle was composed within the first generation of conversion, while the authority of the bishop of Riga was still dominant, and before the Teutonic
A version of this paper was presented to the Medieval German Seminar at the University of Oxford on 1 December 2010, and I am very grateful to the members of the seminar for their feedback. I should also like to thank Michael Gervers at the University of Toronto for discussing some of this material with me many years ago; the two anonymous readers of this journal for their comments; and Helen Buchanan at the Taylor Institution Library for her efforts in obtaining otherwise unavailable scholarship for me.
