The Books of the Maccabees and the Teutonic Order

After the fall of Acre in 1291, the Teutonic Order removed its headquarters first to Venice, and then to Prussia in 1324. Shortly thereafter, during the first third of the fourteenth century, two chronicles recounting the order's origins and its wars in Prussia were written. Peter of Dusburg's Chronicon Terre Prussie¹ describes the Teutonic Order's origins and its wars in Prussia up to 1330. It was commissioned by Werner von Orseln, the first grand master to be based solely in Prussia (1324–30). It is generally acknowledged that this chronicle was written in an attempt to influence opinion in the order, as part of a wider aim to reinvigorate the order's sense of identity and purpose. According to Hartmut Boockmann, in his discussion of the historiography of the order:

dieser Text war auf einen praktischen Zweck hin geschrieben. Er wollte moralische Wirkungen erzielen, er sollte die Ordensritter seiner Zeit, des frühen 14. Jahrhunderts, durch das Beispiel ihrer Vorgänger zur Regeltreue mahnen, sie aufrufen, der ursprünglichen Bestimmung ihres Ordens gerecht zu werden, also die Heiden zu verfolgen und zu bekämpfen.²