At this period Lithuanians were troubled greatly by refugees of their own stock, who had been driven out of Prussia. These people, urged by the Livonian knights, made raids against Novgorod. Warring continually with its new enemy, Novgorod was not able to properly defend its possessions on the coast, and so asked aid of Yuri of Vladimir. Yuri sent Sviatoslav, his brother, with troops. There was a battle at Wenden, the knights were defeated, and the castle was besieged, but the Grand Master succeeded in bringing in reinforcements, and the Russians, satisfied with their booty, withdrew.
The Letts, who were obedient to the Germans and under their [[219]]lead, now threatened Pskoff. The whole country about there, called Esthonia by the Germans, consisted of warring fragments now under German, and now under Russian command. Odempe, Izborsk, and Yurieff passed from hand to hand. The people suffered from the Russians because they yielded to the Germans, and from the Germans because they went back to the Russians. It would be impossible to count all the campaigns and raids of that troubled time.
The archbishop was hated for his cruelty. Populations whom he came to convert were filled with terror by his presence; they submitted to baptism, but they washed it away quickly when he was gone.
To their assistance came the Novgorod prince, Yaroslav, son of Big Nest. When on his way to Riga, envoys came to him from the Sea-Fins, from the island of Izel, and begged him to defend them from the Danes. The country from Izborsk and Yurieff toward Fellin seemed free of the enemy. It remained to drive the Danes from the Revel coast, strengthen Revel and build a stone fortress there. When Yaroslav approached Fellin, a fearful sight met his eyes; traces of the terrible knights were everywhere; villages had been burned; in places the earth was red with blood; there were gibbets with bodies swinging from them. The knights had retaken Fellin, and the Russian garrison had been slaughtered. Yaroslav and his forces went through the country to the sea, approached Kolivan and besieged the castle of Revel for nearly a month. The Danes defended the place valiantly. At that stage, Yaroslav took counsel of the Novgorod men, and decided to abandon the siege for a large tribute in gold. The Pskoff people considered this ending of the campaign inglorious, and blamed their “brothers of Novgorod” for their selfish conduct. But even this campaign did not shake the faith of the people in their Russian defenders.
Yurieff and the country around struggled against the knights till completely exhausted. While waiting for promised reinforcements from Novgorod, a few Russian champions and native people fought with the whole force of Livonian knights. This party of brave men was led by the most insignificant prince of all Russia, that Prince Vyachko, from whom the archbishop had taken his native place, Kuikenos. His name, however, had [[220]]acquired great notoriety among the Germans, for he was their most irreconcilable enemy. From Kuikenos, Vyachko had gone to Yurieff, and there he gave the Germans no peace. He strengthened the place, and made savage raids on all sides. At last the archbishop decided, cost what it might, to take Yurieff, that hateful den where all the “malefactors and traitors” had assembled, as well as many of the bitterest enemies of the church in Livonia, and where they were commanded by that prince who, from the beginning, had been the root of all evil.
The archbishop himself took part in this campaign, bringing with him a multitude of knights from various parts of Germany. The Knights of Livonia assisted with all their strength. The place was surrounded and besieged. In addition to the usual engines of war, the Germans had a movable tower as high as the walls of the city. Under cover of this tower, they began to dig a tunnel. Meanwhile they entered into negotiations with Vyachko, offering him a free escape with all the Russians, horses and arms, if he would surrender the fortress and with it the natives who had found shelter within its walls. Vyachko gave an answer which the archbishop called shameless and insolent, and in Russian style.
After the refusal of terms, the siege continued with redoubled force. The knights complained of the great loss inflicted upon them by the garrison of the fortress, which day after day, made desperate sallies. At last, fearing that relief might come to the besieged, the Germans determined to storm the place. Next morning at daybreak, a fierce assault was made, but it was repulsed. Later on the besieged made an opening in the wall just opposite the tower, and hurled out blazing stuff to burn down the structure. The besiegers rushed to extinguish the fire, and in the general excitement and uproar certain knights made their way through the opening in the wall. Once inside, they spared no one; a terrible struggle ensued. Meanwhile the place was fired by its defenders, who had sworn to perish to the last man in case of defeat. The Germans captured but one man, who later on was sent to Novgorod, with a message that Yurieff was taken.
When this messenger arrived, and announced that help was not needed, that all had perished, there was great sadness in the city, for the warriors were on the eve of marching to relieve the besieged. [[221]]
Not long after this, Pskoff, still fighting with Novgorod, made a friendly alliance and treaty with Riga. This happened when Novgorod men were continually sending away Prince Yaroslav and recalling him. It is not to be wondered at that while there was such internal dissension and disagreement between Novgorod men themselves, and between Novgorod and Pskoff, the Germans succeeded in Esthonia. Whatever the peace terms were between Pskoff and Riga, the Germans had become an acknowledged and independent power on the Baltic coast of Russia.
Yaroslav, about this time, went to Pereyaslavl on the Alta, and Yuri of Vladimir, who had married the daughter of Chermny, gave Novgorod to his brother-in-law, Michael. Thereupon Yaroslav, opposing Yuri, drove Michael from Novgorod, and conquered Chernigoff.