Battle of Saule

Timeline

1. 1236Samogitia–Semigallia border · Baltic SeaThe papacy urged the Livonian Brothers of the Sword to campaign against Samogitia, attempting to open coastal links with the Teutonic Order in Prussia. Master Folkwin marched out with knights, Holstein crusaders, and auxiliary troops from Livonia, Latgale, and Pskov, and returned laden with loot through Semigallia.
2. 1236Saule (Saule/Shavli) · LithuaniaSamogitians and Semigallians ambushed the Order in marshy and wooded terrain. Some forty to fifty knights fell along with Folkwin, the worst defeat since the Order's founding, triggering uprisings in Courland, Semigallia, and Ösel.
3. 1236–1237Riga and the papal court · LivoniaIn 1237, Pope Gregory IX approved the merger of the remnants of the Livonian Brothers of the Sword into the Teutonic Order, reorganized in Livonia as the relatively autonomous Livonian Order. The Battle of Saule thus became a turning point in the lineage of the Livonian military orders rather than in the Prussian conquest itself.