The Knights of the Cross or Krzyzacy

The order of the Knights of the Cross grew out of the German fraternity of the Hospitals of the Holy Virgin, which was organized in Jerusalem, in 1128, during the crusades, to take care of German pilgrims. The German knights also used to join this fraternity. When the Christians were obliged to give up Jerusalem, this fraternity left the holy city and joined the camp of the crusaders at Akkon, to fulfill among them the duties of its vocation. Prince Frederick von Hohenstauf, the son of Barbarossa, raised this fraternity to the dignity of an order which embraced the principal purposes of two other knightly orders, the Johanits and the Templars, namely, to take care of the sick and to make war against the enemies of Christianity. Therefore they divided the members, who must have been of German origin, into the fighting brothers, who wore a white mantle with a black cross, and the serving brothers, to whom soon afterward were added the priests. Akkon, which was taken in 1191, became the first capital of the order. During the rule of the fourth grand master, Herman von Salza, the order came into possession of large estates in the east as well as in the west, in Italy, in Hungary, in Holland and especially in Germany. During the war of the king of Poland, Leszek, the son of Casimir the Just, in ...