The ‘Golden Age’ of the Hanseatic League 93
The Threat by the Princes of the Empire and the Formation of
the Tohopesaten
At the great assembly of the towns’ representatives in summer 1418, Lübeck
proposed a close alliance, a tohopesate, of the towns for 12 years under its lead-
ership. In the case of war, the contingents from the Wendish, Pomeranian,
Westphalian, Prussian, and Livonian towns were fixed; they should be engaged
if there were threats to single towns, even if the enemies were their own terri-
torial lords.94 The plans for an alliance failed, but were not forgotten when the
Northern German princes intensified their policies to strengthen the control
over their territories and towns. At first, forms of closer co-operation between
the regional groups were discussed at an assembly of Saxon and Wendish
towns in Braunschweig in March 1427 when the Wendish towns joined the
Saxon confederation concluded in 1426. Then, in January 1430, at the assem-
bly in Lübeck where representatives of 31 towns came together—the Wendish
group, cities in Saxony, Pomerania, Prussia, Westphalia, and at the Zuiderzee,
even Breslau—they not only agreed on mutual support against the Hussites
but also against other attacks, even by their princes and lords.95
Again, contingents of the towns or regional groups were fixed, reckoned
in basic fighting units of three to four men on horses (knight, archer, squire),
the Glevenien. Lübeck had to provide 16 Glevenien, Hamburg 12, the Prussian
towns 40, the Livonians 20, Cologne 20, Braunschweig 20, etc., together about
400 Glevenien from 51 towns and the two groups from the East, including
25 towns not present who were threatened by exclusion from the Hanseatic
privileges. The whole force would have numbered 1200–1600 men, which was
not without strategic importance, but it would have proved difficult to muster
the contingents in time. Thus, it was also decided that the neighbouring towns
should sent support immediately with full force. Additionally, the aggressors
should not be supported by materials and money or by granting safe-passage.
But because important questions like the problem of costs and payments to
the mercenaries were postponed to the next assembly, the regulations had
only preliminary character and were never put into force.96 Nevertheless, simi-
lar plans recurred in the following years, thus at a common assembly of the
towns’ representatives in March 1441 and at a meeting of the Saxon towns in
94 hub 6, 170.
95 hr i 8, 712 §§ 1, 18, 20–21, 27.
96 Matthias Puhle, Die Politik Braunschweigs innerhalb des sächsischen Städtebundes und
der Hanse im späten Mittelalter, Braunschweiger Werkstücke, vol. 63 (Braunschweig:
Waisenhaus-Buchdr. und Verl., 1985), 80.