Union of Krewo
In a strict sense, the Union of Krewo or Act of Krėva (also spelled Union of Krevo, Act of Kreva; Polish: unia w Krewie; Lithuanian: Krėvos sutartis) comprised a set of prenuptial promises made at Kreva Castle on 14 August 1385 by Jogaila, Grand Duke of Lithuania, in regard to his prospective marriage to the underage reigning Queen Jadwiga of Poland.
Candidates for the throne included Mary's fiancé Sigismund of Luxembourg, Siemowit IV, Duke of Masovia, and Vladislaus II of Opole.
She was betrothed to William of Austria, who in summer 1385 traveled to Poland in an attempt to consummate the proposed marriage and present a fait accompli.
For the last century, Lithuanians defended themselves from the Teutonic Knights, a crusading military order dedicated to conversion of the Grand Duchy into Catholicism.
In 1384, Jogaila explored another option, presented by the Grand Duchy of Moscow and brokered by his Orthodox mother Uliana of Tver: converting to Orthodoxy and marrying Sophia, daughter of Dmitry Donskoy.
[2] Poland and Lithuania battled each other in the decades-long Galicia–Volhynia Wars, but also saw opportunities to regain lands lost to Hungary and regarded the Teutonic Knights as the common enemy.
It included his brother Skirgaila, Duke Boris (possibly his cousin and son of Karijotas), and merchant Hanul of Riga.
[9] Hanul helped Jogaila to recapture Vilnius during the Lithuanian Civil War (1381–1384) and represented interests of merchants, who saw great trade potential between Poland and Lithuania.
[11] On 12 February Jogaila and his relatives arrived in Kraków and were baptized by Bodzanta, Bishop of Gniezno, three days later in the Wawel Cathedral.
[12] Jogaila's new baptismal name Wladislaus was chosen in honor of Jadwiga's great-grandfather king Władysław I the Elbow-high, the penultimate Piast.
[13] Right after the marriage and coronation, Jadwiga and Vytautas marched to Galicia where they defeated Hungarian forces and secured some 97,000 square kilometres (37,000 sq mi) in western Podolia.
He brought some priests, established the first seven parishes, and, according to Jan Długosz, even personally translated Lord's Prayer and Apostles' Creed into the Lithuanian language.
[15] New converts were baptized en masse, with little teaching, and were awarded wool shirts; the haste was later criticized at the Council of Constance.
This was resolved with the Ostrów Agreement – Vytautas became the Grand Duke of Lithuania while Jogaila retained rights of an overlord.
Up until the discovery of the original document in 1835 in a register in the Archives of the Cracow Cathedral Chapter, the Union of Krewo was unknown.
[19] In the 1385 document, the Latin word applicare, describing a future relationship between Poland and Lithuania, has caused the most controversy and academic debate.
