A good example can be found in an essay written by Gerhard Kluge on the history of the pilgrimage site of Wahlstatt near
Liegnitz (Lignica) in Lower Silesia.
AFTER the Battle of
Liegnitz, fought between the Mongol Empire and a combined European force in Poland in 1241, the Mongols cut off the right ear of each fallen European to count the dead, amounting to a grisly nine sacks of severed ears.
Born in 1928 in the former town of
Liegnitz in then-German Silesia -- today Legnica in southwest Poland -- Moses moved to Munich in the 1950s where he began his career creating photo series for Stern magazine.
Logau spent his life in service to the petty courts of Brieg and
Liegnitz. Resenting the forced lowliness of his position, he directed much of his satirical wit at courtly life, particularly at foreign (primarily French) cultural customs he saw adopted by the nobility, and at the misguided contempt of the nobility for the German language.
In 1919 he was denied nomination to secure candidacy in the elections for the National Assembly by the anti-Semitic prejudices of local leaders in
Liegnitz." Jones, German Liberalism, 104; see DDP minutes, 7 January 1919 in BAK: R 45 III, #15, 13-25, 40-53; Wiesenthal to Nathan letter, 24 April 1920, Nathan to Wiener letter, 24 April 1920, and Nathan to Gothein letter, 3 May 1920, in NL Nathan, BAB: N 2207, #18.
In some places, of course, the NSDAP mobilised Catholic voters on a significant scale, as happened in Breslau and
Liegnitz (towns in Silesia where conflicts between Germans and Poles coloured political identity), in the Catholic rural areas of the Palatinate, and among some Catholics in the Black Forest; but these cases were atypical.
Another case where an explanation is absent where one might be expected is in regard to the decision of the expeditionary force that defeated the Polish forces and Teutonic knights at
Liegnitz in April 1241 to forgo further conquests in the region, contenting itself with plundering on the way to rejoin the main Mongol army at Mohi.
Only recently, however, has the most unusual of these collections, the two-volume Sontagliche Evangelien (
Liegnitz: Nicolaus Sartorius, 1616-21) of Thomas Elsbeth (?mid-16th cent.-after 1624), been made available in a new edition by Allen Scott.
The fact that they could read Latin and often were familiar with the great "historicos" of the past is usually mentioned, finally, in the descriptions of such women in the pro-woman literature of the period.(23) Often educated together with their brothers at the courts of many of the minor principalities in central Europe, the daughters of the smaller houses and dynasties would have studied classical history in editions in which the commentaries were just as significant as the original texts.(24) Louise of
Liegnitz was one of these.(25) She may thus have recognized some of the issues articulated in Lohenstein's play as derived from these "political" glosses, particularly those of relevance for female regents.
The Spiritualist Caspar Schwenckfeld, who lived in Strasbourg as an exile from
Liegnitz in Silesia, strongly supported the latter critique.