German Brotherhood of Assassins
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I wanted to ask you something. Which is... what's your name? This article title is conjecture. Although the article subject is canon, no official name for it has been given. |
The German Brotherhood of Assassins were a branch of Assassins based in and around Germany.
History
Late Middle Ages
In 1338, the Assassins saved Lukas Zurburg from a thief on the road to Adendorf and subsequently recruited him into the order. In 1348, the plague swept across Essen, wiping out nearly half of the town's population. From there, a group called the Brothers of the Cross, a Templar organization, began promising protection from the plague.[1]
Lukas suspected that they were after the Ankh, which was said to be located in Central Europe. However, in 1350, both the Brothers of the Cross and Lukas mysteriously disappeared.[1]
Renaissance
Prior to 1502, a historian named Conradus Celtis had spent years uncovering the secrets of history. Having discovered even the history of the Assassins, he came to admire them and sought to compile a comprehensive text that honored them as heroes. Despite this, the Assassins recognized the grave dangers in exposing their order to the public, and sometime around 1501 to 1502, a team of Italian Assassins visited him in Cologne, Germany to ensure that he agreed to keep their existence hidden to common society, and took his works back to Rome.[2]
In 1502, the Elector Friedrich der Weise planned to open a university in Wittenberg, which challenged the practices of the Borgia Papacy and promoted religious reform. In response, Pope Alexander VI, Grand Master of the Roman Rite of the Templar Order, sent a bribe to convince him to back away from the "foolish project", though the Assassins intercepted the money and used it to give him a large, anonymous donation.[2]
The Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian, had taken a heavy beating from Swiss mercenaries during the Swabian War, to which the Borgia had hired several of these commanders as their Papal Guard. Drinking with these mercenaries at a tavern, the Assassins slipped poison into their drinks, before carrying them out. Under the guise of condottieri, they delivered the commanders to Maximilian, to which the Emperor used them to train an army of his own, in order to rival the Swiss.[2]
Following this, he invited the Assassins to help the Swiss train the army, as they had previously bested the Swiss. Once again disguised as condottieri, they helped him train the first of the "Landsknechte", upon which he offered them a regiment should they ever need one.[2]
During the early 16th century, the German Assassins were led by the Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus. Around 1512, Erasmus sent a letter to Claudia Auditore, the acting leader of the Italian Brotherhood, warning the branch of the revolutionary religious thoughts of Martin Luther, fearing for more chaos in the European continent.[3]
Members
Allies and puppets
- Claudia Auditore da Firenze (Italian branch)
- Ezio Auditore da Firenze (Italian branch)
- Conradus Celtis
- Frederick III, Elector of Saxony
References
