Pruthenian

The Pruthenians, better known as the Old Prussians, were a Western Baltic people who held the Baltic coast, divided into clans. Tacitus may have described their forebears as the Aesti in 98 CE.

The Prussian Crusade began in 1230, when Duke Konrad of Masovia called in the Teutonic Order. Its brick castles brought five of seven clans under control, but the Prussians rose five times. The Great Prussian Uprising of 1260 to 1274, ignited by the Order's disaster at Durbe and led by figures including Herkus Monte, nearly swept the invaders away.

Resistance ended with the last rising of 1295; Prussian communities survived within the monastic state. In 1525 Grand Master Albert had catechisms printed in Old Prussian, but plague and assimilation wore the language down until it died out in the early eighteenth century.