The Knights of the Cross
novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz
The Knights of the Cross or The Teutonic Knights (Polish: Krzyżacy) is a 1900 historical novel by the Polish writer Henryk Sienkiewicz. Its first English translation was published in the same year as the original.
The book was serialized by the magazine Tygodnik Illustrowany between 1897 and 1899 before its first complete printed edition appeared in 1900. The book was first translated into English by Jeremiah Curtin, a contemporary of Henryk Sienkiewicz. The Teutonic Knights had since been translated into 25 languages. It was the first book to be printed in Poland at the end of World War II in 1945, due to its relevance in the context of Nazi German destruction of Poland followed by mass population transfers. The book was made into a film in 1960 by Aleksander Ford.
From May 2024, an autograph copy of the novel, used as the basis for the first edition, is presented at a permanent exhibition in the Palace of the Commonwealth in Warsaw.
Historical background
The novel was written by Sienkiewicz in 1900, when the Polish state, after being partitioned among Russian, Austrian and German empires in the late 18th century, did not exist, and most Poles were living in the Russian occupation zone named Vistula Land, formerly Congress Poland. One of Sienkiewicz's goals in writing The Knights of the Cross was to encourage and strengthen Polish national confidence against the occupying powers.
The public source identifies “The Knights of the Cross” as novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Knights, Cross and novel.
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1214098. VIAF identifies the subject as 189371173. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1900, 1897, 1899 and 1945.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Knights of the Cross” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.