Any interesting reads on 14-15 century eastern europe?

by mxswoppers

Im doing research on 14-15 century Lithuania/Poland/Muscovy. Can anyone recomend any articles/books/maps regarding this period and this region?

y_sengaku

As I explain the historiographical circumstances a bit before in Are there any history books on the Late Middle Ages?, the periodization of LME alone severely limit the choice of available books on the topic, especially in Anglophone world, due to the histriographical/ linguistic division within later medieval researchers in Europe.

If you are interested in Central-Eastern Europe, I'd recommend to begin with Michael North, The Expansion of Europe, 1250-1500, trans. Pamera Selwyn, Manchester: Manchester UP, 2012, originally written and published in German in 2007, since such a divide between German histriography and Central and Eastern European ones (possibly except for Russian one) is closer to that between Anglophone and those ones.

As for medieval Lirthuania, in addition to Eric Christiansen's Northern Crusades (1980; rev. ed. 1998), Rowell, S. C. Lithuania Ascending: A Pagan Empire within East-Central Europe, 1295–1345, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1994: is almost only the classic of this field in English so that we should first consult it.

Frost (Robert I.) was originally the expert in early modern period (if I remember correctly), but he recently also publishes the overview work of the Polish-Lithuanian Union from the Middle Ages, The Making of the Polish-Lithuanian union, 1385-1569, Oxford: OUP, 2015 (pbk 2018). Daniel Stone, the 18th century specialists also wrote the overview work of the Union, titled as The Polish-Lithuanian State, 1386-1795, A History of East Central Europe, vol.4, Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001, but I'm afraid that Frost's recent one is better at least at its first section in Later Middle Ages.

On the other hand, you can also check some books in this book list that I compiled for a while ago, such as Ostrowski's (one of the very few remaining Anglo-Phone Russian historians) or those by Janet Martin. As for the historiography of the so-called 'Mongol-yoke' issue, Halperin's works, including the classic book I also mentioned in the list, still remains fundamental one, at least in English.