Studies in medieval missions and crusades to the Baltic countries exploded after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1989 and applied new perspectives and methods. The present book has two advantages: it provides a fairly comprehensive bibliography of studies in the major Western European languages, and it contains nineteen studies in English which have all been published previously but may be difficult to find outside the Baltic sphere (two have been translated from German). Together, the articles present examples from a wide range of historiographical, military, political and economic and social sources. The theology behind the crusades and the beliefs of the original pagan religions – as far as we can say anything about them at all – are only sporadically touched upon. The survival of Orthodox and pagan beliefs and practices in Livonia centuries after conversion to Latin Christianity is mentioned, but only in a very short article concerned with artefacts such as crosses. Most of the articles were published after 1989, and most are exemplary, for example Sven Ekdahl's historiographic analysis of the crusades and colonisation in the Baltic from 2004. The coverage and the successful attempt to balance different positions are impressive considering the length of the article (about forty pages). A couple of articles are a bit descriptive when treating military issues. The oldest article, from 1966, on the Teutonic Order, is built on assumptions in crusading history that have been much debated subsequently, for example the idea that the fervour of crusading diminished around 1200. On the other hand, this article has a fine characterisation of German and Polish history writing on the order before and after the Second World War. The introduction, by Alan V. Murray, is a very successful contextualisation of the Baltic crusades and missions and provides a very helpful summary of recent research. All in all, this is an important introduction to the topic for an English-speaking public and an indispensable book for any university course in medieval Baltic history.