1331

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political events

The Serbian "young king" Stefan Dusan makes peace with his father in the spring, but they soon have another dispute and the son deposes his father in September (see 1330). Now 23, the son will rule alone until his death in 1355 (see 1332).

Hostilities resume in September between Poland and the Teutonic Order (see 1330). The bloody Battle of Plowce September 27 ends in victory for Poland's Wladyslaw I over the Teutonic Knights, whose commander Dietrich von Altenburg has fielded 5,000 men to Wladyslaw's 7,000, but although it is the Knights' first defeat at the hands of any central European army it is a Pyrrhic victory; about half the 4,000 men left dead on the battlefield are Poles, and the Knights continue to hold eastern Pomerania (see 1335; Tannenburg, 1410).

The Japanese emperor Godaigo renews his efforts to regain power from the Hojo regent, is informed upon again as in 1324, and escapes in late September from Kyoto to Nara; the Hojo capture him in early November and civil war begins. Landowner Masashige Kusunoki, 37, in Kawachi province responds to the emperor's call for military support against the Hojo; he fortifies a hilltop position called Akasaka and garrisons it with 500 men, but Hojo forces lay siege to Akasaka. Greatly outnumbered, Kusunoki's men put up a stout resistance and exact a heavy toll on the Hojo, but the siege force cuts off Akasaka's aqueduct, making its collapse inevitable. Kusunoki orders the castle torched, tricks the Hojo into thinking he has committed suicide, and slips out under cover of darkness (see 1332).

religion

The Franciscan friar Odoric of Pordenone dies at Udine January 14 at age 44 while en route to the papal court at Avignon, having baptized more than 20,000 people in his travels through Mesopotamia, Persia, China, and India.

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