EN
The article analyses how sword evangelization (military/coercive Mission) is understood in historiography and the forms of compulsion employed in the so called peaceful Christian missions. Two forms of compulsion are distinguished – social, implemented by the "own" ruler towards his subjects, and political, imposed by the conqueror. However, the fact that on certain occasions the missionaries employed both – social and political forms of compulsion, was also taken into consideration. On the other hand the analysis has revealed that peaceful missions, as they have been perceived in historiography, contained certain forms of compulsion defined by the term “social compulsion”. Thus the logical question arises: what kind of missions can be qualifi ed as military/coercive, which in historiography are most frequently named Schwertmission?