Kyiv in 1008; he wrote a letter to the Holy Roman Emperor Henry II in 1009. These embassies to and from Rus' may be the basis for the somewhat fanciful account in the Russian Primary Chronicle of Prince Vladimir sending out emissaries to the various religions around Rus' (Islam, Judaism, Western and Eastern Christianity), including to the Catholic Church in Germany, although the emissaries returned unimpressed by Western Christianity, explaining in part the eventual adoption of Orthodox Christianity. Catholicism in Rus' From the 11th century to the Council of Florence The Russian Orthodox Church has had a long conflict with Catholicism. Metropolitan Ivan II (died 1089) responded to a proposal of Antipope Clement III for a union of the churches with a letter outlining the theological differences with Catholicism (Markovich attributes this letter to Metropolitan Ivan IV who died in 1166.) Metropolitan Nicephorus I (1103–1121) also considered Catholicism heretical; this has been the standard view in the Russian church and not just among the heads of the church, who were often Greeks sent from Constantinople. Thus, Archbishop Nifont of Novgorod (1135–1156) in the instructional "Questions of Kirik", responded that a woman who took her children to be baptised by a Catholic (the term "Varangian", that is, Viking, is used) priest was to incur the same penance as one who took them to be blessed by a pagan sorcerer. Other sources, including the Kormchaia Kniga (the code of canon law of the medieval Russian Church) attacked Catholicism as a heresy to be shunned. Up until the time of Metropolitan Isidor (1431–1437), a Greek sent from Constantinople to preside over the Church in Rus, the metropolitans of Kyiv had almost no contact with Rome. This did not mean that there was no Catholic presence in Rus'. The Teutonic Knights and the Brothers of the Sword (absorbed into the Teutonic Order in 1227), Swedes, Danes, and other Catholic powers launched a series of crusades against Pskov, Novgorod, and other towns in northwestern Russia and the Novgorodians fought hard to keep westerners out of the Novgorodian Land, not merely due to religious differences, but also because they would pay taxes to the Catholic monarchies' administrative structures. Taxes, tribute, or military levies would then go to the Scandinavian kingdoms or the Germanic city-states of Livonia, or to the Lithuanians, and thus reduce Novgorod's wealth and overall security. In the 1330s and 1340s, King Magnus Eriksson