The Prussian Homage or Prussian Tribute (German: Preußische Huldigung; Polish: hołd pruski) was the formal investiture of Albert, Duke of Prussia (1490-1568), with his Duchy of Prussia as a fief of the Kingdom of Poland that took place on 10 April 1525 in the then capital of Kraków, Kingdom of Poland. This ended the rule of the Teutonic Order in Prussia, which became a secular Protestant state.
Fighting in the Polish-Teutonic War (1519-1521),Thirteen Years War of 1454-1466 ended with an armistice. A year later in 1522, Albert, also the Grand Master of the Teutonic Order and a member of the Royal dynasty of the House of Hohenzollern, became a Protestant, as did many other members of the Teutonic Order and Prussian nobles at the suggestion of Dr. Martin Luther (1483-1546), to Albert.
Luther was a former Roman Catholic priest, continued as a theological professor at the University of Wittenberg in the town of Wittenberg, Saxony and a monk in the Augustinian religious order. A reformer, author and eventual leader of Evangelical Lutheranism, espousing doctrine and theology since 1517, along with gathering many other supporters among laity, clergy, academics, and nobility, initiating the beginnings of Evangelical. He debated / argued with other reformers such as Swiss theologian Ulrich Zwingli, French / Swiss John Calvin or John Knox in the Kingdom of Scotland on their slightly different emphases of Reformed / Calvinism / Presbyterianism movements in the larger Protestantism of the Reformation in Western Christianity during the 16th century.
Albert agreed that Prussia should submit to Poland and become officially a Protestant state. King Sigismund I the Old of Poland (1467-1548, reigned 1506-1548), (who happened to be Albert's uncle) accepted this, because it was better for Poland for strategic reasons rather than have the independent State of the Teutonic Order in Prussia, formally subject to the Holy Roman Empire in Central Europe and Germany and its Emperor and the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church and the Papacy in Rome.
These terms were included in the Treaty of Kraków, which officially ended the Polish–Teutonic War on 8 April 1525. A week later, on 10 April, in the Main Square of the then Polish capital Kraków, Albert resigned as Grand Master and received the title "Duke of Prussia" from Polish King Sigismund. Thus the Duchy of Prussia became the first Protestant state, anticipating the terms three decades later of the Peace of Augsburg of 1555.
As a symbol of vassalage, Albert received a standard with the Prussian coat of arms from the Polish king. The black Prussian eagle on the flag was augmented with a letter "S" (for Sigismundus) and had a crown placed around its neck as a symbol of fealty to Poland.