Discussions of papal involvement in the resolution of temporal disputes in the early fourteenth century have tended to emphasise the ineffectuality of the Holy See in enforcing its judgements and managing to evade accusations of partiality. When, in 1319, the pope ordered the Teutonic Knights to restore Pomorze to the Polish kingdom, the Order refused on the grounds that the ruling had been made by partisan judges-delegate. The potency of the pontiff's subsequent attempts to enforce the judgement was outweighed by the political and military strength of the Order in the region, coupled with its distance from Avignon. Attempts at papal intervention could be met with weapons from an increasingly sophisticated armoury belonging to the spokesmen of temporal rulers. The spiritual authority on which rested the right to intervene was seemingly no longer the preserve of the pontiff: the rhetoric of the ‘negotium terrae sanctae’ could be appropriated by any ruler – irrespective of their actual commitment to the cause, or of the military realities of Outremer. Moreover, it was a rhetoric by which papal policy itself might be judged in its dealings with temporal powers: the Declaration of Arbroath of 1320 famously urged the pope to act as an impartial father in adjudicating between warring nations, else the needless shedding of Christian blood would be the scandal of his reign, at a time when the borders of Christendom were continually threatened.