By 1522, the great Christian fortress of Rhodes
had been taken, and the Ottomans had regained dominance in the Mediterranean Sea, so all
their resources could now be redirected towards the
mainland. Their target was the Kingdom of Hungary, a
fragile land rife with internal chaos - a nation ripe for the picking. Welcome to our video on the Battle of Mohacs,
one of the most significant clashes in the history of Europe. This video was sponsored by Vikings War of
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extremely useful for the start! It had been the ambition of the Ottomans to
conquer the heartlands of Europe ever since Sultan
Mehmed II. Suleyman I knew that the Kingdom of Hungary
was the door that would lead them into the core of Christendom, and with the
current political climate in Europe, the Hungarians would receive little to no aid against this
pending Turkish invasion. Suleyman’s reign began with the conquest
of the Hungarian controlled city of Belgrade in 1521. With the fall of Rhodes in 1522 he was able
to refocus his resources back onto mainland Europe. Europe was a divided continent whose great
powers were locked in perpetual feuds. Among
these were the Kingdom of France, and the Holy Roman Empire, ruled by the Charles V
of the famous Habsburg dynasty. These states were too engaged in a struggle
over control of Italy to pay mind to the Muslim empire at their doorstep. This was something the Ottomans intended to
exploit to their advantage. In 1525, the Habsburgs of Spain and Germany
crushed a French army at Pavia, and captured the
French King, Francis I. Francis was forced to make territorial concessions to the Habsburgs
and relinquish his claims to Italy. And out of desperation, France began looking
for an ally to aid in their struggle against the Habsburgs. Francis turned to the Ottomans. He implored Suleyman for an alliance and pleaded
for him to attack the Habsburgs. This sent shockwaves throughout Europe. Suleyman was delighted at the
prospect, for an alliance with France increased his legitimacy as a European Emperor, and
gave him a pretext to carry out an invasion he
had planned on leading anyways. In order for the Ottomans to strike at Habsburg
territory like the French wished, they would need
to first go through Hungary. This new alliance gave Suleyman extra incentive
to finish what he’d started in 1521, and begin rallying his army
for an invasion of the Hungarian Kingdom. It is here we should turn the clock back a
bit to explain the state of Hungary leading up to the
Ottoman invasion. Since 1490, the country had been stuck in
a downward spiral. King Vladislaus
II was an ineffective king who sought to placate his nobility by selling almost all his Royal Estates to them, but succeeded only in empowering
the Hungarian magnates to take advantage of his weakness. Centralized power declined, and the standing
army of Hungary was disbanded by the lords, eager to increase their own profits. Things only became worse in 1514, when a man
at arms named György Dózsa formed a peasant Crusade of 40,000 farmers, originally intended
to attack the Ottomans. During harvest season,
the Hungarian nobles tried to force the peasants to return to their homes, and harassed their
families to coerce them to do so. All that accomplished was to incite the peasants
into full-scale revolt, resulting in a war that would ravage
all Hungary. The rebellion was brutally put down by
the Voivode of Transylvania, John Zapolya, and over 70,000 peasants would be captured
and tortured in the aftermath. The young King Louis II ascended to the Hungarian
throne in 1516, and over time realized the threat the Ottomans posed to his realm’s
existence. His pleas for unity fell upon deaf ears, for
the peasants, lords, and royal house of Hungary
all had enmity for one another. The land was
divided, and vulnerable. On the 23rd of April, 1526, Sultan Suleyman
I left Constantinople at the head of a massive army,
accompanied by his most trusted vizier Ibrahim Pasha. Varying sources put the total numbers of
this force between 50,000 to 100,000. It was made up of labourers, cavalry and elite
Janissaries alongside 300 cannon. The Ottomans embarked upon an 80-day march
up the Balkans, during which torrential rains flooded the Danube river, making maintaining
of supply lines difficult. Nevertheless, through the
iron discipline of the vizier Ibrahim, the Ottomans reached Belgrade. From Belgrade, Suleyman sent Ibrahim ahead
to capture the fortress of Petrovaradin. Ottoman
sappers detonated mines beneath the walls, and the Janissaries charged in, taking the
fortress while only losing 25 men. The bulk of the Ottoman army joined the strike
force, and moved on. Suleyman knew that the best place for the
Hungarians to make a stand was the mouth of the
River Drava below the town of Osijek, and so he diverted his army towards it. The town of Ilok
fell on August 8th with little resistance. When Suleyman and his army arrived where the
Drava met the Danube, he expected to come face to
face with a huge Hungarian host, but instead was
surprised to find that no enemy was there. King Louis II had mustered an army of around
25,000 men in the town of Tolna. It was made up
Hungarians, Croatians and Bohemians, with a core of men-at-arms and armoured knights. Much like Suleyman, King Louis knew the importance
of the mouth of the river Drava, and ordered his deputy, Stefan Bathory to
lead a vanguard there, and defend it at all costs. However, the nobles refused to submit to Bathory’s
command, declaring they would follow only the King himself. The vanguard plan was abandoned, and the Hungarian
King instead led his quarreling army to a field just outside
a little riverside hamlet known as Mohacs, where they awaited their enemy. On August 26th, the Ottoman host reached Mohacs,
and the two armies came face to face. The Hungarians had set up a camp between the
river Borza and Mohacs proper. They
stood in two lines, the first line being made up of 10,000 infantrymen divided into two
wings, supplemented by divisions of mounted knights. King Louis himself led the second
line, surrounded by 1,000 of his personal armoured cavalry, and the troops of his noblemen. Meanwhile, the Ottomans had managed to advance
themselves into a position well protected by woods and ridges, and set
up an encampment there. Suleyman ordered his troops in a tiered defense,
made up of three lines. The first two lines
were made up of 30,000 Rumelian and Anatolian cavalry, supplemented by 4000
Janissaries and 150 cannons. They were led by Ibrahim Pasha. The third line was led by
Sultan Suleyman himself, and was made up of 15,000 Janissaries and sipahis. They
guarded the bulk of the Ottoman artillery, which was protected by a circle of wagons. Lightly armed Akinji horsemen occupied the
left flank, close to the Hungarian line, and a
rearguard of heavy cavalry and footmen remained back in the encampment in reserve. On August the 29th, fighting began. The Hungarians were the first to strike, and
commenced their assault at 3:00 in the afternoon, knowing the Muslims in Suleyman’s
army would be occupied with their afternoon prayer. A crescendo of Hungarian artillery
fired across the battlefield. The right wing of the Hungarian first line
charged the Ottomans. The Rumelian cavalry were not prepared for
the assault, and the heavily armoured Hungarian footmen broke through the
first two lines of the Ottoman defense, and fought their way towards the Ottoman’s
third line. Inspired by this initial success, the second
line of Hungarian mounted knights charged into
battle, joining the fierce melee at the fringes and encircling the Rumelian cavalry from the
outside, pushing them back towards their camp. Meanwhile, the Hungarian left wing
stabbed at the center of the disordered Ottoman first line. The Hungarians fought bravely,
breaking through to the Sultan’s position, who was now in danger of being cut down. However, this success was unsustainable. As the Hungarians came within range of the
Ottoman wagon fortress, a volley of guns and artillery inflicted heavy damage upon the
first line. Soon after, the Janissaries formed ranks around
their Sultan, and charged the Hungarian knights, overwhelming them with
superior numbers and martial discipline. The
tide had begun to turn, after two hours of fighting, the Ottoman reserves back at camp
had finally rallied onto the battlefield and joined
the Ottoman lines. Meanwhile, the Rumelian
cavalry began to regroup. With Vizier Ibrahim at the head, the Ottomans
launched a fierce counterattack, pushing the Knights in the second line back towards
their camp. From here, the Ottoman army advanced on both
flanks to finish off the remaining foes. The Rumelian cavalry encircled the knights
from behind, while the Janissaries and reserves overwhelmed what remained of the
footmen. The Hungarians were utterly
swarmed by overwhelming Ottoman numbers, surrounded in seperate little pockets, and
massacred. The battle had ended in a great victory for
Suleyman, and a complete disaster for the Hungarians. When the battle seemed lost, King Louis had
attempted to flee. In the chaos, his horse had
thrown him into the flooded Csele brook, and his heavy armour had dragged him to a
watery grave. The Battle at Mohacs was an abject disaster
for the Hungarian Kingdom, whose government was now effectively annihilated. While sources vary, it is generally accepted
that anywhere from 14,000 to 20,000 Hungarian soldiers were slaughtered in the
initial battle, with thousands being taken prisoner and beheaded the next day. The Ottomans only lost between 1000 to 2000
men. Suleyman could not believe he’d destroyed
the entire Hungarian army so quickly; he had expected more out of a Kingdom that was once
a formidable and powerful foe. He kept his
forces stationed at Mohacs for a few days after the battle, expecting more enemy forces
to arrive. When none came, he advanced to the city of
Buda, taking it with almost no resistance. While
Suleyman ordered the city to be spared, sources claim that his army looted and burned it
anyways. The victorious Ottoman army then withdrew
back to Constantinople, carrying with them the spoils of war. After the battle, the mortified Hungarian
nobles were so divided and panicked, they elected two
new Kings simultaneously. One was Ferdinand I of Austria- brother of
the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, the other was John Zapolya. With the support of the Habsburgs, Ferdinand
took advantage of the ensuing power vacuum and
seized Hungarian territory in Bohemia, and the northwestern part of Hungary proper. Meanwhile, Zapolya endeared himself to Suleyman,
agreeing to vassalize under the Ottomans, who became the suzerains of his realm in Transylvania. The Battle of Mohacs marked the end of Hungarian
independence, with all of its former territory now under Habsburg or Turkish dominion. For Suleyman, the victory had not created
a springboard for the invasion of Europe as
he had hoped, but instead formed a borderland between the Ottomans and the Holy Roman Empire
that set the stage for centuries of Habsburg -
Ottoman warfare. But perhaps the most significant legacy of
this defining engagement is the effect it has on the national conscience of
the Hungarian people, who to this day when faced with
bad fortune, utter the words: “More was lost at Mohacs.” We have recorded a podcast on the early structure
and administration of the Ottoman empire as an addendum to this video and you can listen
to it via the link in the description or the pinned
comment. New videos in this series are on the way,
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