Vienna Defiant: The First (Staggering) Siege of Vienna 1529

on the 25th of september 1529 for the first time an ottoman army arrived at the austrian capital of vienna their arrival marked the beginning of a siege characterized by subterranean warfare nasty weather and serious supply problems the siege of vienna was rather short but it was without a doubt an event of pan-european importance it ended the perceived invincibility that had surrounded the ottoman army just when it had come closer to central europe than ever before for centuries this event had extraordinary symbolic power but it is now overshadowed by the second ottoman siege of vienna in 1683 in this video we present the story of the first ottoman siege of vienna which was no less staggering than the second one and as anyone can imagine it would have made the ottomans lives tremendously easier if they could have walked straight through the gates of vienna such coo domains were not uncommon back then and neither are they today as many people's passwords are less than ideal here nordpas a secure password manager created by security experts comes in north pass is the sponsor of this video if you ever chose the name of your local football team your own name or 123456 as a password then you're in good company because as recent studies indicate that is literally what thousands of people all across the world do as well for us there are a couple of reasons to use north pass prime amongst them is that their password manager generates secure passwords for us and remembers them this in turn allows us to log in browse and even shop faster which is essential for us as we're basically working on our computers all day we work on this youtube project a lot so saving time literally translates to a more effective workflow and thus more time with friends and family make your life easier and more secure as well get an exclusive nordpass deal plus one additional month for free by using our link which you can find in the description box or the paint comment all of this is risk-free as nordpass offers a 30-day money-back guarantee now let's jump back to the video in 1520 suleiman the first rose to the throne of the ottoman empire he followed in the footsteps of his great grandfather mehmed ii the conqueror of constantinople and soon showed ambitions to expand the realm in 1521 suleiman conquered the hungarian border fortress of belgrade and in 1526 he crushingly defeated the hungarians at the famous battle of mohach though after this victory the sultan and his army returned home without actively occupying the territory leaving the defeated hungarian kingdom to its own devices among the many who died in the battle of mohache was the hungarian king lios ii lios had no children but he had made an arrangement with archduke ferdinand of austria soon to be emperor of the holy roman empire in accordance with their agreement ferdinand was going to inherit the crown of hungary after lyos death however not everyone was fine with that janos sopoglia the voivode of transylvania had himself crowned king of hungary in late 1526 and about a month later ferdinand did the same ferdinand could not leave this lack of respect unanswered and sent a force of mercenaries to hungary in 1527 by early 1528 he had expelled his rival from the country but there was a catch sepolya who had fled to poland offered to suleiman to rule hungary as his vessel in return the sultan would recognize him as king of hungary and offer military support after long negotiations the sultan agreed to this welcome proposal in 1529 suleiman and his army marched to hungary to permanently occupy his latest acquisition ferdinand who had insisted hungary was his warrant the imperial diet of the holy roman empire that suleiman surely wouldn't stop at the border of the empire according to the historian klaus pitamache he was constantly looking for help all around europe not economizing on richly embroidered horror stories of the merciless turk ravaging hungary but despite his propaganda most european rulers remained skeptical and thought an invasion of the holy roman empire was impossible the general opinion was that after all hungary was ferdinand's own problem all the imperial diet granted was some money twenty thousand infantrymen and four thousand horsemen to defend the territory of the border of the empire these troops were commanded by frederick ii count palantine of the rhine when the ottomans were entering hungary in summer of 1529 ferdinand realized that he wouldn't be able to gather enough men in time to put a stop to their movement he bit the bullet and sent an offer for truce to the sultan in exchange for annual gifts all weapons should rest for 10 years however ferdinand's insight came too late and his offer was way too sparse to sway a man at the head of a marching army soon the ottomans reached the fields of mohache where they held a pompous ceremony a signal of the sultan's power to all of europe sopolia was officially made an ottoman vessel on this occasion in early september they conquered buddha and installed sepolya on the throne as their puppet king then the ottoman sultan and his hungarian patty king together just as ferdinand had feared marched along the danube to komarom guiller and bratislava it was soon clear to everyone that indeed the ottomans were marching for vienna [Music] vienna was situated at the eastern border of the holy roman empire at the confluence of the danube and the river veen and thus well protected from north and east yet its defenses were far from formidable the medieval walls were old and brittle and completely lacked modern bastions in the 15th century some improvements had been made but there had never been a major modernization after mohache the gates were reinforced with bulwarks and in summer of 1529 the suburbs were secured however according to the viennese historian gunther durrigel this was a quote failed attempt to improvise and growth most of this new outer line of defense consisted of wooden fences at best this might stop a cavalry charge small walls or wooden palisades were only built near the eastern gates because there is no proper map from the city of that time all we know about the defenses had to be tediously reconstructed from written sources and contemporary depictions the resulting maps however are stored away in academic literature and not easily accessible this is why some other youtubers and even some scholars made the odd choice of using one of the numerous lighter maps that deceivingly depict a town with bastions often even the one of 1683 our map is based on a reconstruction by two well-known austrian historians walter humelberger and kurt pebal to authorities on this topic already in may ferdinand had put the military command of the city's defense into the most trusted hands the hands of the field captain nicolas count of salman seeing the state of the defenses and the few men at his disposal this experienced warrior fundamentally doubted whether vienna was defensible at all the men were too few the attackers too many the defenses in too bad a shape and the time to change any of these facts too short even before ferdinand who was residing in lintz could react to nicolas's concern the ottomans closed in on vienna at the time nobody knew whether the city could resist [Music] the first herald of the ottoman army that could be seen by the disgruntled defenders of vienna where about 20 to 30 thousand akinji these irregular light cavalry units prepared the ground for the main army by plundering burning and killing word of their gruesome work caused masses of people to flee vienna according to a mastering on the 17th of september only 400 of the 3 500 inhabitants fit for military service remain in vienna the rest had already fled by the 20th of september no more than 12 000 trained infantrymen and 2 600 cavalrymen garrisoned the town some of these troops had been sent by the towns of austria but most were mercenaries hungarians germans and some 700 spanish archibazires they were significantly outnumbered by the approaching army which according to the expert on the siege of vienna contaduridel numbered about 150 000 of which 100 to 120 000 were fighting men once the defenders had realized this they abandoned the large suburbs and burned them down then they had a range of pressing tasks to fulfill they had to stock supplies reinforce the walls and build lower walls as a second line of defense behind the most vulnerable southern defenses in addition they built wooden artillery platforms behind the walls and unroofed some buildings for the same purpose on top of that they now paid the price for using the ditch as a garbage dump for the last decades it was almost leveled and had to be cleaned out in what had to be very laborious and rather disgusting work not exactly pleasant too it must have felt when they had to burn the 28 boats of their flotilla because they were of no use without their crews they had fled vienna as well the only thing that went right for the defenders at this stage was that the ottomans were slowed down by heavy rainfalls which turned the streets towards vienna into swamps and small riverlets into impassable obstacles this won the defenders the time they direly needed nikolas of salm knew that the weather was vienna's best ally only continuous rainfall an early onset of winter and an ottoman food shortage combined could weaken the attackers enough or even force them to leave a lot of rain was quite common at that time of the year and according to the expert on siege warfare christopher duffy the ottoman supply lines were stretched to the breaking point so nicholas's hopes were not unrealistic at all in addition ferdinand was still working hard to put a relief army together but the question remained would the few men be able to hold the old walls long enough vienna's odds improved slightly when about 5 000 imperial troops and 100 heavy cavalry under philip the contentious arrived shortly before the ottomans closed their grip on the town but even so the defenders were still significantly outnumbered and outgunned the role of philip has been de-emphasized by scholars over the course of the last years it was indeed thanks to his efforts that a part of the imperial troops reached the city and he stayed to help in the defense voluntarily according to gunta du riegel he and the count of somme were congenial partners in the defense of vienna meanwhile suleiman let the rear of the main army catch up near the river laita the advance guard consisted of sipahi the professional ottoman cavalry they reached vienna on the 23rd of september on the same day 500 heavy austrian cavalrymen set out from the city to weaken the arriving vanguard before it could settle down they were devastatingly repelled by the akinji and the sipahi near the monastery of saint nicholas and some of them were taken prisoner five of these prisoners were given gifts and rich clothes in the ottoman camp and sent back to vienna with an appeal for surrender vienna left it unanswered the main ottoman army arrived on the 25th of september and one day later still in pouring rain the sultan took up quarters in his opulent tent near ibastov by the 27th of september a sea of ottoman tents stretched around vienna in a wide semicircle closing the city completely off from the land side the ring was completed by the danube flotilla which had successfully set the three bridges over the river on fire receiving these news the rest of the imperial troops under philip's uncle frederick stopped their march for vienna and returned to krems vienna was cut off completely the ottomans quickly installed their batteries and built their siege positions this was quite easy for them because the defenders had not leveled the suburbs completely some houses and stretches of defenses were even fully intact because the suburbs stretched all the way to the city walls they provided welcome cover to the attackers to prevent them from taking hold nikolas of sul ordered several sorties on the 27th and 28th of september respectively 1 000 infantrymen surprised the ottomans who were establishing their positions in the suburbs and inflicted heavy casualties a third major attempt on the 29th of september failed because it was detected early meanwhile the ottoman artillery was thoroughly testing the city walls however due to the muddy streets the ottomans had been forced to abandon all but two of their large guns on the march to vienna so that for the most part they only had small and medium caliber artillery which was not very effective not even against the old walls of vienna thus all they could do was putting up an ongoing barrage at the battlements and the town itself the two large guns were installed in a battery opposite the kana gate which they tried to breach because they observed that their guns were failing the ottomans held a council of war on the 1st of october the grand vizier ibrahim pasha who had commanded the army as serraskar presented his plan to suleiman he proposed to bank primarily on their capable miners and direct their attack against the kantna gate and the adjoining sections of wool once a mine would breach it their 20 thousand janissaries the ottoman elite infantry could storm in the sultan agreed but there was a problem the ongoing rain any tunnel or trench was filled quickly with water which made mining virtually impossible however three days later the weather changed the rain stopped and the ottoman workers took to the shovels the defenders were clueless and still worried about the enemy positions in the suburbs when a christian defector told them what was going on beneath the ruins the ottomans were working on five separate mind tunnels some quickly recovered from the shocking news sent listening posts to the sellers and established assembly places near the canton tower but most importantly he and philip ordered additional sorties to destroy the entrances of the tunnels these were successful at first but as the janissaries were gaining a better foothold in the suburbs it became increasingly more difficult to get to the mines the last and largest of these sorties took place on the 6th of october almost half of the defenders set out for the ottoman positions but they were discovered early and lost the advantage of initiative the ottoman counterattack caught them on the wrong foot and in no time the sallying force got into this order and retreated more than 500 of the retreating men were slaughtered when the guards panicked and closed a gate too early after this the commander abstained from further sorties instead they deployed a number of tirolian miners who happened to be in the city those experienced mine workers placed vessels of water near the defenses which mirrored any convulsion when they detected a tunnel they quickly picked up their own tools and dug a counter mine to neutralize the ottoman mines by destroying them by cleaning out the powder charges or weakening the seal so that the energy could spread when two groups of miners met in the tunnels extraordinarily brutal fights ensued in the muddy darkness underground only melee weapons could be used because firearms would have caused the mines to explode and thus the men stabbed and clapped each other dead eye to eye they wrestled for their lives and those of their brothers above them [Music] the ottomans were determined to take vienna quickly and they were under pressure to do so winter was imminent and discipline and morale in their camp deteriorated quickly in addition they feared that ferdinand or frederick would arrive with a large relay force because of this they ceaselessly worked to get to the walls the defenders were trying to prevent exactly that couldn't keep them away on the 9th of october the first two mines exploded west of the kantna gate and made two breaches of about 25 meters each the janissaries immediately advanced and tried to storm it however they forgot to attack elsewhere too so that the defenders could focus all their forces at the two breaches their counter-attack was led by count of saul himself it was the last time the experienced fighter led his men from the front he was wounded in the thigh in the dense melee despite their leader being wounded the defenders managed to push the janissaries back the ongoing ottoman artillery fire the long shifts on guard and the physical work involved in repairing the defenses as well as in bearing breaches were heavily on the defenders and the townspeople who had stayed the situation deteriorated more and more until on the 11th of october they sent a desperate letter to frederick ii who was still encamped near krems quote from hour to hour the defenders become fewer and weaker please hurry to come to our help do not wait any longer end quote the ottomans gave the defenders of vienna no break they dealt their next blow on the very day the viennese messenger left the town this time the ottomans struck east of the kanna gate however the tyrolean miners had dug venti ducts and cleaned out the explosives of some tunnels because of this the mines were much less effective the hole they made was about 30 meters wide but not a full bridge the top of the wall including the battlements stayed intact still the janissaries attacked this dismal gate in three waves but the defenders stood strong and after a long and bloody struggle the ground was littered with bodies when the last janissaries retreated the defenders counted about 1 000 dead ottomans in the ditch this renewed success lifted the mood of the viennese they were now confident that they could hold out until a relief army or winter would arrive the lookout on saint stephen's cathedral even reported he had already seen fire signals on a nearby mountain the bisan bag but the ottomans weren't done yet the day after in mid-morning the explosion of several mines east of the kanatawa announced a third assault but again the tyrannians had done a good job and therefore the damage was not too bad the attack could be repelled easily by the infantry and the archibaziers at the breach what really hurt the defenders was something else the ottoman guns destroyed the parapets of the most crucial artillery positions at the kana tower so that they had to be abandoned this reduced the vienneses meager firepower even more in the afternoon the ottoman miners brought down a piece of wall between the two first breaches west of the tower which had been bared by the defenders before the dust settled three columns of attackers were throwing themselves at the breach with their artillery badly weakened and their defenses opened up it seemed like the viennese wouldn't be able to hold it off but somehow the defenders still stood up to the janissaries and after a drawn-out fight with their last ounce of strength repelled them yet again although they were completely exhausted after this day of fighting the defenders filled in the bridge as best they could and builds new improvised parapets on the destroyed artillery positions vienna had survived another day salm and philip however were anything but calm and content how many assaults on this dangerously wide breach could the shrinking numbers of defenders repel the only hope was help from outside but there was no substantial relief army on its way and frederick was not yet on the bison back to the contrary he was still encamped at krems and would stay there until the ottomans were gone vienna was on the verge of breaking what the defenders didn't know was that the ottomans were almost as desperate as themselves according to the historian klaus juergen brem the situation in the siege camp worsened from day to day they had suffered heavy losses in each assault morel was low and food was becoming critically scarce supply lines were now overstretched and the foraging troops had to ride ever further to gather the bare minimum of food in the depopulated and plundered hinterland in addition the imminent onset of winter and the expected arrival of a relief army hung over the ottoman tents like dark clouds against this backdrop the grand vizier called a council of war the ottomans decided that the situation was no longer bearable it was high time they went all in [Music] the final assault was scheduled for the 14th of october on the day before the ottoman camp was busy with industrious movement in plain sight of the defenders the soldiers prepared themselves harold's promised generous gifts and the sultan himself inspected the damaged walls expressing his satisfaction with the progress thus far these open preparations were an adept act of psychological warfare the ottomans were proverbially sharpening the executioner's ex and the defenders those to be executed watched in fear while the sun was rising above saint stephen's cathedral three ottoman attack columns formed up in front of the kantna gate the defenders thought their last hour had come however when the first waves of attackers reached the breaches they were repelled quite easily this unexpected success is usually explained by the lack of motivation on the side of the ottoman soldiers especially the janissaries some sources even claim that they had to be driven forward by their officers by force only in the afternoon did the janissaries seem to have found their usual grip then another set of mines widened the breach west of the kana gate to about 80 meters this was a catastrophe for the defenders because the white front gave them a significant disadvantage they mobilized all reserves even the heavy cavalryman dismounted and joined the rose of the common infantry with their last supreme effort they braced themselves against what they surely believed would be the final ottoman way but they stood fir and after a desperate struggle the ottoman tight receded leaving hundreds of bodies at the gates of vienna on the very same evening the serasca had to acknowledge the defeat his men had failed vienna prevailed on the 16th of october the ottomans broke camp they massacred those prisoners of war who couldn't be taken away as slaves about two thousand in total and left for the hungarian border when the rearguard including the grand vizier left the vena back two days later the first snowflakes tumbled from the cloudy sky winter had come sultan suleiman glossed over the embarrassing defeat of his elite troops and even paid them the rewards promised for a victory he announced that he would exercise mercy with the people of vienna because he had learned that king ferdinand was not present and sent messengers to his allies proclaiming the campaign had been a success that was more than a favorable way to put it in this manner the sultan disguised the worst defeat of what was to be a long career as an act of mercy now that everything was over frederick and the imperial troops marched to vienna as anyone could imagine they were not received with a warm welcome by those who had fought for the city with their own lives on the line on the morning of the 21st of october frederick and the viennese council of war decided to pay and discharge the men however frederick's mercenaries demanded to be paid as if they had participated in the siege a price their lords were obviously not willing to pay receiving this answer the enraged mercenaries started a riot which lasted for about a fortnight the victory of vienna against the ottoman army wasn't exploited much at first some light cavalry pursued the ottomans and indeed managed to liberate multiple groups of prisoners because the imperial troops had no permission to cross the borders of the empire nobody took advantage of the ottomans weak moment the only measure taken was the occupation of some crucial strongholds along the eastern border under the supervision of nicholas of somme still busy with this task the defender of vienna died from the injury he had suffered during the siege half a year later in may of 1530 regarding hungary the question at the root of this conflict suleiman the magnificent had achieved his primary goal and secured the power of his vessel sapolya his second goal the conquest of vienna however the sultan had failed in the long run this was of great importance the siege of vienna had been closely observed all over europe when suleiman's army left the nimbus of invincibility that had followed the ottoman army wherever it had gone left with it word of their defeat spread like wildfire and all of europe exhaled in relief [Music]

Channel: SandRhoman History

Views: 250,314

Keywords: siege of vienna 1529, siege, vienna, 1529, habsburg, ottoman, staggering siege, sandrhoman, documentary, history, history documentary, nicholas salm, suleiman the magnificient, ottoman empire, ottoman austrian war, siege of vienna, education, educational

Id: q4ed2dveGmQ

Length: 29min 54sec (1794 seconds)

Published: Sun May 15 2022