The Battle of Nicopolis (, Bitka pri Nikopol; , , ) took place on September 25, 1396, between the Ottoman Empire versus an allied force from Hungary, the Holy Roman Empire, France, Wallachia, Poland, the Knights Hospitaller, the Old Swiss Confederacy, the Republic of Venice, the Republic of Genoa and the Knights of St. John near the Danubian fortress of Nicopolis (Nikopol, Bulgaria). It is often referred to as the Crusade of Nicopolis, and was the last large-scale crusade of the Middle Ages. The battle is sometimes dated to September 28.

Background

There were many minor crusades in the 14th century, undertaken by individual kings or knights. Most recently there had been a failed crusade against Tunisia in 1390, and there was ongoing warfare in northern Europe along the Baltic coast. After their victory at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389, the Ottomans had conquered most of the Balkans, and had reduced the Byzantine Empire to the area immediately surrounding Constantinople, which they later proceeded to besiege (in 1390, 1395, 1397, 1400, 1422 and finally conquering the Byzantine capital in 1453).

In 1393 the Bulgarian tsar Ivan Shishman had lost Nicopolis ? his temporary capital ? to the Ottomans, while his brother, Ivan Stratsimir, still held Vidin but had been reduced to an Ottoman vassal. In the eyes of the Bulgarian boyars, despots and other independent Balkan rulers, this was a great chance to reverse the course of the Ottoman conquest and free the Balkans from Islamic rule. In addition, the frontline between Islam and Christianity had been moving slowly towards the Kingdom of Hungary. The Kingdom of Hungary was now the frontier between the two religions in Eastern Europe, and the Hungarians were in danger of being attacked themselves. The Republic of Venice feared that an Ottoman control of the Balkan peninsula, which included Venetian territories like parts of Morea and Dalmatia, would reduce their influence over the Adriatic Sea, Ionian Sea and Aegean Sea. The Republic of Genoa, on the other hand, feared that if the Ottomans would gain control over River Danube and the Turkish Straits, they would eventually obtain a monopoly over the trade routes between Europe and the Black Sea, where the Genoese had many important colonies like Caffa, Sinop and Amasra. The Genoese also owned the citadel of Galata, located at the north of the Golden Horn in Constantinople, to which Bayezid had laid siege in 1395.

In 1394, Pope Boniface IX proclaimed a new crusade against the Turks, although the Western Schism had split the papacy in two, with rival popes at Avignon and Rome, and the days when a pope had the authority to call a crusade were long past.

The two decisive factors in the formation of the last crusade were the ongoing Hundred Years' War between Richard II's England and Charles VI's France and the support of Philip II, Duke of Burgundy.^[1] In 1389, the war had ground to one of its periodic truces. Further, in March 1395, Richard II proposed a marriage between himself and Charles VI's daughter Isabella in the interests of peace and the two kings met in October 1396 on the borders of Calais to agree to the union.^[2] The support of Burgundy, among the most powerful of the French nobles was also vital. In 1391, Burgundy, trying to decide between sending a crusade to either Prussia or Hungary, sent his envoy Guy de Tremoille to Venice and Hungary to evaluate the situation. Burgundy originally envisioned a crusade led by himself and the Dukes of Orléans and Lancaster, though none would join the eventual crusade. It was very unlikely that defense against the Turks was considered a particularly important goal of the crusade. Burgundy's interest in sponsoring the crusade was in increasing his and his house's prestige and power and, historian Barbara Tuchman notes, "since he was the prince of self-magnification, the result was that opulent display became the dominant theme; plans, logistics, intelligence about the enemy came second, if at all."^[3] In 1394, Burgundy extracted 120,000 livres from Flanders, sufficient to begin preparations for a crusade, and in January 1395 sent word to Sigismund, the King of Hungary |Sigismund that an official request to the King of France would be accepted.^[3] (Sigismund became Holy Roman Emperor in 1433).

In August, Sigismund's delegation of four knights and a bishop arrived in the court of Paris to paint a description of how "40,000" Turks were despoiling and imperiling Christian lands and beg, on Sigismund of Hungary's behalf, for help. Charles VI, having secured a peace with England through the marriage of his daughter, was able to reply that "as chief of the Christian kings" it was his responsibility to protect Christianity and punish Sultan Bayezid. French nobility responded enthusiastically to the declaration; Philip of Artois, Count of Eu, the Constable of France, and Jean Le Maingre, the Marshal of France, declared participation in the crusade the duty of every "man of valor".^[4]

Strength of forces

The number of combatants is heavily contested in historical accounts. Historian Tuchman notes, "Chroniclers habitually matched numbers to the awesomeness of the event," and the Battle of Nicopolis was considered so significant that the number of combatants given by medieval chroniclers ranges as high as 400,000, with each side insisting that the enemy outnumbered them two-to-one, which for the crusaders offered some solace for their defeat and for the Turks increased the glory of their victory. The oft-given figure of 100,000 crusaders is dismissed by Tuchman, who notes that 100,000 men would have taken a month to cross the Danube at Iron Gate, while the crusaders took eight days.^[5]

The closest record to a first-person account was made by Johann Schiltberger, a German follower of a Bavarian noble, who witnessed the battle at the age of 16 and was captured and enslaved for 30 years by the Turks before returning home, at which time he wrote a narrative of the battle estimating the crusader strength at the final battle at 16,000,^[5] though he also estimated Turkish forces as a wildly inflated 200,000.^[6] German historians of the 19th century attempting to estimate the combatants on each side came to the figures of about 7,500-9000 Christians and about 12,000-20,000 Turks, while noting that, from the point of logistics, it would have been impossible for the countryside around Nicopolis to have supplied food and fodder for scores of thousands of men and horses.^[5] (Medieval armies acquired supplies by taking them from the surrounding area as they marched, as opposed to using the supply lines of modern armies.)

Composition of crusader forces

From France, it was said about 2,000 knights and squires joined, and were accompanied by 6,000 archers and foot soldiers drawn from the best volunteer and mercenary companies. Next in importance were the Knights Hospitaller of Rhodes, who were the standard bearers of Christianity in the Levant since the decline of Constantinople and Cyprus. Venice supplied a naval fleet for supporting action, while Hungarian envoys encouraged German princes of the Rhineland, Bavaria, Saxony and other parts of the empire to join. French heralds had proclaimed the crusade in Poland, Bohemia, Navarre and Spain, from which individuals came to join.^[7]

The Italian city-states were too much engaged in their customary violent rivalries to participate, and the widely reported and acclaimed English participation never actually occurred. The report of 1000 English knights comes from contemporary Antonio Fiorentino, and was taken as fact by historian Aziz S. Atiya and others following him. A thousand knights would have actually amounted to "four to six thousand men and at least twice as many horses", counting foot-soldiers and other retainers. However, there are no records of financial arrangements being made in England to send a force abroad, nor of any royal preparation needed to organize and dispatch such a force. Reports of Henry of Bolingbroke or other "son of the Duke of Lancaster" leading an English contingent must be false since the presence of Henry and every other such son, as well as almost every other significant noble in the land, is recorded at the king's wedding five months after the crusade's departure. Atiya also thought that the invocation of St. George as a war cry at Nicopolis signified the presence of English soldiers, for whom George was a patron saint; but Froissart, who mentions this, claims that the cry was made by the French knight Philippe d'Eu. Furthermore, there was no collection of ransom money in England to pay for captives, as there was in every other country that had sent men to the battle. Sporadic mention in contemporary accounts of the presence of "English" may be attributed to Knights Hospitaller of the English tongue subgrouping, who joined their comrades for the crusade after leaving Rhodes (where the Hospitallers were based at the time) and sailing up the Danube.^[8] Possible reasons for the English absence include the increasing tension between the king and the Duke of Gloucester, which may have convinced the two that they had best keep their supporters close, and the antipathy caused by the long war between the English and French, resulting in the English refusing to consider putting themselves under a French-led crusade, regardless of the recently concluded peace.^[7]

Nevertheless, obviously inflated figures continue to be repeated. These include 6-8,000 Hungarians,^[9][10], ~ 10,000 French, English and Burgundian^[11] troops, ~ 10,000 Wallachians,^[12], ~ 6,000 Germans^[13] and nearly 15,000^[14] Dutch, Bohemian, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Bulgarian, Scottish and Swiss troops on the land, with the naval support of Venice, Genoa and the Knights of St. John. These result in a figure of about 47,000 - 49,000 in total; possibly up to 120,000 or 130,000 according to numerous sources, including the 15th century Ottoman historian ?ükrullah who gives the figure of the Crusader army as 130,000 in his Behçetu't-Tevârih^[15][16]

Composition of Turkish forces

Also estimated at about 20-25,000;^[17] but inflated figures continue to be repeated of up to 60,000 according to numerous sources including the 15th century Ottoman historian ?ükrullah who gives the figure of the Ottoman army as 60,000 in his Behçetu't-Tevârih,^[18] Alternately described as roughly half of the Crusader army.^[19] and also including 5,000 Serbian heavy cavalry.

Journey

While Philip, Duke of Burgundy, had originally planned to lead the crusade along with John of Gaunt and Louis of Orleans, all three withdrew, claiming that the peace negotiations with England required their presence, though perhaps also because none dared leave the vicinity of the throne if their chief rivals stayed. However, Burgundy retained control of the enterprise he was funding by naming 24-year-old John de Nevers, the Duke's eldest son, for nominal command. Burgundy, perhaps recognizing that his son, as well as Constable d'Eu and Marshal Boucicaut, who were both under 35, lacked the necessary experience, summoned Enguerrand VII, Lord of Coucy, the most experienced warrior and statesman of the realm, and prevailed on him to be "chief counselor" to Nevers during the crusade. The ambiguity of the crusader command structure would prove to be crucial in the final outcome. While Nevers was given a long list of "counselors", as well as another list of prominent French lords on the crusade with whom Nevers could consult "when it seemed good to him", the concept of unity of command was not yet understood by medieval warriors.^[20] Rules of discipline for the crusade were decreed at a War Council on March 28, 1396, which included the final provision, "Item, that [in battle] the Count and his company claim the avante garde," revealing that the chivalric code continued to require knights to prove their valor by leading the charge.^[21]

To Buda

The crusade set forth from Dijon on April 30, 1396, heading across Bavaria by way of Strasbourg to the upper Danube, from where they used river transport to join with Sigismund in Buda. From there the crusader goals, though lacking details of planning, were to expel the Turks from the Balkans and then go to the aid of Constantinople, cross the Hellespont, and march through Turkey and Syria to liberate Palestine and the Holy Sepulchre, before returning in triumph to Europe by sea. Arrangements were made for a fleet of Venetian vessels to blockade the Turks in the Sea of Marmara and for the Venetians to sail up the Danube to meet the crusaders in Wallachia in July.^[21]

Map of Europe with the Danube marked Coucy was not with the crusader body as it traveled, having been detached on a diplomatic mission to Gian Galeazzo Visconti, the Duke of Milan. Furious at French political maneuvering that had removed Genoa from his influence, Gian Galeazzo had been attempting to stop the transfer of Genovese sovereignty to France and Coucy was dispatched to warn him that France would consider further interference a hostile act. The quarrel was more than political. Valentina Visconti, the wife of the Duke of Orleans and Gian Galeazzo's beloved daughter, had been exiled from Paris due the machinations of Queen Isabeau the same month as the departure of the crusade. The Duke of Milan threatened to send knights to defend his daughter's honor but, in the wake of the disaster at Nicopolis, it was widely believed that he had relayed intelligence to Bayezid I of crusader troop movements. There is no firm evidence of this and it is likely that Gian Galeazzo became a scapegoat after the fact due the existing animosity with France, though there remains the possibility that the Duke of Milan, who had murdered his own uncle to ensure his own power, did in fact betray the crusaders. Coucy, his diplomatic mission complete and accompanied by Henry of Bar and their followers, left Milan for Venice, from where he requisitioned a ship on May 17 to take him across the Adriatic Sea, landing in the Croatian port of Senj on May 30 before making his way overland to the rendezvous in Buda.^[22]

Coucy arrived well before Nevers, who had stopped in the upper Danube for receptions and festivities thrown by German princes. Nevers did not arrive in Vienna until June 24, a full month behind the crusader vanguard led by d'Eu and Boucicaut. A fleet of 70 Venetian vessels loaded with provisions was sent down the Danube, while Nevers enjoyed yet more parties thrown by his brother in law Leopold IV, Duke of Austria. Nevers then asked his brother in law for a staggering loan of 100,000 ducats, which took time to arrange, and eventually arrived in Buda in July.^[23]

Buda to Nicopolis

Once the leaders had arrived, strategy had to be coordinated with Philibert de Naillac, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller, and representatives of the Venetian fleet. 44 Venetian ships had carried the Hospitallers from Rhodes through the Aegean into the Sea of Mamara, and some continued into the Black Sea and up the Danube without engaging in battle. The fact that the Turks, who had an inferior naval presence, did not challenge the Venetians for control of the sea is seen as evidence that Bayezid and the majority of his forces were already on the European side.^[23]

The War Council in Buda was immediately the forum of a fierce dispute. The previous year, Bayezid had declared that he would attack Hungary by May, yet he had not appeared by end of July. Hungarian scouts sent out as far as the Hellespont could find no sign of him, causing the French to proclaim that he was a coward. Sigismund of Hungary assured the crusaders that Bayezid would come, and advised that it would be wiser to let the Turks make the long march to them, rather than make the same long march to find them. This strategy was rejected by the French and their allies. Coucy, acting as spokesman, stated, "Though the Sultan's boasts be lies, that should not keep us from doing deeds of arms and pursuing our enemies, for that is the purpose for which we came." Sigismund had little choice but to acquiesce, though chroniclers also write that Coucy's speech excited jealousy in D'Eu, who felt that he should have had the honor of spokesman due to his position as Constable of France.^[24]

The crusaders began to march down the left bank of the Danube, though part of the Hungarian army veered north to gather the forces of Mircea the Elder, the Prince of Wallachia and of Transylvania, who were the reluctant vassals of Hungary. The remainder of the Hungarians brought up the rear of the crusader column. As the crusaders moved into Muslim-held territory, pillaging and mistreatment of the population reportedly grew. While crusaders had been reported to engage in periodic pillage and rapine while passing through Germany, the indiscipline of the French reportedly reached new heights when they entered "schismatic" lands. Chroniclers also waxed eloquent on the immorality and blasphemy of the crusaders, writing detailed accounts of drunkard knights lying with prostitutes for days, despite writing from at best second-hand accounts. Tuchman cautions that such chroniclers were part of a contemporary tendency to blame the defeat of the crusade on the immorality of the crusaders, and that it is impossible to verify such claims.^[25]

At Or?ova, where the Danube narrows at the Iron Gates gorge, the column crossed to the right bank using pontoons and boats over eight days. Their first target was Vidin, previously an important town of western Bulgaria and then under Turkish control. The prince of Vidin, having no desire to fight for his Turkish conquerors against an overwhelming force of crusaders, promptly surrendered. The only bloodshed was the execution of Turkish officers in the defending garrison, though the incident served to further convince the French that Turks were incapable of challenging the crusaders in the field.^[5]

The next target was Oryahovo (Rachowa), a strong fortress located 75 miles from Vidin. Frustrated by the lack of opportunity to show their bravery in deeds of arms, the French carried out a forced march at night to reach the castle before their allies, arriving in the morning just as the Turkish forces had come out to destroy the bridge across the moat. In fierce combat the French secured the bridge but were unable to push forward until Sigismund arrived. The forces combined and managed to reach the walls before night forced the combatants to retire. The next morning the inhabitants of Oryahovo agreed to surrender to Sigismund on the assurance that their lives and property would be spared. The French promptly broke Sigismund's agreement, pillaging and massacring the town after the gates were open, and later claiming that they had taken the town by conquest because their men-at-arms had topped the walls the night before. A thousand residents, both Turkish and Bulgarian, were taken hostage and the town set ablaze. The Hungarians took the French action as a grave insult to their king, while the French accused the Hungarians of trying to rob them of the glory of victory through combat.^[26][27]

Leaving a garrison to hold Oryahovo, the crusaders continued towards Nicopolis, assaulting one or two forts or settlements along the way, but bypassing one citadel from which messengers escaped to inform Bayezid of the Christian army.^[27] On September 12, the crusaders came within view of the fortress of Nicopolis on its limestone cliff.^[28]

Siege of Nicopolis

The city was well-defended and well-supplied, and the crusaders had brought no siege machines with them. Nevertheless they were convinced that the siege of the fortress would be a mere prelude to a major thrust into relieving Constantinople and did not believe that Bayezid I would arrive so speedily to give them a real battle.^[29] The Ottoman sultan Bayezid I, already occupied with his own siege at Constantinople, gathered his army and marched towards Nicopolis. His vassal Stefan Lazarevi? of Serbia (which was under Ottoman control since the Battle of Kosovo in 1389) joined him on the way, and they arrived on September 24, with about 20,000 men.^[30]

The battle

Battle Map

Wallachia (like Moldavia) was familiar with Ottoman battle strategies, as Mircea had inflicted several blows on the same Bayezid at the Battle of Karanovasa, the Battle of Rovine and the battles over the Principality of Karvuna in 1395. Johann Schiltberger, a Bavarian crusader who fell prisoner at Nicopolis, would later describe in his memoirs the conflict raised by the disagreement on choosing between two different warfare tactics: that of the Crusaders' army, with its bulk of forces constituted by the slow, typically Western heavy cavalry, and that of Mircea, who, prior to the battle, asked Sigismund to execute a reconnaissance mission, to evaluate the enemies? status, and to conclude the optimal strategy. Sigismund agreed, and Mircea asked for the command of the Crusader forces and the right to be the first to attack, after carrying out his own reconnaissance mission with a Wallachian light cavalry party. Sigismund willingly consented, but the proposal was dismissed by John of Nevers and other Western knights, who rejected any change in traditional tactics (Nevers himself aimed for the honour to be the first to attack, as he traveled a great distance, and had spent much money in the expedition).

The French, mostly clad in superior armour, charged towards the Ottoman vanguard, but soon realized they would have to dismount when they reached the line of stakes. They did so, and began to remove the stakes, while under fire from the Ottoman archers. When this was accomplished, the unarmoured Ottoman infantry met the now horseless but well-armoured knights, who had the upper hand in close fighting. The French rushed forward to attack the cavalry and were again successful. Although they were still without their horses, the French pursued the retreating Ottomans all the way back to the hill. However, upon reaching the top, the now exhausted French forces discovered the main Ottoman army awaiting them. In the ensuing fight, the French were completely defeated. Jean de Vienne, admiral of France, was killed in combat, although he is described as having defended the French standard six times before he fell. Jean de Carrouges fell alongside Jean de Vienne. John of Nevers, Enguerrand VII de Coucy and Jean Le Maingre, Marshal of France, were captured. At this point, however, the battle was not yet lost.

Meanwhile, the riderless horses made their way back to Sigismund's camp. Sigismund came to the aid of the French, and met Bayezid's force on the hill. The battle was about evenly matched^[32] until the Serbians arrived. Sigismund was persuaded by his companions to retreat; troops led by Hermann II of Cilli helped him to reach a Venetian ship for safety. Sigismund allegedly said of the French: "If only they had listened to me... We had men in the plenty to fight our enemies."

In the late afternoon, Stefan Lazarevi? led the charge of the 5,000 heavily armoured Serb knights left wing and encircled the undefended wings of Sigismund's troops. Bayezid and his ally and brother-in-law Stefan Lazarevic immediately recognized the well-known banner of another brother-in-law, Nikola II Gorjanski, fighting on Sigismund's side. A deal was made, and Sigismund's army surrendered. The Wallachian army, having witnessed the disastrous attacks made by the other crusaders and the surrender of Sigismund, retreated and started to head for home.

Aftermath

The execution of the prisoners in retaliation for the Rahovo massacre of Ottoman prisoners

On September 26, Bayezid ordered between 3,000 to 10,000 prisoners to be killed, in retaliation for the killing of the Ottoman prisoners in Rahovo by the French. He was also angry that he had lost so many men, especially in the early stages of the battle, despite his overall victory. He kept the younger prisoners for his own army. Those who escaped eventually returned home, although many perished on the way; Sigismund himself was allowed to escape with Nikola Gorjanski and Hermann of Cilli, and he took the sea route back home on a Venetian ship through the Black Sea, the Aegean, and the Mediterranean. Charles VI was informed of the defeat on Christmas.

The knights of Western Europe soon lost their enthusiasm for crusading. Fighting would continue in Spain and the Mediterranean, and among the pagans of northern Europe, but no new expedition was launched from Western Europe to stop the Turkish advance in the Balkans after this defeat, until the period of the Renaissance.

England and France soon renewed their war. Wallachia continued its stance against the Ottomans, having stopped another expedition in the next year, 1397, and in 1400 yet another expedition of the Ottomans. The defeat of Sultan Beyazid I by Timur (Tamerlane) at Ankara in the summer of 1402 opened a period of anarchy in the Ottoman Empire and Mircea took advantage of it to organize together with the Kingdom of Hungary a campaign against the Turks. The Hungarians and Poles were defeated at the Battle of Varna in 1444, and Constantinople finally fell in 1453 to the Turks, followed by the Despotate of Morea in 1460 and the Empire of Trebizond in 1461, which brought an end to the last vestiges of the Byzantine Empire as well as the final remaining pockets of Greek resistance against the Ottoman Turks in both the Balkans and Anatolia.

The Battle of Nicopolis is also widely regarded as the end of the Second Bulgarian Empire, since hopes for its salvation had come to an end with the defeat of the Crusaders.

By their victory at Nicopolis, the Turks discouraged the formation of future European coalitions against them. They maintained their pressure on Constantinople, tightened their control over the Balkans, and became a greater menace to central Europe.^[33]

Notes

References

• Aziz S. Atiya, The Crusades in the Later Middle Ages, New York, 1965.
• Aziz S. Atiya, The Crusade of Nicopolis, New York, 1978.
• Pál Földi, Nagy hadvezérek: Hunyadi János, (Great Warlords: János Hunyadi), Anno Publisher, Budapest. (ISBN 963 9066 66 4)
• R.G. Grant, Battle: A Visual Journey Through 5,000 Years of Combat, Dorling Kindersley, London, 2005.
• Norman Housley, ed., Documents on the Later Crusades, 1274?1580. New York, 1996.
• Thomas F. Madden, Crusades: the Illustrated History, 1st ed., University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 2005.
• Cyril Mango, The Oxford History of Byzantium, 1st ed., Oxford University Press, New York, 2002.
• David Nicolle, Nicopolis 1396: The Last Crusade, Campaign Series, Osprey Publishing, London, 1999.
• Geoffrey Parker, Compact History of the World, 4th ed., Times Books, London, 2005.
• Jonathan Riley-Smith, The Oxford History of the Crusades, Oxford, 1995.
• Froissart's Chronicles Book IV, 1389?1400.
• Philip Sherrard, Great Ages of Man: Byzantium, Time-Life Books.
• Tuchman, Barbara W. (1978), A Distant Mirror: the Calamitous 14th Century., Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1984. ISBN 0-345=28394-5

External links

• Encyclopćdia Britannica: Battle of Nicopolis
• History of War: Battle of Nicopolis, 25 September 1396
• The Crusades Wiki

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