Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Indianwhite (talk | contribs) at 02:46, 19 May 2009. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Siege of Vienna
Part of the Ottoman wars in Europe and Ottoman-Habsburg wars
Engraving of clashes between the Austrians and Ottomans outside Vienna, 1529.
Date 27 September-October 14, 1529 Location Vienna, Austria Result Ottoman retreat, Austrian-Christian victory
Belligerents
Austria, with Czech, German, and Spanish mercenaries	Ottoman Empire Moldavia Serbs
Commanders and leaders
Wilhelm von Roggendorf, Niklas Graf Salm	Suleiman I Grand Vizier Pargalı İbrahim Pasha
Strength
23,000	120,000
Casualties and losses
5,000 killed, high civilian fatalities	14,000 killed

The Siege of Vienna in 1529 was the first attempt by the Ottoman Empire, led by Suleiman the Magnificent, to capture the city of Vienna, Austria. The siege signalled the pinnacle of the Ottoman Empire's power and great rivalry with Europe as well as the maximum extent of Ottoman expansion in central Europe (see Ottoman wars in Europe). Thereafter, 150 years of bitter military tension and reciprocal attacks ensued, culminating in the Battle of Vienna in 1683, marking the start of the Great Turkish War by European powers to remove the Ottoman presence within central Europe. The siege's ultimate failure and the Ottoman's exhaustive efforts to capture the bastion of the Holy Roman Empire at the time, turned the tide against almost a century of unchecked Ottoman conquest throughout eastern and central Europe, which had previously claimed Southeastern Hungary as a vassal state in the wake of the Battle of Mohács. The event is often referenced as the downfall of the Ottoman Empire's once unbridled military hegemony across Europe and Asia, as well as a rather humiliating defeat for the Ottomans at the hands of a far inferior and smaller force.

There is speculation by some historians that Suleiman's main objective in 1529 was in actuality to reassert Ottoman control over Hungary, the western part of which still held out as an independent monarchy known as Royal Hungary. The decision to attack Vienna after such a long interval in Suleiman's European campaign is viewed as an opportunistic manoeuvre after his decisive victory in Hungary. Other scholars theorize that the suppression of Hungary simply marked the prologue to a later, premeditated invasion of Europe.

Background

Main article in Battle of Mohacs, Campaign of Ferdinand I, Long War (Ottoman wars)

In August 1526, Sultan Suleiman I, (widely renowned in the West as the "the Magnificent"), had decisively defeated the forces of King Louis II of Hungary at the Battle of Mohács, paving the way for the Ottomans to gain control of south-eastern Hungary. The Archduke of Austria, Ferdinand I of Habsburg, who was the brother of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, claimed the vacant Hungarian throne in right of his wife, Anna of Bohemia and Hungary, sister to the childless (and thus heirless) Louis II. Ferdinand, won recognition only in western Hungary; while a noble called John Zápolya, from a power-base in Transylvania, challenged him for the crown and was recognised as king by Suleiman in return for accepting vassal status within the Ottoman Empire. Thus Hungary became divided into Royal Hungary and Ottoman Hungary up until 1699.

Following the Diet of Pozsony (modern Bratislava) on 26 October, Ferdinand was declared King of Royal Hungary due to his marriage to Louis' sister and his own sister being the widow of Louis, who perished at Mohács. Ferdinand set out to enforce his claim on Hungary and captured Buda in 1527, only to relinquish his hold on it in 1529 when an Ottoman counter-attack stripped Ferdinand of all his territorial gains. . These gains were short-lived and by 1529, an Ottoman counter-attack swiftly negated all of the gains by Ferdinand in his campaigns in 1527 and 1528.

Ottoman army

In the spring of 1529, Suleiman mustered a great army in Ottoman Bulgaria, with the aim of securing control over all of Hungary and reducing the threat posed at his new borders by Ferdinand I and the Holy Roman Empire. Estimates of Suleiman's army vary widely, with anything from 120,000 men to more than 300,000 men being mentioned by various chroniclers throughout history. There appears to be some tendency of later, 18th century European historians to exaggerate or inflate these figures, to overemphasize the heroic bravery of the outnumbered resistance of Vienna and its allies. As well as numerous units of Sipahi, the elite mounted force of the Ottoman cavalry, and hundreds of thousands of janissaries, the Ottoman army incorporated a contingent of Moldovan and Serb mercenaries from its eastern European provinces. Suleiman acted as the commander-in-chief himself (as well as personally leading his force), and in April he appointed his Grand Vizier (the highest Ottoman minister), a former Greek slave called Ibrahim Pasha, as Serasker, a commander with powers to give orders in the sultan's name.

Suleiman launched his campaign on the 10th of May, 1529 and faced numerous obstacles from the onset. The spring rains that are characteristic of south-eastern Europe and the Balkans were particularly heavy that year, causing flooding in Bulgaria and rendering parts of the route used by the army barely passable. Many large-calibre cannons and artillery pieces became hopelessly mired or bogged down, leaving Suleiman no choice but to abandon them, while camels brought from the empire's Eastern provinces, unused to the difficult conditions, were lost in large numbers. Sickness and poor health became common amongst the ranks of the janissaries, claiming plenty of lives along the perilous journey.

Suleiman arrived in Osijek on the 6th of August. On the 18th he reached the Mohács plain, to be greeted by a substantial cavalry force led by John Zápolya (which would later accompany Suleiman to Vienna), who paid him homage and helped him recapture several fortresses lost since the Battle of Mohács to the Austrians, including Buda, which fell on the 8th of September. The only resistance came at Pozsony, where the Turkish fleet was bombarded as it sailed up the Danube.

Defensive measures

As the Ottomans advanced towards Vienna, the city's population organised an ad-hoc resistance formed from local farmers, peasants and civilians determined to repel the inevitable attack who were supported by a variety of European mercenaries; namely German Landsknecht pikemen and Spanish musketeers sent by Charles V.

The Margrave of Austria (equivalent to the English Marshall), Wilhelm von Roggendorf, assumed charge of the defensive garrison, with operational command entrusted to a seventy-year-old German mercenary named Niklas Graf Salm, who had distinguished himself at the Battle of Pavia in 1525. Salm arrived in Vienna as head of the mercenary relief force and set about fortifying the three-hundred-year-old walls surrounding St. Stephen's Cathedral, near which he established his headquarters. To ensure the city could withstand a lengthy siege, he blocked the four city gates and reinforced the walls, which in some places were no more than six feet thick, and erected earthen bastions and an inner earthen rampart (A type of defensive wall consisting of a low earthen embankment topped by a parapet or palisade), levelling buildings where necessary to clear room for defences.

Siege

The Ottoman army which arrived in late September had been somewhat depleted during the long advance into Austrian territory, leaving Suleiman short of camels and heavy artillery. Many of his troops arrived at Vienna in a poor state of health after the tribulations of a long march through the thick of the European wet season and of those fit to fight, a third were light cavalry, or Sipahis, ill-suited for siege warfare. Three richly dressed Austrian prisoners were dispatched as emissaries by the Sultan to negotiate the city's surrender; Salm sent three richly dressed Muslims back without a response. Suleiman's 300 various artillery pieces and cannons immediately commenced bombarding Vienna's walls, but it failed to significantly damage the Austrian defensive earthworks.

As the Ottoman army settled into position, the Austrian garrison launched sorties to disrupt the digging and mining of tunnels below the city's walls by Ottoman sappers, and in one case almost capturing Ibrahim Pasha. The defensive forces detected and successfully detonated several mines intended to bring down the city's walls, subsequently dispatching 8,000 men on the 6th of October to attack the Ottoman mining operations, destroying many of the tunnels but sustaining serious losses when the confined spaces hindered their retreat into the city.

More rain fell on the 11th October, and with Ottoman's failing to make any breaches in Vienna's walls the chances of a quick and absolute Ottoman victory to add to Suleiman's previously unstoppable European campaign seemed slim at best. In addition, Suleiman was facing critical shortages of supplies such as food and water; while casualties, sickness, and desertions began taking a toll on their ranks. Suleiman's janissaries began voicing their displeasure at the progression of the unfolding siege and demanded that he that take a stand on whether to remain or abandon the siege. The Sultan convened an official council on the 12th of October to deliberate the matter, and decided upon attempting one last, major assault on Vienna, an "all or nothing" gamble to finally conclude what had been a prolonged and bitter stalemate. Even the elite janissaries now voiced discontent at the state of affairs. In view of these factors, Suleiman had no alternative but to contemplate retreat. He held a council of war on 12 October which decided on one last attack, with extra rewards offered to the troops. However, this assault, too, was repulsed, as once again the arquebuses and long pikes of the defenders prevailed in keeping out the Turks.

Unseasonably heavy snowfall made conditions go from bad to worse and the Ottoman retreat into a disaster. Much baggage and artillery was simply left behind (being too cumbersome) or lost in rough conditions, as were many prisoners, wounded and dead. The receding army suffered an attack at Pozsony (modern Bratislava), a short 150km distance from Vienna, as Suleiman's force made its way east back to Ottoman Hungary.

Aftermath

Some historians speculate that Suleiman's final assault wasn't necessarily intended to take the city but to cause as much damage as possible and weaken it for a later attack, a tactic he had employed at Buda in 1526. Suleiman would lead another campaign against Vienna in 1532, alas it was never to truly materialise as his force was stalled by a resilient Royal Hungarian fort in Kőszeg, which managed to delay his force until winter closed in and Charles V, now largely aware of Vienna's vulnerability and weakened state, assembled 80,000 troops to confront the Ottoman force. Instead of going ahead with second siege attempt the Ottoman force turned back, laying waste to the south-eastern Austrian state of Styria in their retreat. So instead of carrying out the planned siege, the invading troops retreated through and laid waste to Styria. The Viennan two campaigns in essence marked the extreme limit of Ottoman logistical capability at the time, to field large armies deep in central and western Europe. The army made its way back to Constantinople where it was stationed for the winter, so that its troops could attend to their fiefdoms and recruit for the next year's campaigning.

Suleiman's retreat however did not mark a complete failure. The campaign underlined and maintained Ottoman control of southern Hungary and left behind a trail of collateral damage in the neighbouring Habsburg Hungary and Austria that impaired Ferdinand's capacity to mount a sustained counter-attack. Suleiman's achievement was to consolidate the gains of 1526 and further establish the puppet kingdom of John Zápolya as a buffer state against the Holy Roman Empire.

The invasion and its climactic siege exacted a heavy toll upon sides, with tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians left it in its wake. It was to be the milestone that marked the end of Suleiman's expansion towards the centre of Europe and arguably the beginning of the the stagnation and decline of the Ottoman Empire as the dominant power of the Renaissance world.Rolf Adolf Kahn, a German historian writing in 1529, remarked: "The delivery of Vienna by a brave garrison under Count Niklas Salm in 1529, was probably a greater though less spectacular achievement than the liberation five generations later brought about primarily by the efforts of a rather large army of combined imperial and Polish forces".

Ferdinand I erected a funeral monument for the German mercenary Niklas Graf Salm, head of the mercenary relief force dispatched to Vienna, as a token of appreciation to his efforts. Niklas survived the initial siege attempt but had been injured during the last Ottoman assault and died on the 4th of May, 1530. The Renaissance sarcophagus is now on display in the baptistery of the Votivkirche cathedral in Vienna. Ferdinand's son, Maximilian II, later built the Castle of Neugebaeude on the spot where Suleiman is said to have pitched his tent during the siege.

See also

• Battle of Tours

References and notes

1. Turnbull says the garrison was "over 16,000 strong". The Ottoman Empire, p 50; Keegan and Wheatcroft suggest 17,000. Who's Who in Military History, p 283; Some estimates are just above 20,000, for example: "Together with Wilhelm von Roggendorf, the Marshal of Austria, Salm conducted the defense of Vienna with 16,000 regulars and 5,000 militia." Dupuy, Trevor, et al, The Encyclopedia of Military Biography, p 653.
2. Turnbull suggests Suleiman had "perhaps 120,000" troops when he reached Osijek on 6 August. The Ottoman Empire, p 50; Christopher Duffy suggests "Suleiman led an army of 125,000 Turks". Siege Warfare: Fortresses in the Early Modern World 1494-1660, p 201. For higher estimates, see further note on Suleiman's troops.
3. Turnbull, Stephen. The Ottoman Empire 1326 - 1699. New York: Osprey, 2003.pg 51
4. ^ Turnbull, Stephen. The Ottoman Empire 1326 - 1699. New York: Osprey, 2003. pg 51
5. "The failure of the first brought to a standstill the tide of Ottoman conquest which had been flooding up the Danube Valley for a century past." Toynbee, p 119; "The expedition had been successful at least politically. Suleiman had driven Ferdinand out of Hungary and installed in his place an obedient vassal. But more significant was the fact that a Turkish army had been beaten back before the walls of Vienna by a force much inferior in numbers. This may be considered the beginning of the end of Ottoman military superiority…at Vienna Suleiman discovered that western artillery was equal to his own and that Austrian and Spanish foot soldiers with their harquebuses and long pikes, were, if anything, superior to his janissaries." Stavrianos, p 77; "Sitting outside the Habsburg capital, with his army beset by seemingly insurmountable logistical problems, Suleiman was brought to conclude that the Ottoman Empire could expand no further into Europe, that Muslim expansionism in Eurasia had reached, indeed had probably extended beyond its destined territorial limits." Sicker, p 1-2.
6. It was an "afterthought towards the end of a season of campaigning". Riley-Smith, p 256; "A last minute decision following a quick victory in Hungary". Shaw and Shaw, p 94; Other historians, for example Stephen Turnbull, regard the suppression of Hungary as the calculated prologue to an invasion further into Europe: "John Szapolya became a footnote in the next great Turkish advance against Europe in the most ambitious campaign of the great Sultan’s reign." Turnbull, p 50.
7. Turnbull, Stephen. The Ottoman Empire 1326 - 1699. New York: Osprey, 2003. pg 49
8. Turnbull, Stephen. The Ottoman Empire 1326 - 1699. New York: Osprey, 2003. pg 49 - 50
9. Turnbull suggests Suleiman had "perhaps 120,000" troops when he reached Osijek on 6 August. Turnbull, p 50; Very high figures appear in nineteenth-century histories, for example that of Augusta Theodosia Drane in 1858, "more than 300,000 men"; such estimates may derive from contemporary accounts: the Venetian diarist Marino Sanuto, on 29 October 1529, for example, recorded the Turkish army as containing 305,200 men (mentioned in Albert Howe Lyber's The Government of the Ottoman Empire in the Time of Suleiman the Magnificent, p 107). Modern books sometimes repeat the higher figures—for example, Daniel Chirot, in The Origins of Backwardness in Eastern Europe, 1980, p 183, says "some 300,000 men besieged Vienna in 1529"; an alternative figure appears in Islam at War: "The sultan’s army of 250,000 appeared before the gates of Vienna in the first siege of that great city", Walton, et al, 2003, p 104.
10. In April, the diploma by which Suleiman confirmed Ibrahim Pasha's appointment as serasker included the following: "Whatever he says and in whatever manner he decides to regard things, you are to accept them as if they were the propitious words and respect-commanding decrees issuing from my own pearl-dispensing tongue." Quoted by Rhoads Murphey in Ottoman Warfare 1500-1700, p 136.
11. ^ Turnbull, p 50-1.
12. Stavrianos, p 77.
13. Ferdinand I had withdrawn to the safety of Habsburg Bohemia following pleas for assistance to his brother, Emperor Charles V, who was too stretched by his war with France to spare more than a few Spanish infantry to the cause.
14. Spielman, p 22.
15. Fisher, p 214.
16. Stavrianos, p 78.
17. Tracy, p 140.
18. Riley-Smith, p 256.
19. Shaw and Shaw, p 93.
20. "This may be considered the end of Ottoman military superiority." Stavrianos, p 78.
21. Kann, p 38.
22. Entry on Salm. Dupuy, et al, p 653.
23. Louthan, p 43.

Bibliography

• Chirot, Daniel, The Origins of Backwardness in Eastern Europe, 1980, ISBN 0-52-200762-0
• Duffy, Christopher, Siege Warfare: Fortresses in the Early Modern World 1494-1660, Routledge, 1996, 0-14-514649-6
• Dupuy, Trevor.N., Curt Johnson, and David.L.Bongard, The Encyclopedia of Military Biography, I.B.Tauris & Co. Ltd., 1992, ISBN 1-85-043569-3
• Fisher, Sydney Nettleton, The Middle East: A History, Knopf, 1979 3rd ed, ISBN 0-3-9432098-0
• Kann, Robert Adolf, A History of the Habsburg Empire: 1526-1918, University of California Press, 1980, ISBN 0-52-004206-9
• Keegan, John, and Andrew Wheatcroft, Who's Who in Military History: From 1453 to the Present Day, Routledge (UK), 1996, ISBN 0-41-512722-X
• Louthan, Howard, The Quest for Compromise: Peacemakers in Counter-Reformation Vienna, 1997, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-52-158082-X
• Lyber, Albert Howe, The Government of the Ottoman Empire in the Time of Suleiman the Magnificent, Harvard University Press, 1913
• Murphey, Rhoads, Ottoman Warfare 1500-1700, Rutgers University Press, 1999, ISBN 0-81-352685-X
• Riley-Smith, Jonathan, The Oxford History of the Crusades, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-280312-3
• Shaw, Stanford Jay, and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Cambridge University Press, 1977, ISBN 0-52-129163-1
• Sicker, Martin, The Islamic World in Decline: from the Treaty of Karlowitz to the Disintegration of the Ottoman Empire, Praeger/Greenwood, 2000, ISBN 0-27-596891-X
• Spielman, John Philip, The City and the Crown: Vienna and the Imperial Court, Purdue University Press, 1993, ISBN 1-55-753021-1
• Toynbee, Arnold, A Study of History, Oxford University Press, 1987 edition, ISBN 0-19-505080-0
• Turnbull, Stephen, The Ottoman Empire: 1326-1699, Osprey Publishing, 2003, ISBN 1-84-176569-4
• Tracy, James. D., Europe's Reformations: 1450-1650, Rowman and Littlefield, 2006, ISBN 0-74-253789-7
• Walton, Mark.W., George.F.Nafziger, and Laurent.W.Mbanda, Islam at War: A History, Praeger/Greenwood, 2003, ISBN 0-27-598101-0

• Conflicts in 1529
• Crusades
• 1529 in Austria
• History of Vienna
• Islam in Austria
• Sieges involving Austria
• Sieges involving the Ottoman Empire
• Battles involving Serbia
• Sieges involving Serbia
• Battles involving Moldavia
• Battles involving Bohemia