Battle of Vienna (1683). Battle of Vienna (1683) Just before the battle

The impression was that the sun now did not set over the lands of the Habsburgs. And what about the Turks? In Vienna, they seemed to have been completely forgotten. And it was a serious mistake. As a result, on September 27, 1529, the hidden threat became a reality: Suleiman the Magnificent (1494–1566), Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, laid siege to Vienna.

Prior to this, in 1526, Suleiman sent his 100,000th army on a campaign against Hungary. On August 29, at the Battle of Mohacs, the Turks utterly defeated and almost completely destroyed the army of Lajos II, and the king himself, who fled from the battlefield, drowned in a swamp. Hungary was devastated, and the Turks took tens of thousands of its inhabitants into slavery.

After that, the southern part of Hungary fell under the rule of the Turks. However, Ferdinand I of Austria (1503–1564), the brother of King Charles V of Spain (they were the sons of Philip I and Juanna of Aragon), put forward his claims to the Hungarian throne, since his wife Anna was the sister of the deceased childless Lajos II. However, Ferdinand managed to achieve recognition only in the western part of Hungary, and in the north-east of the country he had a competitor - the ruler of Transylvania, Janos Zapolya, whom Suleiman the Magnificent recognized as the king of Hungary and his vassal.

Ferdinand I was also proclaimed king of Hungary and captured the capital of Hungary, Buda.

In 1527-1528, the Turks successively conquered Bosnia, Herzegovina and Slavonia, and then, under the slogan of protecting the rights of Janos Zapolya, the Sultan took Buda on September 8, 1529, driving the Austrians out of there, and in September laid siege to Vienna.

The number of troops of Suleiman the Magnificent was at least 120,000 people. In addition to the elite Janissary regiments, the Ottoman army also included Moldovan and Serbian units. Against them, Vienna had very little to offer in its defense - a small defense army and a city rampart of the 13th century, which, in fact, has never been reconstructed since that time.

The Viennese knew that the Turks would not spare them (they were convinced of this after the Austrian garrison of Buda was completely cut out). Ferdinand I urgently left for Bohemia and asked for help from his brother Charles V, but he was embroiled in a difficult war with France and could not provide serious support to Ferdinand. Nevertheless, Ferdinand still received several Spanish cavalry regiments from his brother.

Marshal Wilhelm von Roggendorff took charge of the city's defenses. He ordered all the city gates to be walled up and the walls to be reinforced, the thickness of which in some places did not exceed two meters. He also ordered earthen bastions to be built, demolishing any houses that interfered with construction.

When the Turkish army approached the walls of Vienna, nature itself seemed to come to the defense of the Austrians. Many rivers overflowed their banks, and the roads were washed out. The heavy siege weapons of the Turks got stuck in the mud and sank in the swamps. In addition, hundreds of camels died, on which the Turks carried ammunition, weapons and ammunition. Diseases were rampant among the troops, and many soldiers were unable to fight.

Nevertheless, the Turks offered to surrender the city without a fight. There was no answer to this proposal, which in itself was already an answer - a negative answer.

The siege began, and the Turkish artillery was never able to do any significant damage to the Austrian earthworks. Attempts to dig underground passages into the city or mine trenches also ended in complete failure. The besieged constantly made sorties and frustrated all the plans of the besiegers.

On October 11, a terrible downpour began. The Turks ran out of fodder for their horses, and the number of deserters grew sick and died from wounds and deprivation. Even the elite Janissaries were in a difficult situation.

On October 12, a council of war was convened, at which it was proposed to make a last attempt at an assault. However, this assault was also repulsed, and on the night of October 14, the besieged suddenly heard terrible screams coming from the enemy camp - it was the Turks who massacred everyone
captive Christians before starting the retreat.

Jean de Car writes:

“On October 15, Suleiman's troops lifted the siege. It lasted eighteen days, which is not much, but still never before have warriors dressed in strange armor and light helmets with sultans barely covering their heads, and armed with long curved sabers, come so close to St. Stephen's Cathedral. The Viennese talked about this for a very long time.”

The departure of the Turks was perceived by the besieged as a miracle, and Vienna subsequently received the definition of "the strongest fortress of Christianity" (it was rebuilt as such immediately after the siege by erecting a new, even more powerful belt of fortifications).

In 1532, Suleiman the Magnificent undertook a new campaign, but the conquest of western Hungary took too much time for the Turks. Winter was already close, and it was already useless to try to capture Vienna again. The fact is that Charles V finally came to the rescue of his brother, putting up an 80,000-strong army against the Turks. In addition, the heroic defense of the border fortress of Kösög frustrated the plans of those who intended to lay siege to Vienna again. As a result, the Turks again had to retreat, but at the same time they ravaged Styria.

Nevertheless, the retreat of the troops of Suleiman the Magnificent did not mean their complete defeat. The Ottoman Empire retained control over southern Hungary. In addition, the Turks deliberately devastated the Austrian part of Hungary and large areas of Austria itself in order to weaken the resources of these lands and to make it more difficult for Ferdinand I to repel new attacks. At the same time, the Turks managed to create a buffer puppet Hungarian state, which was headed by the vassal of Suleiman the Magnificent, Janos Zapolya.

Nevertheless, the siege of Vienna, failed by the Turks, marked the end of the rapid expansion of the Ottoman Empire into Central Europe, although after that, fierce clashes continued for another century and a half, reaching their climax in 1683, when the famous Battle of Vienna took place.

In 1678-1679, the bubonic plague raged in Vienna. As a result, a terrible disease killed from 70,000 to 120,000 people - almost a third of the urban population.

Preacher Abraham Santa Clara wrote in 1680:

“There are no alleys, no streets that would not be crossed out by rampant death. For a whole month around Vienna and in Vienna, one could see only one thing - how the dead are being carried, how the dead are being carried, how the dead are being dragged, how the dead are being buried.

Before the city had time to recover from the plague, a new test fell on it. This was the second Turkish siege, which took place in 1683. The Ottoman army under the leadership of the Grand Vizier Kara-Mustafa (1634–1683) under Sultan Mehmed IV reached, according to some sources, 175,000 people, including 15,000–20,000 Crimean Tatars of Khan Murad Giray and 110,000 people from lands subject to the Turks, other sources, including Joseph-François Michaud, "up to 300,000 Muslims gathered in the camp under the walls of Vienna." Historian Alfred Michiels specifies that Kara Mustafa "made enormous preparations and gathered 300,000 troops" together with Emerik Tekeli, a Hungarian feudal lord who concluded an allied treaty with the Turks against the Habsburgs. He also claims that “the real number of Turkish troops is known reliably from the lists found in the tent of Kara-Mustafa. 260,000 regular troops encamped around the militant vizier.

In any case, it was the largest army in the history of the Ottoman Empire. She gathered from Asia, from Africa, from all over the empire, but the most terrible warriors in this army were the Janissaries ( Janissaries - regular Turkish infantry. Together with sipahs (heavy cavalry) and akynji (light cavalry), they formed the basis of the army in the Ottoman Empire. ) and Kalmyks.

Only about 24,000 people managed to gather armed and combat-ready defenders of the city, but they were commanded by Count Ernst Rüdiger von Staremberg (1638-1701). This was a famous Austrian commander who repeatedly showed his remarkable courage and strategic abilities in the war with France, the eternal enemy of Austria. Three years earlier, he had been appointed commandant of Vienna.

The Turks approached Vienna in early July 1683. The defenders immediately decided to sacrifice the suburb and set fire to it. On July 14, the entire gigantic Turkish army was already in front of the walls of the city. At the same time, the general headquarters of Kara-Mustafa is located on a mountain, which is located next to the current church of St. Ulrich. A huge camp was set up, of which Alfred Michiels writes:

“On the morning of the 14th, the rising sun illuminated 25,000 tents in the camp of the infidels. In the very middle, the tent of the Grand Vizier was distinguished by its brilliance and size.

At the sight of such a terrifying picture, panic began in the city, and the impassive and sluggish Emperor Leopold I of the Habsburg dynasty (1640-1705) fled to Linz with the whole court, leaving his capital to its fate.

On the same day, Kara-Mustafa sent an ultimatum to the city about the surrender of the city. Count Ernst Rüdiger von Staremberg, of course, flatly refused to capitulate. And the point here was not only in his personal courage. Everyone in the besieged city knew very well that shortly before this, the Turks had staged a massacre in Perchtoldsdorf, located south of Vienna. The authorities of this settlement recklessly accepted the offer of surrender, but the Turks treacherously violated its terms and drowned everything around in blood.

Having received a refusal, Kara-Mustafa ordered to dig long trenches in the direction of the city, which would protect his soldiers from Austrian artillery fire. However, the Turks also had excellent artillery of 300 guns, but the fortifications of Vienna were strong, built according to the latest fortification science of that time. Realizing this, the Turks began to mine the city fortifications.

The Turkish command had two options for the development of events: on the one hand, it was possible to rush with all its might to the attack (and this could well lead to victory, since there were many times more Turks than the defenders of the city), on the other hand, it was possible to besiege and securely block the city. Kara-Mustafa chose the second option. He correctly considered that the assault on a well-fortified city would cost him huge casualties, while the siege was an excellent way to take Vienna anyway, but with minimal losses. And, I must say, he almost succeeded. The only thing the Grand Vizier did not take into account was time. It was his slowness that eventually led to the fact that help had time to approach Vienna.

But before that it was still far away, but for now the Turks cut off all the ways of supplying the besieged city with food. The garrison and the inhabitants of Vienna were in a critical situation. As Oscar Jaeger writes in his World History, "hunger and exhaustion took their toll." The general exhaustion soon became so severe that Count von Staremberg ordered the execution of anyone who fell asleep or passed out while on duty. But even such harsh measures no longer helped, because it is very difficult to love the Motherland on an empty stomach (we should not forget that even the Our Father begins with a request for daily bread).

However, it was hard not only for the defenders of Vienna. The Turks also suffered heavy losses, and many sick and wounded accumulated in their camp.

Despite the fact that Vienna held out very staunchly, by the end of August it began to seem that the forces of the besieged had come to an end. And at that time, help approached the city from the northeast.

The decisive battle took place on September 12, 1683, when the united forces of the Holy League, an anti-Turkish coalition under the patronage of the Pope, formed during the outbreak of the Austrian war against Turkey, approached Vienna.

The total strength of the allied army was over 84,000 people. The combined forces were commanded by the King of the Commonwealth, Jan III Sobieski (1629–1696). With him he brought 37,000 soldiers with 28 guns. Charles V of Lorraine commanded 18,400 Austrians with 70 guns. Prince Georg-Friedrich of Waldeck fielded 20,000 Bavarian, Franconian and Swabian soldiers with 38 guns. Elector of Saxony Johann-Georg III commanded 9,000 Saxons with 16 cannons.

The size of the Turkish army on the day of the Battle of Vienna, apparently, did not exceed 55,000-60,000 people.

Six days earlier, the Polish army had crossed the Danube 30 kilometers northwest of Vienna and joined with the rest of the Holy League, whose actions had already been blessed by Pope Innocent XI. Only King Louis XIV, the principal opponent of the Habsburgs, refused to help the allies.

By this time, Turkish sappers had blown up significant sections of the city walls one after another, which led to the formation of huge gaps. Everything indicated that very soon they would have to fight on the streets of the city.

The Christian allies needed to act very quickly so as not to besiege captured Vienna themselves. They reached the approaches to the city and occupied the Kahlenberg and Leopoldsberg mountain ranges, towering above the valley where the Turkish positions were located. This done, they signaled their arrival to the besieged by flares.

In the early morning of September 12, the Turks launched an attack to prevent the Allies from properly building up their forces. Charles V of Lorraine with his Austrians counterattacked from the left flag, and the Germans attacked the center of the Turkish positions.

Historian Oscar Jaeger writes:

“The entire Christian army moved forward against the barbarians. On the left, closer to the Danube, the imperial troops were deployed, under the leadership of the Duke of Lorraine, who had thirty-three sovereign princes under his command; among them was one from the House of Savoy. In the center were government troops, as well as Saxon and Bavarian troops, led by the electors themselves; on the right - the Poles with their king Sobes-kim. The Turks now had to build a front simultaneously on two sides: to the side of the city and to the side of the reinforcements.

Kara-Mustafa, in turn, counterattacked, but it was too late. Now the Polish cavalry dealt a powerful blow to the flank of the Turks. It was a great attack! A real twenty-thousand iron avalanche of Polish hussars and German cavalry rolled over the Turks. It is believed that this was one of the largest cavalry charges in the history of warfare.

In addition, the enthusiastic defenders of Vienna ran out of the city and joined the attack on the Turks.

It was a victory after which Jan III Sobieski paraphrased the famous saying of Julius Caesar, saying: “ Venimus, Vidimus, Deus vicit- "We came, we saw, God won."

Joseph-Francois Michaud says:

“Victory was soon decided. “Glory to God,” the King of Poland wrote at the end of the battle, “the Lord gave victory to our people; bestowed such a triumph, which was not seen in past centuries! On the day after the battle, prayers of thanksgiving were performed in all the Viennese churches, which the Grand Vizier had sworn to turn into mosques. A large Muslim banner was sent to the pope, and Sobieski sent a "report on the battle won and the salvation of Christendom" to the French king.

In the battle near Vienna, the Turks lost at least 15,000 people killed and wounded. Over 5,000 people were taken prisoner. At the same time, the Allies captured all Turkish guns. Allied losses were approximately 4,000–4,500.

Alfred Michiels states:

“There was a terrible fight; everywhere the infidels were defeated. Little by little, the Christians surrounded them on all sides, pressed them to the river and began a terrible massacre […] On the day of the liberation of Vienna, 20,000 Ottomans died by the Germans and Poles.

Oscar Jaeger adds:

“The Turks fled, leaving on the battlefield […] 300 guns, 15,000 tents, 9,000 wagons and up to ten million in money and jewelry. The pursuit of the runaway enemy also gave significant results.

The Polish king then wrote to his wife:

“We captured unheard-of riches […] tents, sheep, cattle and a considerable number of camels […] This is a victory that has never been equaled, the enemy is completely destroyed and everything has been lost. They can only run for their lives […] Commander Shtaremberg hugged and kissed me, calling me his savior.”

Note that Ernst Rüdiger von Staremberg was wounded in the hand, but remained at his post throughout the siege. As a reward for this, he received the rank of field marshal. He ordered the restoration of the badly damaged fortifications of Vienna to begin immediately - in case of a Turkish counterattack. But it turned out to be redundant. The Turks did not even think about revenge. Moreover, they themselves dealt with Kara-Mustafa, who suffered a crushing defeat: on December 25, 1683, on the orders of Sultan Mehmed IV, he was strangled with a silk cord, each end of which was pulled by several people.

E.H. Gritsak writes in his book "Vienna":

“After the siege of 1683, the once beautiful Vienna was a huge pile of stones surrounded by burnt suburbs. The fortress wall gaping with holes, charred trees, collapsed houses, entire neighborhoods destroyed by fire and Turkish shells, left no doubt that the city would have to be rebuilt. The construction period that began then turned out to be intense, fortunately beneficial, and determined the development of the Austrian capital for centuries.

Having learned a bitter lesson, the authorities first of all took care of protection, issuing a decree according to which any construction was prohibited closer than 600 steps from the fortress walls. All buildings in the restricted area were demolished […]

Feeling the care of the crown, the capital began to develop very quickly. A noticeable revival was observed both in the economy and in culture, which soon reached unprecedented heights.

As for the Turks, in the next sixteen years they lost Hungary and Transylvania, until they finally admitted their defeat by signing the Peace of Karlowitz on January 26, 1699.

Vienna battle took place on September 11, 1683, after a two-month siege of Vienna, the capital of Austria, by the troops of the Ottoman Empire. The Christian victory in this battle put an end to the Ottoman Empire's wars of conquest on European soil forever, and Austria became the most powerful power in Central Europe for decades.

The large-scale battle was won by the Polish-Austrian-German troops under the command of Jan III Sobieski, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania. The troops of the Ottoman Empire were commanded by Kara Mustafa, Grand Vizier of Mehmed IV.

The Battle of Vienna was a turning point in the three-century war of the states of Central Europe against the Ottoman Empire. Over the next 16 years, Austrian troops launched a large-scale offensive and recaptured significant territories from the Turks - southern Hungary and Transylvania.

Prerequisites for the battle

The Ottoman Empire has always sought to capture Vienna. A strategically important major city, Vienna controlled the Danube, which connected the Black Sea with Western Europe, as well as trade routes from the Eastern Mediterranean to Germany. Before starting the second siege of the Austrian capital (the first siege was in 1529), the Ottoman Empire carefully prepared for war for several years. The Turks repaired roads and bridges leading to Austria and to the supply bases of their troops, to which they brought weapons, military equipment and artillery from all over the country.

In addition, the Ottoman Empire provided military support to the Hungarians and non-Catholic religious minorities living in the part of Hungary occupied by the Austrians. Dissatisfaction with the anti-Protestant policies of Emperor Leopold I of Austria of Habsburg, an ardent supporter of the Catholic Counter-Reformation, grew over the years in this country. As a result, this discontent resulted in an open uprising against Austria, and in 1681 the Protestants and other opponents of the Habsburgs allied themselves with the Turks. The Turks, on the other hand, recognized the leader of the rebellious Hungarians, Imre Tököly, as the king of Upper Hungary (present-day eastern Slovakia and northeastern Hungary), which he had previously conquered from the Habsburgs. They even promised the Hungarians to create a "Kingdom of Vienna" especially for them, if they would help them capture the city.

In 1681-1682, clashes between the forces of Imre Thököly and the Austrian government troops sharply increased. The latter invaded the central part of Hungary, which served as a pretext for war. Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha managed to convince Sultan Mehmed IV to allow an attack on Austria. The Sultan ordered the vizier to enter the northeastern part of Hungary and besiege two castles - Gyor and Komárom. In January 1682, the mobilization of Turkish troops began, and on August 6 of the same year, the Ottoman Empire declared war on Austria.

In those days, supply capabilities made any large-scale offensive extremely risky. In this case, after only three months of hostilities, the Turkish army would have to winter far from their homeland, in enemy territory. Therefore, during the 15 months that passed from the beginning of the mobilization of the Turks to their offensive, the Austrians intensively prepared for war, entered into alliances with other states of Central Europe, which played a decisive role in the defeat of the Turks. It was during this winter that Leopold I made an alliance with Poland. He pledged to help the Poles if the Turks laid siege to Krakow, and the Poles in turn pledged to help Austria if the Turks laid siege to Vienna.

On March 31, 1683, a note declaring war arrived at the Habsburg Imperial Court. She was sent by Kara Mustafa on behalf of Mehmed IV. The next day, the Turkish army set off from the city of Edirne on an aggressive campaign. In early May, Turkish troops arrived in Belgrade, and then went to Vienna. On July 7, 40,000 Tatars camped 40 kilometers east of the Austrian capital. There were half as many Austrians in that area. After the first skirmishes, Leopold I retreated to Linz with 80,000 refugees.

As a sign of support, the King of Poland arrived in Vienna in the summer of 1683, thus demonstrating his readiness to fulfill his obligations. For this, he even left his country undefended. In order to protect Poland from foreign invasion during his absence, he threatened Imre Thököly to ravage his lands to the ground if he encroached on Polish soil.

Siege of Vienna

The main Turkish forces arrived near Vienna on July 14. On the same day, Kara Mustafa sent an ultimatum to the city to surrender the city.

A total of 84,450 people (of which 3,000 guarded the drummers and did not participate in the battle) and 152 guns.

Just before the battle

Allied Christian forces had to act quickly. It was necessary to save the city from the Turks, otherwise the allies themselves would have to besiege captured Vienna. Despite the multinationality and heterogeneity of the allied forces, the allies established a clear command of the troops in just six days. The core of the troops was the Polish heavy cavalry under the command of the King of Poland. The fighting spirit of the soldiers was strong, for they went into battle not in the name of the interests of their kings, but in the name of the Christian faith. In addition, unlike the Crusades, the war was fought in the very heart of Europe.

Kara Mustafa, having at his disposal enough time to organize a successful confrontation with the forces of the allies, raising the morale of his soldiers, failed to properly take advantage of this opportunity. He entrusted the protection of the rear to the Crimean Khan and his cavalry of 30,000 - 40,000 horsemen.

Khan, on the other hand, felt humiliated by the insulting treatment from the Turkish commander in chief. Therefore, he refused to attack the Polish troops on their way through the mountains. And not only the Tatars ignored the orders of Kara Mustafa.

In addition to the Tatars, the Turks could not rely on the Moldavians and Vlachs, who had good reasons not to like the Ottoman Empire. The Turks not only imposed a heavy tribute on Moldavia and Wallachia, but also constantly interfered in their affairs, removing local rulers and putting their puppets in their place. When the princes of Moldavia and Wallachia found out about the conquest plans of the Turkish Sultan, they tried to warn the Habsburgs about this. They also tried to avoid participating in the war, but the Turks forced them. There are many legends about how Moldavian and Wallachian gunners loaded their cannons with straw cannonballs and fired them at the besieged Vienna.

Because of all these disagreements, the allied army managed to approach Vienna. The Duke of Lorraine, Charles V, gathered an army in the German territories, which received reinforcement due to the timely arrival of Sobieski's army. The siege of Vienna was in its eighth week when the army arrived on the north bank of the Danube. The troops of the Holy League arrived at Kahlenberg (Bald Mountain), which dominated the city, and signaled their arrival to the besieged with flares. At the military council, the allies came to the decision to cross the Danube 30 km upstream and advance on the city through the Vienna forests. In the early morning of September 12, just before the battle, Mass was celebrated for the Polish king and his knights.

Battle

The battle began before all the Christian forces were deployed. At 4 o'clock in the morning, the Turks attacked to prevent the Allies from properly building up their forces. Charles of Lorraine and Austrian troops counterattacked from the left flank, while the Germans attacked the center of the Turks.

Then Kara Mustafa, in turn, counterattacked, and left some of the elite Janissary units to storm the city. He wanted to capture Vienna before Sobieski arrived, but it was too late. Turkish sappers dug a tunnel for a full-scale undermining of the walls, but while they were feverishly filling it up to increase the power of the explosion, the Austrians managed to dig an oncoming tunnel and neutralize the mine in time.

While the Turkish and Austrian sappers competed in speed, a fierce battle was going on above. The Polish cavalry dealt a powerful blow to the right flank of the Turks. The latter made the main bet not on the defeat of the allied armies, but on the urgent capture of the city. This is what ruined them.

After 12 hours of battle, the Poles continued to hold firmly on the right flank of the Turks. The Christian cavalry stood all day on the hills and watched the battle, in which so far mainly foot soldiers participated. At about 5 p.m., the cavalry, divided into four parts, went on the attack. One of these units consisted of Austro-German horsemen, and the remaining three - from Poles and citizens of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. 20,000 cavalrymen (one of the largest cavalry attacks in history) under the personal command of Jan Sobieski descended from the hills and broke through the ranks of the Turks, already very tired after a day of fighting on two fronts. The Christian horsemen struck directly at the Turkish camp, while the Vienna garrison ran out of the city and joined in the massacre of the Turks.

The Ottoman troops were not only physically exhausted, but also discouraged after their failed attempt to undermine the walls and break into the city. And the cavalry attack forced them to retreat south and east. Less than three hours after the charge of their cavalry, the Christians won a complete victory and saved Vienna.

After the battle, Jan Sobieski paraphrased Julius Caesar's famous dictum by saying "Venimus, Vidimus, Deus vicit" - "We came, we saw, God conquered".

Aftermath of the battle

The Turks lost at least 15 thousand people killed and wounded; over 5 thousand Muslims were taken prisoner. The Allies captured all the Ottoman cannons. At the same time, the losses of the allies amounted to 4.5 thousand people. Although the Turks retreated in a terrible hurry, they still managed to kill all the Austrian prisoners, with the exception of a few nobles left alive with the expectation of getting a ransom for them.

The booty that fell into the hands of the Christians was enormous. A few days later, in a letter to his wife, Jan Sobieski wrote:

“We captured unheard-of riches… tents, sheep, cattle and a considerable number of camels… This is a victory that has never been equaled, the enemy has been completely destroyed and everything has been lost. They can only run for their lives… Commander Shtaremberg hugged and kissed me and called me his savior.”

This stormy expression of gratitude did not prevent Staremberg from ordering the restoration of the badly damaged fortifications of Vienna to begin immediately - in case of a Turkish counterattack. However, this turned out to be redundant. The victory near Vienna marked the beginning of the reconquest of Hungary and (temporarily) some Balkan countries.

In 1699, Austria signed the Peace of Karlowitz with the Ottoman Empire. Long before that, the Turks dealt with Kara Mustafa, who suffered a crushing defeat: on December 25, 1683, Kara Mustafa Pasha, on the orders of the commander of the Janissaries, was executed in Belgrade (strangled with a silk cord, for each end of which several people pulled).

Historical meaning

Although at that time no one knew this yet, the battle of Vienna predetermined the course of the entire war. The Turks fought unsuccessfully for the next 16 years, losing Hungary and Transylvania, until they finally admitted defeat. The end of the war was brought by the Peace of Karlowitz.

The policy of Louis XIV predetermined the course of history for centuries to come: the German-speaking countries were forced to wage wars simultaneously on both the Western and Eastern fronts. While the German troops fought as part of the Holy League, Louis took advantage of this by conquering Luxembourg, Alsace and Strasbourg, devastated vast territories in southern Germany. And Austria could not give the Germans any support in their war with France while the war with the Turks was going on.

In honor of Jan Sobieski, the Austrians built in 1906 a church in honor of St. Joseph on the top of the Kahlenberg hill, north of Vienna. The railway line Vienna - Warsaw is also named after Sobieski. The constellation Shield of Sobieski was also named after him.

The Polish-Austrian friendship did not last long after this victory, as Charles V of Lorraine began to belittle the role of Jan III Sobieski and the Polish army in the battle. Neither Sobieski himself, nor the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth gained anything significant from saving Austria. On the contrary, the battle near Vienna marked the birth of the future Austrian Empire (-) and the fall of the Commonwealth. In and 1795, the Habsburgs took part in the first and third partitions of the Commonwealth, as a result of which this state disappeared from the political map of Europe. The statement of Nicholas I is significant: “The most stupid of the Polish kings was Jan Sobieski, and the most stupid of the Russian emperors was me. Sobieski - because he saved Austria in 1683, and I - because I saved her in 1848. (The Crimean War was lost by Russia primarily because of the treachery of Austria: Russia had to keep half of its army on the Austrian border in order to avoid a “stab in the back”).

religious significance

In memory of the victory over the Muslims, since Sobieski entrusted his kingdom to the intercession of the Virgin Mary of Czestochowa, Pope Innocent XI decided to celebrate the feast of the Holy Name of Mary not only in Spain and the Kingdom of Naples, but throughout the Church. In the liturgical calendar of the Roman Catholic Church, this is September 12th.

From the metal of captured guns won in the battle, in 1711, the Pummerin bell was cast for St. Stephen's Cathedral.

In culture

According to legend, it was after the victory in the Battle of Vienna that coffee began to be drunk in the city and coffee houses appeared.

In music

In literature

• Monaldi R., Sorti F. Imprimatur: To press. - (Series: Historical detective). - M .: AST; AST Moscow; Transitbook, 2006. - ISBN 5-17-033234-3; 5-9713-1419-X; 5-9578-2806-8.
• Malik W.. - M .: Children's literature, 1985.
• Novichev A. D. History of Turkey. T. 1. - L.: Publishing House of Leningrad State University, 1963.
• Podhorodetsky L. Vienna, 1683. - Trans. from Polish. - M .: AST, 2002. - ISBN 5-17-014474-1.
• Emiddio Dortelli D'Ascoli. Description of the Black Sea and Tataria. / Per. N. Pimenova. Foreword A. L. Berthier-Delagarde. - Notes of the Odessa Society of History and Antiquities. T. 24. - Odessa: "Economic" type. and lit., 1902.
• Chukhlib T.. - Kyiv: Clio, 2013. - ISBN 978-617-7023-03-5.

In cinema

• « September 11, 1683"- a feature film, dir. Renzo Martinelli(Italy, Poland, 2012).

see also

An excerpt characterizing the Battle of Vienna (1683)

On the 25th of August, on the eve of the battle of Borodino, the prefect of the palace of the emperor of the French, m r de Beausset, and colonel Fabvier arrived, the first from Paris, the second from Madrid, to the emperor Napoleon in his camp near Valuev.
Having changed into a court uniform, m r de Beausset ordered the parcel brought by him to the emperor to be carried in front of him and entered the first compartment of Napoleon's tent, where, talking with Napoleon's adjutants surrounding him, he began to uncork the box.
Fabvier, without entering the tent, stopped talking with familiar generals at the entrance to it.
Emperor Napoleon had not yet left his bedroom and was finishing his toilette. He, snorting and groaning, turned now with his thick back, then with his fat chest overgrown with a brush, with which the valet rubbed his body. Another valet, holding the bottle with his finger, sprinkled cologne on the well-groomed body of the emperor with an expression that said that he alone could know how much and where to sprinkle cologne. Napoleon's short hair was wet and tangled over his forehead. But his face, although swollen and yellow, expressed physical pleasure: "Allez ferme, allez toujours ..." [Well, even stronger ...] - he kept saying, shrugging and groaning, rubbing the valet. The adjutant, who entered the bedroom in order to report to the emperor on how many prisoners had been taken in yesterday's case, handing over what was needed, stood at the door, waiting for permission to leave. Napoleon, grimacing, looked frowningly at the adjutant.
“Point de prisonniers,” he repeated the words of the adjutant. – Il se font demolir. Tant pis pour l "armee russe," he said. "Allez toujours, allez ferme, [There are no prisoners. They force them to be exterminated. So much the worse for the Russian army. shoulders.
- C "est bien! Faites entrer monsieur de Beausset, ainsi que Fabvier, [Good! Let de Bosset come in, and Fabvier too.] - he said to the adjutant, nodding his head.
- Oui, Sire, [I am listening, sir.] - and the adjutant disappeared through the door of the tent. Two valets quickly dressed His Majesty, and he, in the blue uniform of the Guards, with firm, quick steps, went out into the waiting room.
Bosse at that time was hurrying with his hands, setting the gift he had brought from the empress on two chairs, right in front of the emperor's entrance. But the emperor dressed and went out so unexpectedly quickly that he did not have time to fully prepare the surprise.
Napoleon immediately noticed what they were doing and guessed that they were not yet ready. He didn't want to deprive them of the pleasure of surprise him. He pretended not to see Monsieur Bosset, and called Fabvier to him. Napoleon listened, with a stern frown and in silence, to what Fabvier told him about the courage and devotion of his troops, who fought at Salamanca on the other side of Europe and had only one thought - to be worthy of their emperor, and one fear - not to please him. The result of the battle was sad. Napoleon made ironic remarks during Fabvier's story, as if he did not imagine that things could go differently in his absence.
“I have to fix it in Moscow,” Napoleon said. - A tantot, [Goodbye.] - he added and called de Bosset, who at that time had already managed to prepare a surprise, placing something on the chairs, and covering something with a blanket.
De Bosset bowed low with that courtly French bow that only the old servants of the Bourbons knew how to bow, and approached, handing the envelope.
Napoleon turned to him cheerfully and tugged him by the ear.
- You hurried, very glad. Well, what does Paris say? he said, suddenly changing his previously stern expression to the most affectionate.
- Sire, tout Paris regrette votre absence, [Sir, all Paris regrets your absence.] - as it should, answered de Bosset. But although Napoleon knew that Bosset should say this or the like, although he knew in his clear moments that it was not true, he was pleased to hear this from de Bosset. He again honored him with a touch on the ear.
“Je suis fache, de vous avoir fait faire tant de chemin, [I am very sorry that I made you drive so far.],” he said.
– Sir! Je ne m "attendais pas a moins qu" a vous trouver aux portes de Moscou, [I expected no less than how to find you, sovereign, at the gates of Moscow.] - Bosse said.
Napoleon smiled and, absently raising his head, looked to his right. The adjutant came up with a floating step with a golden snuffbox and held it up. Napoleon took her.
- Yes, it happened well for you, - he said, putting an open snuffbox to his nose, - you like to travel, in three days you will see Moscow. You probably did not expect to see the Asian capital. You will make a pleasant journey.
Bosse bowed in gratitude for this attentiveness to his (hitherto unknown to him) propensity to travel.
- A! what's this? - said Napoleon, noticing that all the courtiers were looking at something covered with a veil. Bosse, with courtly agility, without showing his back, took a half-turn two steps back and at the same time pulled off the veil and said:
“A gift to Your Majesty from the Empress.
It was a portrait painted by Gerard in bright colors of a boy born from Napoleon and the daughter of the Austrian emperor, whom for some reason everyone called the king of Rome.
A very handsome curly-haired boy, with a look similar to that of Christ in the Sistine Madonna, was depicted playing a bilbock. The orb represented the globe, and the wand in the other hand represented the scepter.
Although it was not entirely clear what exactly the painter wanted to express, imagining the so-called King of Rome piercing the globe with a stick, but this allegory, like everyone who saw the picture in Paris, and Napoleon, obviously, seemed clear and very pleased.
“Roi de Rome, [Roman King.],” he said, pointing gracefully at the portrait. – Admirable! [Wonderful!] - With the Italian ability to change the expression at will, he approached the portrait and pretended to be thoughtful tenderness. He felt that what he would say and do now was history. And it seemed to him that the best thing he could do now was that he, with his greatness, as a result of which his son in bilbock played with the globe, so that he showed, in contrast to this greatness, the simplest paternal tenderness. His eyes dimmed, he moved, looked around at the chair (the chair jumped under him) and sat down on it opposite the portrait. One gesture from him - and everyone tiptoed out, leaving himself and his feeling of a great man.
After sitting for some time and touching, for what he did not know, with his hand until the rough reflection of the portrait, he got up and again called Bosse and the duty officer. He ordered the portrait to be taken out in front of the tent, so as not to deprive the old guard, who stood near his tent, of the happiness of seeing the Roman king, the son and heir of their adored sovereign.
As he expected, while he was breakfasting with Monsieur Bosset, who had been honored with this honor, enthusiastic cries of officers and soldiers of the old guard were heard in front of the tent.
- Vive l "Empereur! Vive le Roi de Rome! Vive l" Empereur! [Long live the Emperor! Long live the king of Rome!] – enthusiastic voices were heard.
After breakfast, Napoleon, in the presence of Bosset, dictated his order to the army.

For a long period after the signing of the Treaty of Zhitvatorok (1606), Ottoman-Austrian relations were generally calm, marred from time to time only by border incidents with unsuccessful attempts by the Habsburgs to secure a certain share of political influence in Transylvania. The situation changed when, as a result of the punitive expeditions of the Ottoman troops in 1658-1661. Varadsky vilayet was formed in Transylvania from part of its regions, and an obedient vassal of Porte was placed on the throne of the principality. As a result, the independence of the Transylvanian Principality weakened, it lost its significance as a subject of international relations.

Vienna, trying to avoid war at all costs, agreed with the capture of Varad by the Turks. Bargaining with Sultan Mehmed IV about the conditions for maintaining peace, Emperor Leopold I lost time to mobilize forces to repel another Turkish aggression.

Austro-Turkish War 1663-1664 In 1663, the Turkish army invaded the territory of the Kingdom of Hungary, and the following year moved to the Austrian capital. Western Europe, as never before, realized the danger that not only Vienna, all of Austria, but also the cities and lands of the German Empire behind it, were a few days' march from the Ottoman strongholds. The imperial estates, the Electors of Brandenburg, Bavaria, Saxony, the Archbishop of Salzburg and the Rhine Union sent their troops to help Leopold I. The Pope and the Spanish king helped with money and military equipment.

The general battle took place on August 1, 1664 on the border of Hungary and Austria near the town of Szentgotthard. The Ottoman army had a double numerical superiority, but as a result of the struggle retreated, and then fled. The imperials gave the Turks the opportunity to withdraw to Vashvar. While European military leaders, politicians, diplomats acted to consolidate success under Szentgotthard, representatives of the emperor and the sultan drew up the text of a peace treaty, which was concealed for a month and a half.

Treaty of Washwar 10 August 1664 expanded the Hungarian possessions of the Sultan along the entire length of the Ottoman-Austrian border. Mehmed IV and Leopold I assumed mutual obligations not to help the opponents of the other, to keep each other informed about their plans (!) And exchanged expensive gifts as a token of good intentions.

The reasons for Leopold's conclusion of this hasty, called by his contemporaries "shameful, cowardly and dishonest peace" lay in the sphere of old problems of the Austrian Habsburg dynasty. The priorities of its foreign policy remained in Western Europe and were built primarily on the basis of relations with France and the German princes. Their participation in the Hungarian events in Vienna was feared no less than the prospect of fighting the Turks alone. The attempts of the French king Louis XIV to put together an anti-Habsburg bloc were seen everywhere by the House of Austria: in relations between the king and the princes, between the king and the Confederation of the Rhine, between the king and the Hungarian opposition, between the king and Transylvania, between the king and Poland, and also between the king and the sultan.

Such suspicions were not unfounded.

On the one hand, a military conflict between France and Spain over the Southern Netherlands was brewing in Western Europe, and it worried Leopold more than the Hungarian problems. Therefore, the Vienna court sought not to tie its hands in a war with Turkey.

On the other hand, Austria, neither militarily nor politically, did not yet feel ready for a win-win war, especially not being sure of the trouble-free functioning of the international anti-Ottoman coalition. Hungary, because of which and in which this war was fought, for the sake of its salvation, could turn against the Habsburgs, not disdaining any alliances, even with their sworn enemies: both with the sultan and with the French king. The Austrian house was wary and distrustful of the Hungarians, which could not but be reflected in the decisions taken in Vienna in matters of the war of liberation. The problem was not only of a political nature - after the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) the financial possibilities of the Habsburgs were extremely exhausted.

The Peace of Vasvar in 1664 caused a shock in Hungary, accompanied by indignation at the Habsburgs. The Austrian government cracked down on the oppositional Hungarian nobility, a “direct rule” regime was introduced in the country, which led to an open uprising and a long internal war (the Kuruc movement) under the leadership of I. Tököly. The main task of the anti-Habsburg movement was the expulsion of the Turks and the restoration of the united Kingdom of Hungary in the form in which it existed before the Mohacs catastrophe (1526). The Hungarian political elite had no other way to "save the nation" than to seek help from powerful powers that could, if not continue the war of liberation, then at least keep Austria from the final subjugation of Hungary. These powers were France and the Ottoman Empire. In turn, both Louis XIV and Mehmed IV, providing military and financial support to Thököli, used the Kuruc movement as a trump card in their confrontation with the Habsburgs.

Kara Mustafa's campaign against Vienna in 1683 The conclusion of the Bakhchisaray truce (1681) with Russia opened the way for the Sultan to the long-awaited war with the German emperor. Mehmed IV dreamed of the glory of the Hungarian campaigns of Suleiman I and dreamed of surpassing his ancestor by taking Vienna. The immediate goal was seen by Istanbul in the complete and final conquest of Hungary. The successful military actions of the Kurucians against the Habsburgs turned out to be just in time. I. Thököly received a sultan's diploma with recognition as the prince of Upper Hungary (Slovakia), he became a subject of the Porte with the obligation to pay tribute.

In the spring of 1683, the Turkish army set out from Adrianople. It was announced that a campaign against Hungary had begun, no other plans for the campaign were advertised. Mehmed's court was located in Belgrade, where the Sultan declared Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa the serasker of the campaign. The vizier was its main organizer and longed for military glory - in the battles against the Russians and Cossacks in Ukraine, he did not get the laurels of the winner.

From Belgrade, already without the sultan's escort, Kara Mustafa continued his journey deep into the Hungarian territories. The whole color of the aristocracy of Western Hungary, through which the path to Vienna ran, offered their service to the Grand Vizier.

The Turkish army was joined by Tekoly detachments, the troops of the Crimean Khan, the military contingents of Moldova, Wallachia and Transylvania, led by their rulers, detachments of border beylerbeys and commandants of fortresses (information on the quantitative composition of the Ottoman army ranges from 100 to 350 thousand people). The military council decided to go to Vienna.

July 14, 1683 Kara Mustafa approached the Austrian capital. A week before, Leopold I left her with the court, which was perceived by the population as a shameful flight. The commander-in-chief of the imperial army, Duke Charles of Lorraine, deployed part of his forces near the city in order to wait for the approach of the allied troops here and create a reserve fist. A 12,000-strong garrison remained in the capital.

For two months, these soldiers, together with detachments of volunteers from among the townspeople, courageously defended themselves, repelling the assaults of the Ottomans, which followed every 2-4 days. At the beginning of the siege of Kara Mustafa, he did not use troops and heavy artillery to the full: he wanted to get the city with its huge wealth safe and sound. This could be achieved by forcing Vienna to surrender, which would place it at the disposal of Kara Mustafa. Taking the city by storm would make it legitimate booty for the soldiers. In the second half of August, when it became clear that the crowns intended to hold out to the end, the grand vizier brought down on them the full power of the Ottoman military machine. The besieged were in a critical situation.

France and the Hungarian question. Louis XIV played a significant role in preparing the Ottoman invasion. From the time of the allied treaty between Francis I and Suleiman I (1535), France had a special position at the Sultan's court, was considered a friend, and the Porte in international affairs paid attention primarily to its position. In the XVI - the first half of the XVII century. France resolutely opposed the growth of the power of the Habsburgs and invariably supported the Sultan in international conflicts. However, after the Peace of Westphalia (1648), the Austro-French confrontation weakened somewhat, and the friendly relations of France with the German states and the Commonwealth, which adhered to the anti-Ottoman orientation, strengthened. Therefore, the court of Versailles did not strive as actively as before to support the foreign policy plans of Istanbul, so as not to compromise itself once again in the eyes of European public opinion with ties with the Islamists. Very symbolic was the gesture of Cardinal D. Mazarin, who, leading French foreign policy for many years, incited Porto against the German emperor, and, dying (1661), bequeathed 200 thousand escudos to the Vatican to organize a European war with the Turks.

In the late 1660s - early 1680s. Ottoman-French relations were strained. Mehmed IV had reason to be dissatisfied with his ally Louis XIV: under Szentgotthard, a French detachment fought along with the imperial army, and the Venetians defended the walls of the Cypriot capital Candia with French volunteers. In an effort to tear Poland away from Austria (the rapprochement of these countries, which replaced their traditional rivalry in the Danube-Carpathian region, manifested itself already at the turn of the 16th-17th centuries), France promised the Polish king Jan III Sobieski assistance in strengthening the positions of the Commonwealth in the Baltic and tried to provide pressure on Porto with the aim of concluding the Zhuravne peace as soon as possible (1676).

On the banks of the Bosporus, the diplomatic initiatives of Versailles in the Hungarian question were followed with growing concern - in Warsaw, French diplomats negotiated with representatives of the Kurucians and the government of Transylvania on the creation of an anti-Habsburg bloc and a campaign against Hungary. French diplomacy made every effort to isolate Emperor Leopold I and provoke a conflict between him and the Sultan. At the same time, Louis was afraid to act openly and in every possible way shied away from Mehmed's insistent proposals to conclude an alliance against the emperor. Already on the campaign, Kara Mustafa was afraid to meet French troops in Austria helping his opponents. The French ambassador assured the grand vizier that only a new attack on the Commonwealth could cause an anti-Turkish action by France and that Louis would not oppose the capture of the Austrian capital by the Ottomans.

During the siege of Vienna, Louis, given the plight of the emperor, offered Leopold soldiers along with a long truce, but on the condition that he recognize the French seizures in Alsace, Lorraine and the Southern Netherlands, carried out in the early 1680s.

Having been refused, Louis hatched the idea of ​​liberating Vienna himself, driving back the Turks, acting as the savior of Europe, and by this alone establishing the predominance of France on the continent and, possibly, receiving the crown of the Holy Roman Empire. The eastern policy of France did not just use the momentary situation, but sought to take into account all the factors of the international situation, turning them to its own advantage. Louis consistently tried to integrate the Porte into the politics of the eastern regions of Central Europe under his influence.

However, events did not develop according to the scenario of Versailles.

The defeat of the army of Kara Mustafa. IN March 1683 when the Sultan's troops set out from Adrianople, German Emperor And polish king concluded defensive-offensive alliance against the Ottoman Empire, which formed the basis of the future Holy League.

In August, Jan III Sobieski with an army hurried to the aid of the Viennese. Connecting with the troops of Charles of Lorraine and contingents of troops from Saxony and Bavaria, Sobieski led the operation to lift the siege of the Austrian capital. September 12, when the Turks were preparing for a decisive assault on Vienna, the allies attacked them. The Crimean Tatars betrayed the grand vizier and left without joining the battle. The Turks were defeated and began to retreat to Buda. Sobieski, determined to continue the war, ignored Leopold I's decision to disband the allied forces and rushed after the Ottoman army.

Kara Mustafa not only managed to restore order in his troops, but also inflicted a heavy defeat on Sobieski. It was the turn of the imperial troops who came to the rescue to save the Polish king. On October 9, the Ottomans were defeated while crossing the Danube. Kara Mustafa fled to Belgrade, where the usual fate of a commander who lost a war awaited him: execution by strangulation with a silk cord.

Depressed, Mehmed IV withdrew from public affairs. Even in mosques, imams publicly accused the sultan of not thinking about anything but harem pleasures and hunting in a difficult time for the country.

Great battles. 100 battles that changed the course of history Domanin Alexander Anatolyevich

Battle of Vienna (Siege of Vienna) 1683

Battle of Vienna (Siege of Vienna)

In the 17th century, the Ottoman Empire, outwardly at the pinnacle of power, entered a period of crisis. The defeat at Lepanto put an end to the Turkish naval expansion, but there remained a powerful land army, accustomed to winning. However, by the middle of the century, large-scale changes were taking place in it, which significantly reduced its combat effectiveness. Step by step, the process of decomposition of the elite corps of the Janissaries is going on. They began to acquire families, began to engage in trade and crafts. Gradually, the Janissaries became a conservative political force and an instrument of palace coups. From a real fighting force, they are increasingly turning into a kind of Roman Praetorian guard.

This, however, has not yet been noticed by either the Turkish sultan or Europe, trembling from the Ottoman name. In the 1670s, the Turks managed to further expand their territory in Europe, capturing Podolia and the steppe Ukraine up to the Dnieper. No one imagined then that this would be their last success.

The reason for the great Austro-Turkish war was the anti-Protestant policy of the Austrian Archduke Leopold I, concurrently Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Austrian troops invaded central Hungary. Hungarian Protestants, led by their leader Imre Tekeli, turned to the Turks for help. The Ottomans considered this split among the Christians the most favorable opportunity to capture Vienna, the most important fortress blocking the way for the Turks to Central Europe. In 1683, the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed IV declares war on the emperor.

The Turks for the war with Austria gathered a very significant army. There were up to eighty thousand people in it, on foot and on horseback, including twelve thousand Janissaries. In addition, on the orders of the Sultan, the Crimean Khan sent a thirty-thousand horse horde, significant contingents were sent by the Wallachians and Hungarians Tekeli. In general, the Ottoman forces can be estimated at one hundred and fifty - one hundred and seventy thousand people.

The commander of the Austrian imperial army, Charles of Lorraine, at that time had no more than twenty thousand soldiers. True, back in March 1683, Emperor Leopold concluded a defensive alliance with the Polish king Jan Sobieski, but the allied army was still gathering when the Turks had already approached the walls of Vienna. In the very first battles, the Turks threw back Charles of Lorraine. Together with the retreating Charles, eighty thousand refugees fled from Vienna, led by the emperor himself. Eleven thousand garrison and five thousand city militias remained in the city. On July 14, the Turks closed Vienna in a siege ring. On the same day, the commander-in-chief of the Turkish army, Kara Mustafa, sent an ultimatum to the city to surrender the city. The commander of the garrison, Count von Shtaremberg, flatly refused to capitulate.

The inhabitants of Vienna demolished many houses outside the city walls to leave the besiegers without cover. This made it possible to conduct heavy fire on the Turks, in case they went on the attack. In response, Kara Mustafa ordered to dig long trenches in the direction of the city in order to protect his soldiers from fire. Although the Turks had excellent artillery of three hundred guns, the fortifications of Vienna were very strong, built according to the latest fortification science of the time. Therefore, the Turks had to resort to the tactics of mining the massive city walls.

The Turks also cut off all the ways of supplying the besieged city with food. The garrison and the inhabitants of Vienna were in a desperate situation. Exhaustion and extreme fatigue became such acute problems that Count von Staremberg ordered the execution of anyone who fell asleep at his post. By the end of August, the forces of the besieged were almost completely exhausted.

In early September, five thousand experienced Turkish sappers laid mines under the Vienna fortifications and blew up, one after another, significant sections of the city walls, the Burg bastion, the Lebel bastion and the Burg ravelin. As a result, gaps up to twelve meters wide were formed in a number of places. The defenders of Vienna tried to dig their tunnels to thwart the Turkish sappers. But on September 8, the Turks nevertheless occupied the Burg ravelin and the Lower Wall. The fall of Vienna seemed to be a matter of the very near future. And then the besieged prepared to fight in the city itself.

Fortunately for the defenders of the city, just at this time a large Polish army crossed the Danube and joined the army of Charles of Lorraine, who had managed to defeat the Hungarians of Tekeli shortly before. The combined Allied army numbered more than eighty thousand men, but they had to move very quickly in order not to reach the walls of Vienna too late. The allies succeeded, which was facilitated by disagreements in the Turkish camp. So, the Crimean Khan, left in the rear, was offended by this and refused to attack the Polish troops on their way through the mountains, although his light and mobile cavalry could greatly delay, and perhaps completely stop the heavy and clumsy Polish cavalry in the mountains.

On September 12, the time for the great battle came. The battle began even before the entire Christian force was deployed. At 4 o'clock in the morning, the Turks attacked to prevent the Allies from properly building up their forces. In response, Charles of Lorraine and the Austrian troops counterattacked from the left flag, while the Germans attacked the center of the Turks.

Then Kara Mustafa also threw most of the troops into a counterattack, and left some of the elite Janissary units to storm the city. He wanted to capture Vienna before Sobieski's Poles arrived, but it was already too late. Turkish sappers dug a tunnel for a full-scale undermining of the walls, and while they were feverishly filling it up to increase the power of the explosion, the Austrians managed to dig an oncoming tunnel and neutralize the mine in time.

While the Turkish and Austrian sappers competed in speed, a fierce battle was going on above. The approaching Polish cavalry dealt a powerful blow to the right flank of the Turks. The Ottomans, on the other hand, made their main bet not on the fight against the allied armies, but on the urgent capture of the city. This turned out to be a fatal mistake.

After twelve hours of battle, the Poles continued to hold firmly on the right flank of the Turks. The main part of the Christian cavalry stood all day on the hills and watched the battle, in which so far the infantrymen participated to a greater extent. At about 5 pm, the quartered cavalry went on the attack. One of these units consisted of the Austro-German horsemen, and the other three - from the Poles. Twenty thousand cavalry, under the personal command of Jan Sobieski, descended from the hills and broke through the ranks of the Turks, already very tired after a day of fighting on two fronts. The Christian horsemen struck directly at the Turkish camp, while the Vienna garrison ran out of the city and joined in the massacre of the Turks.

Siege of Vienna. Painting of that time

The Ottoman troops were not only physically exhausted, but also discouraged after their failed attempt to undermine the walls and break into the city. And the cavalry attack forced them to retreat south and east. Less than three hours after the charge of their cavalry, the Christians won a complete victory. Vienna was saved.

The Turks lost at least fifteen thousand people killed and wounded. Over five thousand were taken prisoner. The Allies also captured all the Ottoman cannons. At the same time, the total losses of the allies amounted to four and a half thousand people. A huge Turkish convoy, and numerous tents, hastily abandoned by the Turks, fell into the hands of Christians. In a word, the victory was complete.

The defeat of the Turkish army near Vienna was of great importance in the history of Europe. He put an unambiguous end to the further expansion of Turkish expansion in Europe. After this defeat, the Ottoman Empire was forced to switch to strategic defense, gradually losing the previously captured lands and losing its former influence.

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In the summer of 1683, the Crimean Khan Murad Giray received an official invitation to Sultan Mehmed IV at the headquarters near Belgorod. The solemn reception and treats in the Sultan's army were not accidental. On the recommendations of the Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha, the Sultan had the intention of inviting Murad Giray to participate in the war with the Austrians. Already in July 1683, the allied forces under the leadership of Murad Giray moved to the main place of events - Vienna. They were also joined by the Magyar rebels - Kurucs under the leadership of Count Imre Tekeli, an opponent of Austrian domination.

For several years, the Ottoman Empire carefully prepared for this war. Roads and bridges were repaired leading to the Austrian border and to the supply bases of the Turkish troops, to which weapons, military equipment and artillery were brought. After all, it was necessary to conquer the capital of the Habsburgs, a strategically important city that controlled the Danube, connecting the Black Sea with Western Europe.

Oddly enough, the provocateurs of a new war were the Austrians themselves, who invaded the central part of Hungary, which since 1505 was part of the borders of the Ottoman Empire. It should be noted that the Magyar peasantry reacted to the arrival of the Turks as liberation from the dominance of local feudal lords, who imposed unbearable requisitions on them, moreover, unlike the bloody feuds between Catholics and Protestants in Europe at that time, the Turks did not prohibit any of the religions, although the transition to Islam was strongly encouraged. Moreover, many simple Magyars who converted to Islam managed to climb the career ladder of the military estates of the Ottoman Empire. True, the inhabitants of the northern Hungarian lands offered resistance to the Turks, creating detachments of haiduks. It was on the haiduks that the Austrian government was counting, which was striving to annex the Hungarian lands to its empire. But the main population did not accept the Austrians. Unrest began in the country against the anti-Protestant policy of the Emperor of Austria Leopold I of Habsburg, an ardent supporter of the Catholic Counter-Reformation. As a result, discontent resulted in an open uprising against Austria, and in 1681 the Protestants and other opponents of the Habsburgs, led by the Magyar Count Imre Tekeli, allied with the Turks.

In January 1682, the mobilization of Turkish troops began, and on August 6 of the same year, the Ottoman Empire declared war on Austria. But military operations were conducted rather sluggishly, and after three months the parties curtailed the campaign for 15 months, during which they carefully prepared for war, attracting new allies. The Austrians, fearing the Ottomans, made alliances with other states of Central Europe whenever possible. Leopold I agreed to an alliance with Poland, which he promised to help if the Turks besieged Krakow, and the Poles, in turn, pledged to help Austria if the Ottomans besieged Vienna. On the side of Mehmed IV came the Crimean Khanate and Imre Tekeli, who was declared the Sultan by the King of Hungary and Prince of Transylvania.

And only on March 31, 1683, the Habsburg Imperial Court received a note declaring war. She was sent by Kara Mustafa on behalf of Sultan Mehmed IV. The next day, the Turkish army set out from Edirne on a campaign. In early May, Turkish troops approached Belgrade, and then moved to Vienna. At the same time, 40,000-strong Crimean Tatar cavalry led by Murad Giray set out from the Crimean Khanate to the capital of the Austrian Empire and on July 7 set up camp 40 km east of the Austrian capital.

The Crowns panicked in earnest. The first to abandon the capital to the mercy of fate was Emperor Leopold I himself, followed by all the courtiers and Viennese aristocrats, then rich people left the city. The total number of refugees was 80,000. Only the garrison remained to defend the capital. And on July 14, the main forces of the Turks arrived near Vienna, and on the same day Kara Mustafa sent an ultimatum to the city about the surrender of the city. But Count von Staremberg, commander of the remaining 11,000 soldiers and 5,000 militia and 370 guns, flatly refused to capitulate.

Although the allied forces had excellent artillery of 300 guns, the fortifications of Vienna were very strong, built according to the latest fortification science of the time. Therefore, the Turks resorted to mining the massive city walls.

The allies had two options for taking the city: either rush to attack with all their might (which could well lead to victory, since there were almost 20 times more of them than the defenders of the city), or besiege the city. Murad Giray strongly recommended the first option, but Kara Mustafa gave preference to the second option. He reasoned that an assault on a well-fortified city would cost him enormous casualties, and that a siege was the perfect way to take a city with minimal casualties.

The Turks cut off all the ways of supplying the besieged city with food. The garrison and the inhabitants of Vienna were in a desperate situation. Exhaustion and extreme fatigue became such acute problems that Count von Staremberg ordered the execution of anyone who fell asleep at his post. By the end of August, the forces of the besieged were almost completely exhausted. A minimum of effort and the city would have been taken, but the vizier was waiting for something, remaining deaf to the advice of the Crimean Khan, to start the assault. As the Ottoman historian Funduklulu notes, Murad Giray disagreed with the opinion of the supreme vizier Kara Mustafa and was ready to lead his askers to take Vienna himself, but the vizier did not allow him to do this, fearing that the laurels of victory would go to the Crimean Khan, and not to him. But he was in no hurry to take any action. According to the sources of those years, the vizier near Vienna settled down quite well. In his huge tent, there were rooms for meetings and smoking pipes, in the middle of which fountains, bedrooms, and a bath flowed. He naively assumed that Vienna was the last barrier on the way to Central Europe, and very soon all the laurels of victory would go to him.

But something happened that the Crimean Khan feared.

The slowness of the vizier led to the fact that the main forces of Christians approached the city. The first failure occurred 5 km northeast of Vienna at Bisamberg, when Count Charles V of Lorraine defeated Imre Tekeli. And on September 6, 30 km northwest of Vienna, the Polish army joined up with the rest of the troops of the Holy League. The situation was not saved by the fact that King Louis XIV, the opponent of the Habsburgs, took advantage of the situation and attacked southern Germany.

In early September, 5,000 experienced Turkish sappers blew up one after another significant sections of the city walls, the Burg bastion, the Löbel bastion and the Burg ravelin. As a result, gaps 12 meters wide were formed. The Austrians, on the other hand, tried to dig their tunnels to interfere with the Turkish sappers. But on September 8, the Turks nevertheless occupied the Burg ravelin and the Lower Wall. And then the besieged prepared to fight in the city itself.

Unlike the Ottomans, the allied Christian forces acted quickly. Kara Mustafa, who had at his disposal so much time to organize a successful confrontation with the forces of the allies, to raise the morale of his soldiers, failed to properly take advantage of this opportunity. He entrusted the protection of the rear to the Crimean Khan and his cavalry of 30-40,000 horsemen.

Murad Giray feared such an outcome. He did his best, but time was wasted. In addition, the vizier behaved extremely tactlessly, ignoring the advice and actions of the khan, in a fit of anger, humiliated the khan's dignity. And something happened that Kara Mustafa did not expect. Khan refused to attack the Polish troops on their way through the mountains, although his light and mobile cavalry could have prevailed over the heavily armed, hulking Polish horsemen of Jan Sobieski.

Because of all these disagreements, the Polish army managed to approach Vienna. The eight-week siege of the city was in vain. Realizing his mistake, the vizier made an attempt to reconcile with the khan and on September 12 at 4 o'clock in the morning ordered the allied troops to start the battle in order to prevent the enemy from properly building their forces.

Kara Mustafa wanted to capture Vienna before the arrival of Jan Sobieski, but it was too late, the Poles approached earlier than the vizier expected. Turkish sappers dug a tunnel for a full-scale undermining of the walls, and while they were filling it up to increase the power of the explosion, the Austrians managed to dig an oncoming tunnel and neutralize the mine in time. And at this time, a fierce battle was going on above. The Polish cavalry dealt a powerful blow to the right flank of the Turks, who made their main bet not on the defeat of the allied armies, but on the urgent capture of the city. This is what ruined them.

After 12 hours of battle, the Ottoman troops were not only physically exhausted, but also discouraged after failing to undermine the walls and break into the city. And the attack of the Polish cavalry forced them to retreat south and east. Less than three hours after the charge of their cavalry, the Poles won a complete victory and saved Vienna.

In order not to appear in the eyes of the Sultan as the culprit of failures near Vienna, Kara Mustafa shifted all the blame to the Crimean Khan and in October 1683 Murad was removed.

Gulnara Abdulaeva