First siege of Kruja

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Siege of Kruja
Part of: League of Lezha
date May 14th to November 23rd, 1450
place Kruja
output Albanian victory.
consequences The Ottoman Army is withdrawing from Albania for the time being.
Parties to the conflict

Ottoman red flag.svg Ottoman Empire

Coa Kastrioti Family.svg League of Lezha

Commander

Murad II.
Prince Mehmed

Skanderbeg
Vrana Konti

Troop strength
100,000 to 160,000 8,000 men, a quarter of them infantry;
1,500 to 4,000 in Kruja under the command of Vrana Konti.
losses

20,000 in the siege and many more victims in the escape from Albania.

1,000 killed, wounded or demobilized

Kruja with the castle, behind the Skanderbeg mountains

The first siege of Kruja took place from May 14th to November 23rd, 1450 , when about 100,000 Ottoman soldiers attacked the city of Kruja , from which Skanderbeg had been organizing the Albanian resistance against Ottoman rule since 1443 .

The troops of the League of Lezha , led by Skanderbeg, were demoralized because of the two lost battles at Svetigrad and Berat between 1448 and 1450. The support of the clergy , who claimed to have had visions of angels and a victory, gave the Albanian warriors the motivation to defend the capital of the League of Lezha by all means and to the last man.

After Skanderbeg had left a garrison of about 4,000 men under his loyal lieutenant Vrana Konti , he attacked the Ottoman camps around Kruja from the mountains and attacked the supply caravan of Sultan Murad II's army . In September, the Ottoman army had lost its order The soldiers' courage sank and diseases spread in their camps. The Ottoman army, realizing that Kruja would no longer fall by their strength, lifted the siege and set out again for Edirne . Murad II died there ; his son Mehmed II took power in his place.

In 1443, when a Hungarian army advanced into the Ottoman sphere of influence, Skanderbeg and his troops withdrew from the Ottomans and took possession of the Kruja fortress . From here he organized the resistance against the Ottomans.

Campaigns from 1448 and early 1450

After a few unsuccessful attacks by Ottoman military commanders on Albania, Murad II besieged the fortress of Svetigrad from May 14, 1448 with around 80,000 men . Svetigrad was an important strategic place as it controlled the routes from Macedonia to Albania. The small garrison of Albanian, Bulgarian and other European troops held the fortress, while Skanderbeg attacked the Ottoman camp from outside. After the Ottomans poisoned the wells, a group of defenders decided to open the city gates and let the Ottomans in, giving them control of the fortress. The Sultan initially withdrew from Albania and Skanderbeg besieged the fortress from September 23, 1448. After several failed attacks, Skanderbeg withdrew. At the beginning of 1450 the Pasha of Gjirokastra took the fortress of Berat by attacking at night .

prehistory

The war opponents

Albanian morale before the siege

The fighting morale of the Albanians fell because of the losses of the previous two years. When the Ottomans began their march on April 5, 1450, people believed they saw angels flying over Albania. Skanderbeg himself claims to have had a vision in which Saint George presented him with a flaming sword to destroy the enemies of the "true religion". This speech, along with many other visions of the clergy, revived the morale of the Albanian fighters.

Albanian preparations

Before the siege began, Skanderbeg left Kruja with 8,000 men (2,000 infantry and 6,000 cavalry ) and found a suitable position in Mount Tumenishta to attack the Ottomans from there. 4,000 men remained in Kruja under the leadership of Vrana Konti . Vrana also had some Germans, French and Italians under his command. Kruja had enough supplies for a 16 month siege. The women and children were taken to the Venetian cities of Albania while the men were instructed to burn the harvest and move to the mountains and castles.

Ottoman preparations

Murad arrived on May 14th with 100,000 of his best men (60,000 cavalry). Murad proposed to Vrana Konti to hand over the fortress, but Vrana refused. Despite the high firepower of the Ottoman cannons (one of the ten cannons was supposed to shoot stones at 400 pounds and another at 200 pounds), they were in an inconvenient position as Kruja fortress was “almost part of the mountain on which it was built was built ”. The cannons could fire two or three times a day, but were not accurate. Two large and four smaller cannons were on the south side, and the rest was concentrated on the main gate.

siege

First phase

Murad let his cannons fire for four days until a breach was made in the wall. The Sultan saw himself at an advantage and ordered his troops to storm through the gap in the wall. However, the garrison was able to repel the attack and then repair the wall. Murad feared a counterattack by Skanderbeg and sent scouts into the surrounding mountains to investigate an attack. Skanderbeg led an attack on the Ottoman camp at dusk, in which several hundred people died. He captured Ottoman supplies but almost lost his life. When Skanderbeg returned to his men, his "shield was so broken that it could not be seen". The attack cost Skanderbeg ten dead and several wounded. The defenders haven't had much trouble. The main burden of the attack came from the south side, where the Ottoman losses were very high.

Second phase

When the second storm started, the Ottomans tried to get through the gate with their lances. After heavy losses, the Ottoman army had to withdraw and Sultan Murad held a meeting with his generals for the next two days. An immediate measure was to protect the camp from another surprise attack. To achieve this, an army led by Prince Mehmed was ordered to the place where the first attack had taken place. Moisi Arianit Golemi faked an attack with 500 horsemen: the alarm was given and the Ottomans prepared for this attack. Meanwhile, Skanderbeg and his troops marched around the camp and attacked where the enemy had not expected. Before a counterattack could be organized, he withdrew from the camp.

During Skanderbeg's absence, a large Ottoman attack was carried out on the south side of Kruja. But accidental self-fire forced them to stop the attack. The Ottomans tried to storm the castle but were unsuccessful. Their attacks made no progress, and their army had already suffered a great number of fatal losses. Skanderbeg, on the other hand, lost around 1,000 men by then. Moisi Golemi and Tanush Thopia with a few thousand men, and Skanderbeg were now divided into three groups, which simplified the attack on the Turkish camp. Skanderbeg began to move towards the camp when the Ottomans mobilized 8,000 men and pulled them towards the Skanderbegs. Skanderbeg slowly withdrew. Subsequently, Moisi and Tanush broke into the camp. The Ottoman troops were lured into the foreland. The next day (July 25th) the troops were surrounded and completely destroyed. The next day Skanderbeg was seen over the rock of Kruja in a meeting with Vrana Konti .

Final phase

When Vrana returned to the fortress, the Sultan sent a pasha to talk to Vrana and give him rich gifts. The pasha wanted to convince Vrana that Murad was a better ruler than Skanderbeg and that the siege was almost over. But Vrana refused to capitulate. As a result, a new attack on the fortress began. Murad sent a messenger to Skanderbeg and promised him 10,000 crowns a year. Skanderbeg declined the offer. The attack continued and the Albanian position seemed hopeless. On October 14th, Skanderbeg offered the Venetians Kruja. Despite his threat to hand over the city to the Turks, the Venetians refused this offer, as they were not interested in jeopardizing their good trade relations with the Ottoman Empire by supporting the Albanians. On October 26th, the Turks lifted the siege.

aftermath

The siege killed 20,000 Ottomans and more than 1,000 Albanians. Marin Barleti suspects that Murad died of illness near the fortress of Kruja; Murad died in Edirne in 1451. Murad gradually withdrew from Albanian territory, fearing that the Albanian winter would cost even more lives. During the retreat, thousands of enemy soldiers were killed in attacks by Albanian militias . Skanderbeg's resources were exhausted. He asked the Republic of Ragusa for help. The Raguser informed Pope Nicholas V , and he agreed to support Skanderbeg financially.

Skanderbeg's success earned him a great deal of prestige throughout Europe, and embassies were sent to him from Rome , Naples , Hungary and Burgundy . Skanderbeg became a vassal of Alfonso V of Aragon on March 26, 1451 with the Agreement of Gaeta . With the help of this contract he got many soldiers and other support from Aragon.

In 1466 and 1467, Ottoman troops tried - again unsuccessfully - to conquer the city. It wasn't until 1478, ten years after Skanderbeg's death, that the city finally fell and became part of the Ottoman Empire .

Legends

According to legend, Skanderbeg let a herd of goats drift down the mountain during one night with candles on their horns. The Ottomans thought this was an Albanian attack and went into the field against the herd. When they were far enough out of the camp, Skanderbeg attacked and destroyed them. After the siege, Skanderbeg had an iron goat's head attached to his helmet as a reminder of his ingenious tactics that night.

According to another legend, Skanderbeg walked through the mountains with this helmet on, and the enemies thought he was a goat, because they did not believe that humans could march through this terrain. So he fell in the back of the Turks.

See also: Skanderbeg's helmet (especially on different art-historical interpretations of the goat's head)

literature

  • Oliver Jens Schmitt: Skanderbeg. The new Alexander in the Balkans , Verlag Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-7917-2229-0
  • Oliver Jens Schmitt: The Venetian Albania . (1392-1479). 2001. pp. 303-306.
  • Marin Barleti : Historia de vita et gestis Scanderbegi Epirotarum principis. Rome before 1510

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Origin of Daniel: Castle and old town of Kruja (Albania). January 2, 2010, accessed August 4, 2012 .
  2. Schmitt 2001. p. 306. [1]