Battle of Liegnitz (1241)
Battle of the Mongols near Liegnitz,
depiction from the 14th century
| date | April 9, 1241 |
|---|---|
| place | Choice instead of Liegnitz |
| Exit | Mongol victory |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
|
Seniorat Poland |
|
| Commander | |
| Troop strength | |
| According to old chronicles, 100,000 men, probably significantly fewer | According to ancient chronicles, 40,000 men, probably significantly fewer |
| losses | |
|
unknown |
According to ancient chronicles, 30,000 deaths, probably significantly fewer |
In the Battle of Liegnitz on April 9, 1241, a Mongolian army defeated a Polish - German force.
To avoid confusion with the Battle of Liegnitz of 1760 , it is also referred to as the Battle of Wahlstatt , although the place name Wahlstatt came about later as a result of the battle.
prehistory
After the fall of Kiev in 1240, Batu Khan and an army of the Golden Horde , only a small part of which consisted of Mongols, set out on a campaign of conquest in the West and invaded Poland . After the destruction of Sandomir and Krakow in the winter of 1240/41, Batu divided his army. An army pillar under the princes Baidar (a son of Chagatais ) and Orda moved to the northwest, Batu itself with the main army to the south.
On the way to the banks of the Oder at the beginning of 1241 only the Duchy of Silesia lay between Western Europe and the northern army column of the Mongols. At that time the Duke of Silesia was Henry II , known as "the Pious", who was also the Senior Duke of Poland. He recognized the impending danger and hurriedly assembled an army. Duke Heinrich was considered pious, courageous and self-confident, but was largely left to his own devices. Emperor Friedrich II was indispensable in Italy, where he struggled with the Pope for supremacy. The King of Hungary was faced with the invasion of the Mongols' southern army column; there the battle of Muhi took place on April 11th . After all, King Wenceslaus I of Bohemia promised help and also began to raise an army.
Heinrich collected the remains of the Polish army that had escaped the Mongols so far and called the Silesian knights to the flags. He got support from some Knights of the Templars and Teutonic Knights , maybe also some Johanniters . Furthermore, some German contingents followed his call for help, including Duke Friedrich II of Austria . The weak point was the infantry. It consisted mainly of armed civilians - city citizens of Liegnitz, farmers and miners from the mines of the nearby Goldberg . They were held together by some armored mercenaries. According to the historian Jan von Flocken, Heinrich's army consisted of barely 4,000 men. In his opinion, statements by contemporary chroniclers of 40,000 men were exaggerated.
The Mongolian army under Baidar Khan was far superior, especially in terms of horsemen (flakes: 10,000 men, contemporary chroniclers: 100,000).
Course of the battle
In view of his numerical inferiority, Heinrich could have moved south, where King Wenceslaus of Bohemia advanced with a strong army (Flocken: 5,000 men, contemporary chroniclers: 50,000 men). But then Heinrich would have had to risk that the nimble cavalry army of the Mongols would have bypassed him. Heinrich decided to take up the fight and lead it as a holy crusade . Almost all of his fighters put a cross on their clothing to document this. The army of King Wenceslas was a day's ride away on the day of the battle; after all, the mounted vanguard of the Bohemians had meanwhile arrived.
On April 9, 1241, the two armies clashed on the Wahlstatt (Polish: Legnickie Pole , 'Liegnitzer Feld'), a hill between the Katzbach and Weidelache rivers southeast of Liegnitz . The Christian army was lined up in two rows: in front in the center stood the infantry, flanked on the right and left by the Polish horsemen and the knights of the order. Behind it stood the Silesian knighthood, reinforced by German and Bohemian knights and mounted professional warriors.
Henry's army was largely destroyed by the Mongols; the duke fell in battle. His head was carried on a lance as a trophy in front of the city gates of Liegnitz. Despite the victory, the Mongols did not advance further northwest.
Consequences of the battle
After an unsuccessful attempt to conquer Liegnitz, Baidar Khan stopped the march to the west and moved with his troops south to the main power in Hungary. On the way, Mongolian troops were pushed away by Gotthart Brandis . The Mongols withdrew to Moravia along the Sudetes . Since the Western alliance disintegrated after the Mongols had turned back, Bohemia now faced the Mongols alone. The mountain passes near Glatz could be closed, but after the capture of Ratibor and Troppau , the Mongols invaded Moravia through the Moravian Gate , took Prerau , Littau , Wischau and other cities and devastated the Hanna plain . Only two Moravian cities - Olomouc and Brno - as well as the north-east Hungarian Neustadt am Zeltberg resisted and were besieged by the Mongols without success. Olomouc was defended by 6,000 men under Jaroslaw von Sternberg , who is said to have killed Baidar Khan in a fight. The Mongols withdrew from Olomouc three days later and rejoined Batu Khan's main army in Hungary. Despite their victory over the Hungarians, the Mongols did not advance further west, possibly because Great Khan Ögedei Khan was dying and then died in December 1241 and the line of succession was unclear. Presumably the Mongol leaders withdrew to elect a new ruler.
Heinrich's mother and wife, the Silesian Duchesses Hedwig von Andechs and Anna von Böhmen , had a provost built on the battlefield and handed it over to the Benedictines of the Opatowitz Monastery near Königgrätz . Heinrich's body was found. The place around the propstei was named Wahlstatt after the general term for a battlefield ; since 1948 it has been called Legnickie Pole ('Liegnitzer Feld'). Even today, a service to commemorate the battle takes place in the provost every year on April 9th.
Six noble Silesian families later called themselves “cousins of Wahlstatt”, of which only one male family member is said to have survived the battle: the Rothkirch , Strachwitz , Nostitz , Seydlitz , Prittwitz and Zedlitz families . According to a myth, the Rothkirch family lost all male family members in the battle. There was only one male offspring born after the battle. The Association of Surviving Fighters took over the guardianship for this. Members of these six families living today hold regular meetings to commemorate the day of battle.
The Museum of the Battle of Liegnitz has been in Wahlstatt since 1961 .
literature
- Gustav Strakosch-Grassmann: The Mongol invasion of Central Europe in 1241 and 1242 . Innsbruck 1893.
- Denis Sinor: Inner Asia and its contacts with medieval Europe . Variorum Reprint, London 1977.
- Hansgerd Göckenjan: The Mongol Storm. Reports from eyewitnesses and contemporaries 1235–1250 . Styria, Graz 1985.
- Marianne Tölle (Red.): The Mongol Storm. AD 1200–1300. Translated from the English by Ursula Maria Mössner. Time-Life Books, Amsterdam 1989.
- Ulrich Schmilewski (Ed.): Wahlstatt 1241. Contributions to the Mongol battle near Liegnitz and its aftermath . Weber, Lorch (Württemberg) 1991.
- James Chambers: The devil's horsemen. The Mongol invasion of Europe ; Phoenix, London 2003; Castle Books, Edison (NJ) 2003.
- Jan von Flocken: Mongol Storm - The Battle of Liegnitz ; Die Welt, issue of July 8, 2007.
- Wassili Jan : Genghis Khan , Batu Khan , To the Last Sea ; Trilogy of novels, Kiepenheuer, Weimar 1965.