Thomas Morosini (Admiral)

Tommaso Morosini (* 16th or 17th century; † January 27, 1647 ) was a Venetian admiral, largely responsible for the strategy of Venice in the war for Crete .

life and career

Tommaso Morosini was a member of a patrician dynasty that provided the Republic of Venice with four doges . In the first year of the war for Crete (1645–1669) he represented in the Senate of Venice the thesis that Crete would be defended most effectively and cheaply if reinforcements and supplies for the Ottoman invading army were to be found in Crete through a blockade squadron at the exit of the Dardanelles into the Aegean Sea would intercept. Morosini was therefore entrusted with the command of a squadron of high board ships that was just there in March 1646. The breakthrough of the galley fleets of the Ottoman Grand Admiral (Kapudan Pascha) could never be completely prevented, especially when a slack paralyzed the Venetian sailing warships. It was quite unusual that the Ottoman Grand Admiral led his forces back north from Crete as early as January 1647. Morosini reached him with a far inferior squadron near Euboea. In the unequal battle, he and the Kapudan Pasha lost their lives on January 27th. The Ottoman fleet was dispersed. Morosini's concept determined the Venetian naval warfare until 1660.

literature

• Ekkehard Eickhoff, Venice, Vienna and the Ottomans. Upheaval in Southeast Europe 1645–1700, 20105, pp. 51–57 (after Andrea Valiero, Historia della Guerra di Candia, Venice 1679. Valiero was flotilla commander in Morosini's squadron)
• Venezia e la difesa del Levante. Da Lepanto a Candia 1570–1670, Venice 1986 (exhibition catalog), pp. 156–158
• RC Anderson, Naval Wars in the Levant, Princeton 1952, pp. 125-127, 130f.
• Nicolae Jorga , History of the Ottoman Empire based on the sources, (1908–1913). New edition Eichborn Verlag Frankfurt / Main 1990, Volume 4, 43 f.