Which famous military leader, sometimes called "The Lame" beseiged Smyrna in 1402
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Siege of Smyrna The Siege of Smyrna (December 1402) was fought between the Knights of Rhodes, who held the harbour and sea-castle of Smyrna (now İzmir) in western Anatolia, and the army of the Turco-Mongol emir Timur. The Turco-Mongols blockaded the harbour and attacked the fortifications with stone-throwing siege engines, while the defenders, numbering only about 200 knights, countered with arrows and incendiary projectiles. After two weeks of strong resistance against a far superior adversary, the outer wall was destroyed by mining and breached. Some of the garrison managed to escape by sea, but the inhabitants and the city itself were destroyed.
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Timur Timur (Persian: تیمور‎ ‎ "Temūr", Chagatai: "Temür "; 9 April 1336 – 18 February 1405), historically known as Amir Timur and Tamerlane (Persian: تيمور لنگ‎ ‎ "Temūr(-i) Lang", "Timur the Lame"), was a Turco-Mongol conqueror. As the founder of the Timurid Empire in Persia and Central Asia he became the first ruler in the Timurid dynasty. According to John Joseph Saunders, Timur's background was Iranized and not steppe nomadic.
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Silahdar Yusuf Pasha Silahdar Yusuf Pasha (Turkish: "Silahdar Yusuf Paşa" , Arabic: يوسف باشا‎ ‎ ; 1604–1646), was an Ottoman "vezir" and admiral (Kapudan Pasha, grand admiral of the Ottoman fleet), known for conquering Chania in western Crete in only 54 days in 1645 during the Cretan War (1645–69). He built a large "han", or Turkish inn, at Vrana in 1644, which still stands today.
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Philip the Tetrarch Philip the Tetrarch, sometimes called Herod Philip II (Greek: Ἡρώδης Φίλιππος , "Hērōdēs Philippos") by modern writers (ruled from 4 BC until his death in AD 34) was the son of Herod the Great and his fifth wife, Cleopatra of Jerusalem. Philip II was born in ~19 BCE. He was a half-brother of Herod Antipas and Herod Archelaus; and should not be confused with Herod II, whom some writers call Herod Philip I."
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Catalan campaign in Asia Minor In 1303, the Byzantine Emperor Andronicus II Palaeologus hired 6,500 Catalan mercenaries under Roger de Flor to campaign against the Turks in the spring and summer of the same year. Their costly service came with success, driving back the Turks in parts of Asia Minor. At Philadelphia, 18,000 Turkish soldiers (possibly those of Aydinids) were left dead, the work of the Catalans.
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Martin I of Sicily Martin I of Sicily (c. 1374/1376 – 25 July 1409), called "The Younger", was King of Sicily from 1390 to 1409.
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Theodore Balina Theodore Balina (Bulgarian: Теодор Балина /Teodor Balina) was an Ottoman Bulgarian nobleman and leader in the Sanjak of Nicopolis who led the First Tarnovo Uprising against the Ottoman Empire in 1598.
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Suleiman II Suleiman II (15 April 1642 – 22/23 June 1691) (Ottoman Turkish: سليمان ثانى "Süleymān-i sānī") was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1687 to 1691. After being brought to the throne by an armed mutiny, Suleiman and his grand vizier Fazıl Mustafa Pasha were successfully able to turn the tide of the War of the Holy League, reconquering Belgrade in 1690, as well as carrying out significant fiscal and military reforms.
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List of campaigns of Suleiman the Magnificent The imperial campaigns (Ottoman Turkish: سفر همايون‎ , "sefer-i humāyūn") of Suleiman the Magnificent were a series of campaigns led by Suleiman, who was the tenth and longest-reigning Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. He is known in the Western world as "Suleiman the Magnificent", and in the East as "the Lawgiver" (Turkish: "Kânûnî" ), for his complete reconstruction of the Ottoman legal system. During his reign from 1520 to his death in 1566, the Ottoman Empire became the most powerful state in the world. At its height, the Empire stretched from Hungary to Yemen.
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Ottoman Interregnum The Ottoman Interregnum, or the Ottoman Civil War (20 July 1402 – 5 July 1413; Turkish: "Fetret Devri" , "Interregnum Period"), was a civil war in the Ottoman Empire between the sons of Sultan Bayezid I following the defeat of their father by the Central Asian warlord Timur at the Battle of Ankara on 20 July 1402. Although Mehmed Çelebi was confirmed as sultan by Timur, his brothers İsa Çelebi, Musa Çelebi, Süleyman Çelebi, and later, Mustafa Çelebi, refused to recognize his authority, each claiming the throne for himself. Civil war was the result. The Interregnum lasted for 11 years until the Battle of Çamurlu on 5 July 1413, when Mehmed Çelebi emerged as victor in the strife, crowned himself sultan Mehmed I, and restored the empire.
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Skanderbeg George Castriot (Albanian: "Gjergj Kastrioti" , 6 May 1405 – 17 January 1468), known as Skanderbeg (Albanian: "Skënderbej or Skënderbeu" from Ottoman Turkish: اسکندر بگ‎ "İskender Bey"), was an Albanian nobleman and military commander, who served the Ottoman Empire in 1423–43, the Republic of Venice in 1443–47, and lastly the Kingdom of Naples until his death. After leaving Ottoman service, he led a rebellion against the Ottoman Empire in what is today Albania and Macedonia. Skanderbeg always signed himself as "Lord of Albania" (Latin: "Dominus Albaniae" ), and claimed no other titles but that in official documents.
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Martino Zaccaria Martino Zaccaria was the Lord of Chios from 1314 to 1329, ruler of several other Aegean islands, and baron of Veligosti–Damala and Chalandritsa in the Principality of Achaea. He distinguished himself in the fight against Turkish corsairs in the Aegean Sea, and received the title of "King and Despot of Asia Minor" from the titular Latin Emperor, Philip II. He was deposed from his rule of Chios by a Byzantine expedition in 1329, and imprisoned in Constantinople until 1337. Martino then returned to Italy, where he was named the Genoese ambassador to the Holy See. In 1343 he was named commander of the Papal squadron in the Smyrniote crusade against Umur Bey, ruler of the Emirate of Aydin, and participated in the storming of Smyrna in October 1344. He was killed, along with several other of the crusade's leaders, in a Turkish attack on 17 January 1345.
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Theodore Pileles Doranites Theodore Doranites (Greek: Θεόδωρος Δωρανίτης ; died July 1352) also known as Pileles (Πιλέλης ), was a Byzantine Greek aristocrat and military leader in the Empire of Trebizond. A prominent member of the Doranites aristocratic family from Trebizond, Theodore Doranites was one of the leading figures in the civil strife that disrupted the Empire in the 14th century.
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Alvise Loredan Alvise Loredan (1393 – 6 March 1466) was a Venetian nobleman of the Loredan family. At a young age he became a galley captain, and served with distinction as a military commander, with a long record of battles against the Ottomans, from the naval expeditions to aid Thessalonica, to the Crusade of Varna, and the opening stages of the Ottoman–Venetian War of 1463–1479, as well as the Wars in Lombardy against the Duchy of Milan. He also served in a number of high government positions, as provincial governor, "savio del consiglio", and "Procuratore de Supra" of Saint Mark's Basilica.
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Alexander I of Georgia Alexander I the Great (Georgian: ალექსანდრე I დიდი Aleksandre I Didi) (1386 – between August 26, 1445 and March 7, 1446), of the Bagrationi house, was king of Georgia from 1412 to 1442. Despite his efforts to restore the country from the ruins left by the Turco-Mongol warlord Timur's invasions, Georgia never recovered and faced the inevitable fragmentation that was followed by a long period of stagnation. Alexander was the last ruler of a united Georgia which was relatively free from foreign domination. In 1442, he abdicated the throne and retired to a monastery.
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Siege of Szigetvár The Siege of Szigetvár or Battle of Szigeth (pronunciation: [ˈsiɡɛtvaːr] Hungarian: "Szigetvár ostroma" , Croatian: "Bitka kod Sigeta "or" Sigetska bitka" , Turkish: "Zigetvar Kuşatması" ) was a siege of the fortress of Szigetvár, Kingdom of Hungary, that blocked Suleiman's line of advance towards Vienna in 1566 AD. The battle was fought between the defending forces of the Habsburg Monarchy under the leadership of Nikola Šubić Zrinski (Hungarian: "Zrínyi Miklós" ), former Ban of Croatia, and the invading Ottoman army under the nominal command of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (Ottoman Turkish: سليمان‎ "Süleymān").
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Battle of Gallipoli (1416) The Battle of Gallipoli occurred on 29 May 1416 between a squadron of the Venetian navy and the fleet of the Ottoman Empire off the Ottoman naval base of Gallipoli. The battle was the main episode of a brief conflict between the two powers, resulting from an Ottoman raid against Venetian possessions in the Aegean Sea in late 1415 and early 1416. The Venetian fleet, under Pietro Loredan, was charged with transporting Venetian envoys to the Sultan, but was authorized to attack if the Ottomans refused to negotiate. The subsequent events are known chiefly from a letter written by Loredan after the battle. The Ottomans exchanged fire with the Venetian ships as soon as the Venetian fleet approached Gallipoli, forcing the Venetians to withdraw. On the next day, the two fleets manoeuvred and fought off Gallipoli, but during the evening, Loredan managed to contact the Ottoman authorities and inform them of his diplomatic mission. Despite assurances that the Ottomans would welcome the envoys, when the Venetian fleet approached the city on the next day, the Ottoman fleet sailed to meet the Venetians and the two sides quickly became embroiled in battle. The Venetians scored a crushing victory, killing the Ottoman admiral, capturing a large part of the Ottoman fleet, and taking large numbers prisoner, of whom many—particularly the Christians serving voluntarily in the Ottoman fleet—were executed. The Venetians then retired to Tenedos to replenish their supplies and rest. Although a crushing Venetian victory, which confirmed Venetian naval superiority in the Aegean Sea for the next few decades, the settlement of the conflict was delayed until a peace treaty was signed in 1419.
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Thrasybulus Thrasybulus ( ; Greek: Θρασύβουλος , "Thrasyboulos"; "brave-willed"; c. 440 – 388 BC) was an Athenian general and democratic leader. In 411 BC, in the wake of an oligarchic coup at Athens, the pro-democracy sailors at Samos elected him as a general, making him a primary leader of the successful democratic resistance to that coup. As general, he was responsible for recalling the controversial nobleman Alcibiades from exile, and the two worked together extensively over the next several years. In 411 and 410, Thrasybulus commanded along with Alcibiades and others at several critical Athenian naval victories.
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Battle of Nish (1443) At the Battle of Niš ("Battle of Nish") (early November, 1443), crusaders led by John Hunyadi, captured the Ottoman stronghold of Nish (now Niš, Serbia) and defeated three armies of the Ottoman Empire. The Battle of Niš was part of Hunyadi's expedition known as the "long campaign". Hunyadi, at the head of the vanguard, crossed the Balkans through the Gate of Trajan, captured Niš, defeated three Turkish pashas, and after taking Sofia, united with the royal army and defeated Sultan Murad II at Snaim (Kustinitza). The impatience of the king and the severity of the winter then compelled him (in February 1444) to return home, but not before he had utterly broken the Sultan's power in Bosnia, Herzegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Albania.
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Murad II Murad II's reign was marked by the long war he fought against the Christian feudal lords of the Balkans and the Turkish beyliks in Anatolia, a conflict that lasted 25 years. He was brought up in Amasya, and ascended the throne on the death of his father Mehmed I. His mother was Valide Sultan Emine Hatun (daughter of Suleyman Bey, ruler of Dulkadirids), his father's third consort. Their marriage served as an alliance between the Ottomans and this buffer state, and produced a son, Mehmed II, who would go on to successfully conquer the Byzantine Empire's capital, Constantinople, in 1453.
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Diades of Pella Diades of Pella (Ancient Greek: Διάδης Πελλαίος ), surnamed the "Besieger" (Πολιορκητής ), was a Thessalian inventor of many siege engines, student of Philip II's military engineer Polyidus of Thessaly.
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Matthew Kantakouzenos Matthew Asen Kantakouzenos or Cantacuzenus (Greek: Ματθαίος Ασάνης Καντακουζηνός, "Matthaios Asanēs Kantakouzēnos", Bulgarian: Матей Асен Кантакузин, "Matey Asen Kantakuzin" c. 1325 – 15 June 1383) was Byzantine Emperor from 1353 to 1357.