Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Saturday, 29 August 2026

The Battle of Mohács 1526

 
Today is the 500th anniversary of the battle of Mohács in 1526 when the Ottoman forces overwhelmed the Hungarian army led by King Louis II and broke the ability of the realm to defend itself. In the folk memory of Hungarians it remains an unparalleled disaster.

This was to be followed by the Ottoman occupation of central Hungary in 1541, capturing Buda exactly fifteen years later on August 29th 1541, leaving the Habsburg King Ferdinand I with the west and north of the kingdom and his rival King John I from the Zápolya family holding Transylvania, and the Holy Crown of St Stephen. The Holy Crown was eventually returned to King Ferdinand and the eastern kingdom recognised as the principality of Transylvania under Ottoman suzerainty. 161 years after the battle is 1526 a second battle, almost on the anniversary, saw the Habsburg forces smash the Ottoman army in the second battle of Mohács and free most of the historic Hungarian realm from Turkish rule.
 
 Wikipedia has a detailed account of not just the battle but the historical background, the events leading up to the battle itself and the events afterwards. This can be read at Battle of Mohács
 
There is another detailed and illustrated account of the battle from the website The Past at The end of everything: the Battle of Mohács, 29 August 1526

Recent research into the abnormally wet weather conditions in 1526 in Hungary is set out in an article from  Daily News Hungary.com at Was the weather completely different 500 years ago? This is what was recorded in the days before the Battle of Mohács

Wikipedia also has a biography of the unfortunate King Louis II who drowned in the flight from the battlefield aged only twenty. This can be seen at Louis II of Hungary


King Louis II

A portrait by Titian

Image: Wikipedia 

 His body was subsequently recovered and buried in the royal church at Székesfehévár. His widow was to act initially as Regent of Hungary for her brother King Ferdinand and then for many years as Regent of the Netherlands for her elder brother the Emperor Charles V. She retired with him to Spain and died in 1558, and is buried at El Escorial. There is an online biography of her at Mary of Hungary (governor of the Netherlands)


A jousting Sallet of King Louis II 
Decorated with the intertwined initials L and M for himself and his wife Mary of Austria.

Image : metmuseum.org

It is thought to have been looted by the Ottomans from Buda and was found in what is now Istanbul. 
It is now in the Metropolitan Museum, and there is more about it at Attributed to Kolman Helmschmid - Jousting Sallet (Rennhut) Made for Louis II (1506–1526), King of Hungary and Bohemia - German, Augsburg - The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)