30 May 1434, late afternoon
The feigned retreat
Mikuláš Krchlebec of Krchleby, burgrave of Zvíkov, leads the league’s vanguard on foot towards the field armies’ fort. It fires its four guns at the front of the fort, halts as if in confusion and draws the fire of all the field armies’ guns. Then it turns and falls back towards its own wagons as if beaten.
Mikuláš Krchlebec of Krchleby, who led the vanguard of the lords’ league, in Luděk Marold’s panorama of the battle, 1898Wikimedia Commons, Luděk Marold, CC BY-SA 4.0 (Mikuláš Krchlebec z Krchleb (Bitva u Lipan).png)
A wagon fort holds as long as its wagons stay chained: horsemen cannot ride through them, and men on foot who climb them meet flails and handguns. The feigned retreat brings the defenders out. Taking it for a real flight, the field armies unchain their wagons and pursue onto the plain, horse and foot, shouting “They are running!”. Bartošek of Drahonice has the whole fort move after the league. Most modern historians hold that a detachment went out with a few wagons from the head of the column and left the fort open behind it.
Sources
- Petr Čornej, Lipanská křižovatka (1992).
- Bartošek of Drahonice, Chronicle, and the letter of the Plzeň men of 1 June 1434, in František Šmahel, Die Hussitische Revolution (2002), vol. 3.
- Stephen Turnbull, The Hussite Wars 1419–36 (2004).
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