May – December 1475
Caffa and Theodoro, 1475
The Genoese hold Feodosia (then Caffa) and the other trading towns on the coast of the Crimea. In the hills behind the coast lies the Greek Principality of Theodoro, whose prince Isaac gives his sister Maria in marriage to Stephen of Moldavia in 1472. In March 1475 the nobles of the Crimean Khanate replace Khan Meñli Giray with his brother, and Meñli flees to the Genoese at Caffa.
The church of St John the Baptist and the Genoese walls of Feodosia (Caffa)Wikimedia Commons, Qypchak, CC BY-SA 3.0 (THE GENOESE FORTRESS IN CAFFA.jpg)
On 20 May 1475 an Ottoman fleet under Gedik Ahmed Pasha leaves Constantinople for the Crimea. Caffa surrenders after a siege of five days, on 6 June 1475, or on 9 June by the Ottoman chronicle of Aşıkpaşazade. The Ottomans then take Sudak (then Soldaia), Balaklava (then Cembalo) and Kerch, and their ships cross the Sea of Azov to Azov (then Tana). Meñli Giray, who has sided with the Genoese, is taken to Constantinople as a prisoner.
Stephen's brother-in-law Alexander has taken Theodoro from his brother Isaac with Moldavian help, and he holds the fortress of Mangup with 300 Wallachian soldiers. The Ottomans besiege it from September and storm it five times, and at the end of December 1475 hunger forces the defenders to surrender. Alexander is taken to Constantinople and beheaded, and the southern coast of the Crimea comes under direct Ottoman rule. Meñli Giray returns in spring 1478 with an Ottoman fleet and rules as khan under the sultan's protection.
Meñli I Giray with his son Mehmed Giray and Sultan Bayezid II, in the Hünername, 1584–1588Wikimedia Commons, unknown Ottoman painter, Public domain (Meñli I Giray (centre) with the eldest son, future khan Mehmed I Giray (left) and Turkish sultan Bayezid II (right).jpg)
Sources
- Aşıkpaşazade, Tevârîh-i Âl-i Osmân (late 15th century).
- Franz Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror and His Time (1978).
- Alexander A. Vasiliev, The Goths in the Crimea (1936).
- Halil İnalcık, The Ottoman Empire: The Classical Age, 1300–1600 (1973).
- Jonathan Eagles, Stephen the Great and Balkan Nationalism (2014).
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