January 1474 – February 1476
Šabac, 1474–1476
The Ottomans hold Šabac, which they call Böğürdelen, an important border fort on the lower Sava about 60 km west of Belgrade. In January 1474 Ali Bey Mihaloğlu, the bey of Smederevo, raids eastern Hungary, destroys Oradea (then Várad) and takes 16,000 prisoners. Matthias Corvinus is at war with the kings of Poland and Bohemia until late 1474 and then turns against the Ottomans.
The ruins of the fortress of ŠabacWikimedia Commons, Ванилица, CC BY-SA 4.0 (Šabac, Šabačka tvrđava 004.jpg)
After the victory at Vaslui, Stephen of Moldavia swears loyalty to Matthias on 15 August 1475. Mehmed offers Matthias peace, but the king refuses and in the winter marches against Šabac. During the siege Matthias is nearly captured while he watches the fort from a boat, and the fort falls to him on 15 February 1476.
A soldier of the Black Army on a patent of arms of 1504Wikimedia Commons, unknown painter, Public domain (Soldier of the Black Army, from a patent letter.jpg)
At the same time Matthias sends Vlad III, whom he has released from his prison in 1475, and the Serbian Vuk Grgurević into Bosnia. In February and March 1476 they take Srebrenica and other forts and lay waste to Srebrenica, Kušlat and Zvornik, and Vlad has the Ottoman prisoners impaled.
Sources
- Antonio Bonfini, Rerum Ungaricarum decades (about 1497).
- Franz Babinger, Mehmed the Conqueror and His Time (1978).
- Pál Engel, The Realm of St Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary, 895–1526 (2001).
- Tamás Pálosfalvi, From Nicopolis to Mohács: A History of Ottoman-Hungarian Warfare, 1389–1526 (2018).
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