Prepared by: Georgy Vilkov
The materials of the site https://www.moldovenii.md/, as well as the publications of G. Astvatsaturov were used
In 1415, the ruler of Wallachia, Mircea the Old, agrees to pay the Ottoman Empire an annual harach of 3,000 gold pieces, after the Turks capture Turnu (Severin) and Brăila as a result of punitive expeditions to Wallachia, turning Giurgia into a paradise, forcing the ruler of the Wallachian to make peace. In 1420, after a major campaign in Wallachia, during which the Turks defeat and execute the ruler Mihai, the successor of the ruler Mircea on the throne, the Ottomans reach the borders of the Moldavian principality. In 1420, the Turkish fleet attacked Cetate Alba (future Akkerman), but the fortress was recaptured by the Moldavian army. The second attempt by the Turkish fleet to capture Chetay Albe also ended in failure for him.
Despite these victories, in order to ensure its security and sovereignty, Moldova, under the reign of Petru Arona, agreed to pay 2,000 gold coins to the Ottoman Porte. The payment of the kharacha meant the recognition and observance by the Ottomans of Moldova as an independent principality.
In the summer of 1455, Sultan Magomed II issued a decree to stop the invasions of Moldova. But seven years later, the situation on the southwestern border of Moldova became more complicated after, in July 1462, the Ottomans, having captured Targovishte (the capital of Wallachia) and expelling Vlad Tepes, known in literature as Dracula, placed Rada the Handsome on the throne of Wallachia, leaving him armed forces to help. From now on, all future invasions of Moldova by the Ottomans will be carried out jointly with the Wallachian detachments.
In 1469, already in the time of Stefan III the Great, the Ottomans once again, together with the Wallachians, attacked the Moldavian lands, but the soldiers of Stefan III resolutely repulsed this raid.
In the period from 1469 to 1470, Tatars attacked Moldova. Moldavian troops under the command of Stefan III win a brilliant victory over the Tatars at Lipnik, not far from the Dniester (Ocnita region). The convincing, categorical victories of Stefan III alarmed the Ottomans. In December 1473, the Ottomans, again united with the Vlachs, organized a major campaign against Moldova: 12,000 Turks, united with 17,000 Vlachs, attacked, plundered and burned the Moldavian principality up to Byrlad. But the Moldavian troops are also repelling this joint Wallachian-Turkish invasion. By 1474, after several defeats by the Wallachian-Turkish alliance, it became clear that a fight between Moldova and the Ottoman Porte was inevitable. The Ottoman Empire reached the peak of its power and could not allow such a small country as Moldova to become an obstacle to its expansion. But Moldova, which became a recognized European factor under Stefan III, did not allow anyone to trample on their lands with impunity. Stephen III turned to Pope Sixtus IV with a proposal to organize a Christian anti-Turkish coalition. But it was to no avail. The Moldavian principality and its lord Stefan III were left alone in front of the hordes of the Ottomans and their satellites - the Vlachs and the Tatars.
In December 1475, a 120,000-strong army, under the command of Khadym Suleiman Pasha, with the support of the Wallachian army, invades the territory of the Moldavian principality, heading towards its capital, Suceava. The goal of the campaign was to capture Moldova and replace Stefan III with another ruler, obedient to the Ottomans. Stefan III, having an army of only 40,000 soldiers, supported by several thousand Székelys (Sekui), Hungarians and Poles, used the tactics of exhausting and weakening the enemy. The lands on the way of the Valaho-Turks were devastated. The Moldavians exhausted their opponents with continuous raids.
Stefan III chose the valley of the Birlad River, south of Vaslui, as a battlefield. The armies met on the so-called High Bridge (Podul Ynalt) 60 km south of the city of Iasi, at the confluence of the Rakov and Byrlad rivers on January 10. Despite the numerical inequality, the good knowledge of the area by the Moldavians contributed to the fact that during the battle the Moldavian army, which consisted of 40 thousand poorly armed people's militias, mainly peasants, as well as 5 thousand hired Hungarian soldiers, partly provided by Matyas Korvin, sekeyi volunteers plus 2 thousand Poles utterly defeated the 120 thousandth Turkish army of Suleiman Pasha (including 20 thousand enslaved Bulgarians). The Turks lost in the battle from 40 to 50 thousand people. killed. The final offensive was preceded by an unusual trick of the Moldavian military trumpeters. Having penetrated deep into the rear of the Ottoman army, the trumpeters gave the signal for a decisive attack. Turkish soldiers were literally confused, deciding that they were surrounded. Panic set in, which Stefan immediately took advantage of. The enemy was defeated.
The great victory of the Moldavians, “badly armed and taken almost from the plow” (K. Marx), spread the glory of Moldova even more throughout Europe and covered the name of the sovereign Stefan III, who was later called the Great, with unfading glory. The widow of Sultan Murad I admitted: "The Turkish army has never suffered such a defeat." After this resounding victory, Stefan III the Great does not allow himself to rest on his laurels.
A few days after the battle, the sovereign of Moldova informs and warns the Christian kings and princes: “... The unfaithful Turkish emperor plans to take revenge and come in May himself and with all his strength against us and conquer our country, which is the gate of Christianity and which God delivered from this before so far. But if this gate of Christianity, that is, our country, is lost - may God deliver us from this - then all of Christianity will be in great danger. Therefore, we ask you to send your captains to us to help against the enemies of Christianity, while there is still time ... "
On June 20, 1475, Stefan III the Great wrote to his representatives in Hungary, Stanch, Duma and Mikheu: “... We learned through our people about the enemies of Christianity, about the infidels who are against us ... and the sultan himself will go against us by land, so that he himself will enslave our land with all their strength and with all the strength of Wallachia, because the Wallachians are enemies for us, like the Turks. And to believe reasonably that this is so.
The Turkish armies, united with the Wallachian ones, attacked Moldova a year later, on July 26, 1476, at a place called Valea Alba (White Valley), near Razboeni. Here Moldovans once again died for their homeland. The Battle of the White Valley (Razboen) is the culminating event in the punitive campaigns undertaken by the Turks together with the Muntians (one of the names of the Vlachs) against the Moldavian Country. This is how Stefan III the Great, a direct participant in this battle, conveys this tragic event for Moldova and the Moldovans. What follows is a genuine model of an objective account of an event with adverse consequences for the narrator himself and his people. Genuine sincere story model: “Io Stefan governor, by the grace of God, ruler of the Moldavian Land, in the year 1476, my reign of the 20th of the current year, a strong Mehmet, the emperor of Tours, rose up with all his eastern forces, and with him Basarab, the governor named Layote, came with him with all his Bessarabian country. And they came to rob and take the Moldavian Country; and reached this place called the White Stream. And we, Stefan governor and with our son Alexander, went out to meet them here and made a great battle with them in the month of July 26; and by the will of God, the Christians were defeated by the infidels and many Moldavian wars (warriors) fell here... "
From the inscription on the church built in memory of those who fell in the battle near Valya Alba, 1496, it is written in the Anonymous (Bistritsa) Chronicle of Moldova: “In the summer of 6984 (1476) in the month of July, on Friday, the king of Tur himself, called Mehmet bey, came with all his forces and Basaraba voivode with them and with all his army against Stefan voivode, create a battle with them at the White Pototsi and then empower the cells of Turkey and with hicklenimi Munteans. And fell that good knights and great boleri and kind, and young youths (...) under the hands of the infidels and the filthy tongue and under the hands of the filthy Muntians, as the accomplices of the bisha to the bastards and the bisha in their participation in Christianity ... ".
However, much more Turks died in this battle, the Moldavians put up fierce resistance, further retreating and devastating their country in order to deprive the Turks of the possibility of supplying the army, hiding behind the walls of their cities and fortresses. The Turks failed to take the capital of Moldova, Suceava, and the exhausted and hungry Turks, under the threat of an epidemic that had begun and the Hungarian army of Matei Corvin approaching to help Stefan, retreated from Moldova.
Thus, the campaign of 1476 by Mehmet II did not achieve its goal - Moldova retained its independence. The diplomatic efforts of Stefan III, his written and oral, through ambassadors, appeals to the Venetian Republic, the papal curia, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Hungarian and Polish kingdoms with a proposal to form an anti-Ottoman Christian coalition to guard the "gates of Christianity" - Moldova, were futile. Neighboring countries, large ecclesiastical and trading centers became more and more passive as the Ottoman-Wallachian expeditions became more difficult to stop.
In the summer of 1484, a powerful Turkish army, together with the Wallachian troops and "with the support of the Tatars," besieged the fortress of Chilia, defended by the Moldavians under the command of Ivanko and Maxim. After a hard week-long siege, the Turco-Vlachs capture the fortress.
On August 8, 1484, the Turkish-Valachian-Tatar troops also captured Cetate Albe, which was defended by the Moldavians under the command of the pyrcalabs (commandants) Kherman and Oane. But the trials of Moldova did not end there. Having learned that Stefan III was in Kolomyia, the Turks, together with the Wallachians, attacked Moldova in September 1485, robbed and set fire to the country to Suceava, but Stefan III quickly returned and, under the pressure of his troops, the Ottomans retreated to Chilia itself.
A month later, the Moldavian army under the command of Stefan III defeated (11/16/1485) near Katlabuga (in Bessarabia, that is, in Budjak) the Turkish army led by Bali-bek Malkoch oglu. However, Stefan fails to free Kiliya.
During this period, Stefan III the Great becomes the number one enemy of the Turks and Tatars. In the spring of the following year (1486), a powerful Turkish army, led by the same Bali-bek, again attacks Moldova, trying to conquer it. In the Battle of Shkei (1486), the Moldavian army defeats the interventionists and eliminates the pretender to the Gompodar throne Chronoda.
Exalted by kings, princes, European chroniclers, church hierarchs - the papal curia, the Senate of Venice, who fed him sweet speeches, pompous phrases and empty promises - left without anyone's help before the Turkish hordes, united with Wallachian and Tatar troops, betrayed by all Wallachian rulers, whom he himself put on the throne, forced to take into account the territorial claims and other neighbors, Stefan III the Great signs in 1489 a peace treaty with Sultan Bayezid II, pledging to pay Porte Haraci 3,000 Venetian florins, while remaining the only autocratic ruler Moldova, however, without Chilia and Cetate Albe.
Moldova after Stefan
The long stay of Stefan III the Great on the throne of Moldova had a beneficial effect on all areas of the political, social, economic, administrative and spiritual life of Moldova. All the achievements of the Moldavian state under the rule of Stefan III the Great are the result of the coincidence of the most daring plans of the great governor with the aspirations of his subjects. With the support of the peasants, petty boyars, townspeople, merchants and servicemen, as well as neutralizing any attempt of disobedience on the part of the big boyars, Stefan managed to establish the Moldavian state among the authoritative European countries.
Consistently asserting the system of a unitary state with a rigid hierarchy, Stefan III the Great created the necessary conditions for the development of Moldova in all areas. The period of his reign remained the most brilliant and exceptionally fruitful in the development of Moldova. The resounding victories of the Moldavians under the command of Stefan Voevoda over the Ottomans, Vlachs (Munteans), Poles, Tatars, and Hungarians crowned the well-deserved glory of the Moldavian warriors, spreading throughout Europe the message of a courageous people and state with a name Moldova little known before Stefan.
After Stefan III the Great (July 2, 1504), his son Bogdan III (1504–1517) came to the throne of Moldova, who inherited from his father the qualities of a brave warrior, quick in action and ambitious in desires. However, unlike his father, he was not always cautious enough and did not know how to anticipate the course of events, using the modest defensive capabilities that the country had.
Already a year after the enthronement, the ruler entered the war with Poland because of the contested Pokutia. Moldavian-Polish clashes continued until 1509. Managed at times impulsively, without a common vision of the situation, without a thoughtful determination of the directions of the political strategy (concluding alliances, agreements, or at least agreements), Moldova increasingly fell under the influence of the big boyars, lost credibility with neighboring states, and lost the ability to protect itself from invasions. The long Moldavian-Polish conflict, the attack of the Vlachs and the retaliatory punitive expedition, the subsequent devastating invasions of the Tatars to Chukhur and Yassy (1510, 1513), the new intervention of the Vlachs, who once again violated the "eternal peace", forced Bogdan III to normalize relations with the Ottomans and pay tribute to them, but already 8,000 gold.
Seen by the historian Ureke “as a strategist who watched all sides so that the country left from his father was not infringed,” Bogdan III the Terrible (Chel Grozavu) died in 1517 in Iasi.
At that time, his son Stefanita was 11 years old. It was he who was put on the throne and ruled Moldova for 10 years (1517–1527). In fact, for five years, until 1522, Moldova was ruled by Luca Arbore, a major boyar, porter (commandant) of Suceava, who was actually regent under the teenager Stefanita, who bears the title of "voda".
Guided in politics by the principles of Stefan III the Great, Luca Arbore tried to keep Moldova whole and independent. His attempts to keep the country in his hands on behalf of the minor ruler aroused the dissatisfaction of the big boyars. At the age of 16, Stefanita, incited by the boyars, abandons his mentor and in April 1523 orders Luca Arbore to be beheaded.
In January 1527, Stefanita Voda dies in Khotyn, according to one version, from poisoning.
The next ruler of the Moldavian Principality, Petr Rares, comes to his first reign (1527–1538), and this circumstance will have a sensitive effect on Moldova.
The most talented son of Stefan III inherited many qualities from his father - he was dynamic, uncompromising in decisions. However, sometimes he was mistaken in assessing the emerging balance of power in Central Europe, he was not always able to predict the result of inevitable clashes. Petru Rares first strengthened relations with Poland, improved relations with the Porte (which, in turn, entered into an alliance with Poland), established contacts with Ferdinand of Habsburg. At the same time, in the second year of his reign, Petar Rares organized a campaign, one of the largest undertaken by the Moldavians to Transylvania. As a result of this campaign in the winter of 1529, Peter Raresh received from the King of Hungary Ioan Zápolya as a payment - the Bistrica fortress and its environs, the Rodna valley, and the Ungurashul fortress.
The victories in Transylvania turned the head of Peter Rares. Losing a sense of reality, he ceased to reckon with the opinion of the gospodar council. The boyars complained that: “The Lord never listens to our advice”, “out of these victories… becoming proud, Petru Rares considered that luck would always be with him, would always accompany him”, writes Manolake Dragic reproachfully.
In December 1530, the Moldavian troops entered Pokutia, leaving their garrisons in the cities and fortresses. However, in August 1531, the Polish khatman (hetman) Jan Tarnovsky returned Pokutia to Poland. The ruler, wanting to capture Pokutia at any cost and repair the damage, sends troops to Poland, but their advance was stopped at Gvozdiyek (08/19/1531). Three days later, on August 22, 1531, the Moldavian army was defeated in the Battle of Obertyn.
Petr Raresh's "arrogance" had grave consequences for Moldova.
Considering that the time has come to subdue Moldova, weakened by a military company in Poland, Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent organizes a major campaign, calling under his thujas (banners) and Vlachs, coordinating the operation with the Tatars.
09/15/1538 Suleiman and his Ottoman-Walachian detachments occupy the capital of the Moldavian principality - Suceava, which did not even resist. Boyars betray their ruler. Peter Rares leaves Moldova (09/28/1538) and hides in the Chicheu fortress.
Thus, the ill-conceived actions of Petru Rares had dramatic consequences for Moldova in all directions - economic, territorial-administrative and political: Budzhak and Tighina join the Ottoman Empire, which appoints (without consultation with the government council) a new ruler of Moldova - Stefan Lacuste.
So, from 1538 Moldova fell under Ottoman domination. The Turks resettled the Nogai Tatars in Budjak. For the first time, the Ottomans leave a garrison of 500 Janissaries in Suceava to guard their henchman, Stefan Lakuste.
In turn, Turkish chroniclers consider Moldova conquered by the Ottoman Empire back in 1476 after the Battle of the White Valley, and subsequent Turkish campaigns were organized mainly to suppress the uprisings of recalcitrant rulers.
Be that as it may, 1538 was the year of the final enslavement of the Moldavian principality. True, unlike the Balkan lands, a pashalyk was not created here, but the Moldavian gospodar administration was preserved. Based on the idea that Tighina and its environs belong to the Moldavian state, a number of researchers emphasize the severe consequences of its loss. But the facts testify to a somewhat different, very peculiar situation. It can be said with a fair degree of certainty that in this case, Turkey decided to finally remove the problem of the disputed territory that existed between the Moldavian state and the Tatar khans, who, under all the above-mentioned rulers of Moldova, actually ruled this region. From the Moldavian chronicles, all the numerous devastating Tatar attacks on cities and entire regions of Moldova are known.
So, Tigina is mentioned only in the sense that the attacks of the Tatars come from her side (the proximity of Budzhak), but the city is never mentioned in these chronicles as having suffered from such invasions.
As it was written in other sections of the site (versions of origin), it is obvious that before the Turkish conquest, the city and trading post of Tigina were under the rule of the Tatars and their vassals, the Genoese, who were forced to leave after the fall of Belgorod to their trading post Olkhonia (Magpie), and then completely leave this region, although legally Tigina was part of the Moldavian principality.
As the strongest, the Sultan stationed his Ottoman garrison in Tighina, and for many centuries customs and
coastal villages have already become a Turkish possession, called Ben-Der by the Turks, and the Tatars once again confirmed their vassal dependence on Turkey, however, it even suited them for such political intervention by the Ottomans, since the latter took on very burdensome functions of protecting borders and maintaining in the fortresses of regular garrisons.
The Crimean Khan Sahib-Girey I (1532-1551) took an active part in the conquest campaign of the Turkish sultan against Moldova and was generously rewarded, although he was defeated by Raresh at Shtefanesti before taking Suceava.
After the fall of Suceava, the Sultan celebrated the victory with the Crimean Khan for five days, and there, perhaps, their agreement on the construction of the Bendery fortress took place. That is why a number of researchers consider this khan to be the “parent” of the fortress.
Similar deals between the Tatars and the Turks were no longer uncommon. If we take into account that the construction of the Perekop fortress began simultaneously with Bendery, the fortifications of Ochakov were significantly strengthened, then we can conclude that the Turks and Tatars created a whole system of defensive structures. Enriched as a result of predatory campaigns in Russian lands, Moldova, Poland, the Crimean khans and beys saw in the construction of stone castles-fortresses a symbol of the establishment of their statehood, as well as the creation of more reliable springboards for their devastating raids, and did not spare money for this. Only for the construction of the Tyagin fortress on the Dnieper Mengli-Girey paid the Turks 150,000 gold pieces.
The construction of the Bendery fortress by order of the Tatars was a convenient excuse for Sultan Suleiman to send his troops there.
The rejection of Tighina by the Ottomans was marked by the placement of a marble slab on the Gate Tower of the citadel of the fortress, the so-called "tarikh Suleiman" (now restored), the inscription on which read:
“I am the slave of Allah and the ruler of this world, the Sultan. Allah made me
faithful leader of the people of Mohammed, I am the favorite of the All-Merciful.
The wisdom of Allah and the miraculous power of Mohammed are my companions. I'm that one
Suleiman, in whose name "Khutba" (prayer) was read in the saints
places.
I am the one who sent ships to the seas of Europe, Africa and
Indian. I am the Shah of Baghdad and Iraq, the king of Rome (Byzantium) and the sultan
Egypt.
The throne and the golden crown of the Hungarian king I achieved out of sympathy and
my generosity, he (the king) is the obedient slave of the Sultan.
And also the governor of Peter, a multi-evil rebel, I expelled. When from
the dust of my horse's horseshoes has risen, I have conquered Bogdan (Moldova).
Year 945 (according to the Muslim calendar), Hassan Bey, new Qadi
Bender, who fortified the crossing, helped the sea beys. I am Suleiman, a descendant
Osmanov, who built the fortress and wrote the chronogram"
Almost every word of the last two lines carries a great semantic load. Scientists have determined the date of the chronogram as 1538. According to the manner of execution of the tarikh and the writing of individual elements, it is known that the chronogram was carved by a skilled Tatar stonemason from Bakhchisaray, Kafa, or some other city of the Crimean Khanate. The phrase "new kadiy Bender" makes it possible to assume the presence of the Turks at the customs point long before the construction of the fortress.
- Wallachia called the historical region between the Carpathian Mountains and the Danube River, which is now located in the southern part of Romania
- Harach - poll tax from non-believers (dhimmis) in Muslim states
- Raya - the territory taken from the vassal ruler and directly subordinate to the Ottoman administration (usually in the vicinity of the fortress)
- Sekui - one of the sub-ethnic groups that make up the Hungarian national minority on the territory of the modern Republic of Romania
- Pokutya - a culturally distinctive region and a historical region now in the west of Ukraine, between the Prut and Cheremosh rivers.
