Mihai the Brave

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In 1593 , he was recognized by the Turkish Sultan Murad III as ruler of Wallachia . In 1594 , during the Austro-Turkish war , the 22-year-old prince of Transylvania, Zhigmond Batori, began negotiations with Mihai Hrabry and with Moldavian ruler Aron Tiran . All three principalities ( Transylvania , Wallachia and Moldavia ) were dependent on the Turks, but were going to go to the side of the Habsburgs. In 1595, Zhigmond invited Mihai and Aron to Alba-Julia to conclude an agreement: according to his plan, both of them were to become his vassals (after which they were promised military assistance in the fight against the Turks).

Aron refused to go and paid for it: very soon he was overthrown by his hetman Stefan Razvan , who took his place. Mihai sent an embassy, ​​the members of which signed an agreement on May 20, 1595 . A little later, on June 3, 1595 , the agreement was signed by the ambassadors of the new sovereign of Moldova, Stephen VIII Razvan . Mihai the Brave subsequently claimed that his ambassadors exceeded their authority.

Social Policy

In 1595, Mihai the Brave issued a decree establishing that “every serf, wherever he is discovered, remains forever serf where he is” ^[2] .

The liberation of Wallachia

On August 21, 1595, a huge (supposedly one hundred thousandth) Turkish army, commanded by the great vizier himself, crossed the Danube and moved to Bucharest . On August 23, 1595, Mihai the Brave, who commanded very small forces, blocked the way for the Turks at the village of Kalughereni, between Giurgiu and Bucharest . Thanks to the courage of Mihai’s troops and his military talent, an important tactical victory was won at the Battle of Kalughereni , which strengthened the spirit of the Wallachians. However, the Turkish army, although it suffered heavy losses, was not destroyed and remained a formidable force. Mihai retreated north, leaving Bucharest , which was occupied by the Turks without a fight. Satisfied with this success, the Turks, who did not consider Wallachia the main theater of the military campaign, continued their campaign and soon became firmly stuck in the fight against the Habsburgs on the territory of Hungary. After waiting for this moment, Mihai the Brave, united with the Transylvanian army under the command of Istvan Bochkai , took Targovishte , Bucharest and Braila . For a while, all of Wallachia was liberated from the Turks.

Joining Transylvania

While the position of Mihai the Brave was strengthened, his formal overlord Zhigmond Bathory , sandwiched between the Turks and the Habsburg empire, lost heart and on December 23, 1597 entered into a shameful agreement with Emperor Rudolph II . Gigmont exchanged Transylvania for the Principality of Opole (Duchy) in Silesia , the title of Prince of the Holy Roman Empire and an annual pension of 50 thousand thalers. On April 10, 1598, Zhigmond transferred power to the representatives of the emperor. However, Rudolph II was in no hurry with compensation. The deceived Zhigmond on August 20, 1598 secretly returned to his principality and drove out the representatives of the Habsburgs, and then successfully repelled the invasion of the Turks. On March 29, 1599 , Zhigmond transferred power over Transylvania to his cousin Andras (son of Andras VII), the Hungarian cardinal, prince-bishop of Warmia and the grand master of the Order of the Dragon . Such a change of power in Transylvania was favorably received by the Ottoman Empire and the Commonwealth , but caused discontent in the camp of the anti-Turkish coalition. The result was an invasion of the combined forces of the Habsburgs and Mihai the Brave in Transylvania. Under the command of the imperial general Giorgio Bast, these troops defeated the army of Andras ( October 28, 1599 ). Andras himself was killed during the retreat ( November 3, 1599 ). The prince of Transylvania became Mihai the Brave.

Accession of Moldova

The policy of the Moldavian ruler Stefan Razvan , who recognized himself as a vassal of Gigmond Bathory , caused a conflict with the Commonwealth . In August 1595 , the Poles entered Moldova, expelled Razvan and seated Jeremiah Movila on the throne. On August 27, 1595 , the new ruler signed an agreement in which he recognized his vassal dependence on the Commonwealth and undertook to pay tribute. Polish garrisons remained in Khotyn and Suceava . Movila also pledged to pay tribute to the Crimean Khan and the Turkish Sultan. It is clear that the burden of payments lay on the common people, and the ruler was extremely unpopular.

In May 1600 , Mihai the Brave, by that time already the ruler of the two principalities glorified by victories, Wallachia and Transylvania, with a 17,000 army opposed Jeremiah Movila , on whose side there were 15 thousand Moldovan soldiers and 3 thousand Poles. With the rapprochement with the Wallachian troops, the Moldavians revolted, and the battle did not come to a battle. The fugitive Jeremiah Movila took refuge in the Khotyn fortress .

Now, under the rule of Mihai the Brave, there were all three Danube principalities. He became known as “the ruler of Wallachia, Transylvania and all Moldavian land ” ^[3] .

The collapse of plans and death

The success of Mihai the Brave was put to an end by the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth a few months after the accession of Moldova. He did not find support among the Moldovan and Transylvanian feudal lords, who feared that the unification under the leadership of Wallachia would lead to an increase in the power of the Wallachian boyars and to diminish their own influence. He could not count on the support of the Habsburgs , who themselves claimed to be included in their state of Transylvania, Wallachia and Moldova. All this had sad consequences for Mikhail the Brave. The tycoons of Transylvania, in collusion with whom the Moldavian nobility was also, moved their army to Wallachia and on September 18, 1600 won the battle with the army of Mikhail the Brave at Miralesau .

In September 1600 , significant Polish forces entered Moldova under the command of the crown hetman Jan Zamoysky . The detachments left by Mihai were defeated, and Jeremiah Movila was again proclaimed a sovereign. The Poles did not stop there and soon expelled Mihai from Wallachia, who was ruled in October 1600 by the imprisonment of Simeon Movila , the brother of Jeremiah (he ruled until July 3, 1601).

In Transylvania, the power of Mihai the Brave was very fragile from the very beginning. Local feudal lords feared that it was going to dominate the natives of Wallachia and to reduce their own influence. Having arranged a coup, the Transylvanian nobility drove out the representatives of Mihai the Brave and on February 4, 1601, again elected Zhigmond Bathory as their prince, who by this time had gathered a new army near Kolozhvar .

Having lost everything, Mihai went to Vienna to ask the emperor for help. Having received the corps of imperial troops led by General Giorgio Basta , Mihai returned to power in Wallachia, and then opposed Zhigmond Batori and defeated him on August 3, 1601. However, the consolidation of Mihai the Brave in Transylvania was not included in the plans of the emperor. General Giorgio Basta plotted, as a result of which Mihai the Brave was killed near Turda on August 9, 1601 .

Since August 1601 , after the death of Mihai the Brave, Simion Movila became the ruler of Wallachia.

• In 1971, Sergiu Nikolaescu's film, Mihai the Brave, was released

• Order of Mihai the Brave

• Mihai the Brave / Shkundin GD // Meot Archaeological Culture - Mongol-Tatar Invasion [Electronic resource]. - 2012. - P. 491. - (The Big Russian Encyclopedia : [in 35 vols.] / Ch. Ed. Yu. S. Osipov ; 2004—2017, vol. 20). - ISBN 978-5-85270-354-5 .
• The World History. Encyclopedia. Volume 4
• Mihai the Brave // Megaencyclopedia of Cyril and Methodius