Battle of Miracleau

On October 18, 1599, Mihai the Brave triumphed in the Battle of Shelimbare and was crowned Prince of Transylvania. Although the Austrian Emperor Rudolph II wanted Mihai and General Giorgio Basta to rule together, Mihai was contemptuous of Basta. In 1600, Mihai was betrayed by public shame, and the Hungarian nobility rebelled and gathered an army near Dyulafekhervara ( Alba-Julia ). The Basta forces joined the rebels, and only the sekoys remained on the side of Mihai the Brave, as he defended their rights and freedoms that had previously been violated by the Hungarian nobility.

Basta advanced his troops against the Wallachians, who had been fortified in the village of Mireslau, located a few kilometers north of the Mures river. The number of the Wallachian army totaled approximately 22 thousand people, which included mainly mercenaries (Poles, sekets, Cossacks). Baba Novak in the center of the construction commanded the cavalry. Basta had at his disposal 30 thousand soldiers from the Hungarian nobility, as well as Austrian and German mercenaries.

Mihai began the battle with shelling from the hills, while his main troops stayed in the village and covered themselves with 2 thousand Széké riflemen. At the initial stage of the battle after the shooting, the Hungarian nobility lost a lot of people killed and wounded, and Mihai decided that he would easily win. However, Basta went on a trick: forcing Mihai to leave his defensive positions, he forced him to pursue the Austrians. Mihai, continuing the persecution, urged his troops to “chase the cowardly dogs” and led them out of the defensive position, which Basta took advantage of. He threw the heavy cavalry into battle, crushing the troops of Mihai. Among the Wallachians, panic broke out: the Cossacks were the first to flee from the field, rushing towards Muresh. Baba Novak tried to show some resistance in the center of the battlefield with his cavalry, but this was not enough. Realizing that the continuation of the battle would not be successful, Mihai mounted his horse and sailed through Muresh.

The Wallachians lost more than 5 thousand killed and a huge number of prisoners: the angry Hungarian nobles executed the sekeei who were killed. Basta lost 1 thousand dead. The defeat of Mihai the Brave put an end to his rule in Transylvania, and Mihai was expelled from there by the Polish army Jan Khodkevich and fled to Prague to ask for help from Emperor Rudolph. In 1601, he returned with a new army and defeated Prince Sigismund Batory at Goroslo, but was killed by Basta on August 9, 1601.

Romanian historians evaluate the coronation of Mihai the Brave as the ruler of all three Romanian lands: Wallachia, Moldavia and Transylvania as the most important step. Hungarian historians consider the reign of Mihai the Brave only an episode during the anarchy of the Thirteen Years War, characterized by political intrigue and the struggle for power among the Hungarian nobility, as well as the intervention of the Habsburgs and the Ottoman Empire in these feuds. After the defeat of Mihai the Brave, feuds did not stop until, in 1604, Istvan Bochkai was crowned prince of Transylvania.

• Manole Neagoe, Mihai Viteazul, Ed. Scrisul Românesc, Craiova, 1976, p. 203.
• George Marcu (coord.), Enciclopedia bătăliilor din istoria românilor, Editura Meronia, București, 2011.
• Constantin C. Giurescu & Dinu C. Giurescu, Istoria Românilor: Volumul II (1352-1606), București, 1976.