On the Borderlands of Great Empires: Transylvanian Armies 1541-1613

In 1526, the army of the Hungarian kingdom was soundly defeated by the army of the Ottoman sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, in the battle of Mohács. In the following decades the lands that were once part of the Hungarian Crown were divided. On the eastern half of the former Hungarian kingdom a new state was born, the Principality of Transylvania. For one and a half century (1541-1691), Transylvania was a distinct state on European maps, and played an important military and strategic role i...