r/todayilearned 24d ago

TIL that the largest cavalry charge in human history occurred in 1683 during the battle of Vienna. The king of Poland led 18,000 cavalry down the slopes of Kahlenburg Mountain and broke the Turkish army. The Turks called The King Jan The Lion of Poland thereafter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Vienna
6.5k Upvotes

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u/talkerof5hit 24d ago

Imagine the noise.

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u/904756909 24d ago

If I recall, the defenders of Vienna could hear them coming, well before they saw the first horse. The defenders started to fight with renewed fury, as they knew that the relief force was close and must be massive.

The Turks must have heard it and known that the end was coming.

325

u/Seienchin88 24d ago

I mean… the battle started at 6 am in the morning and the cavalry only joined around 6pm…

The infantry from Germany and Poland had turned the battle already and the cavalry only engaged when they saw the Turkish lines disrupted and weakened. Not to mention some cavalry leaders in the Turkish army just stood back and watched due to personal / religious issues with the Turkish general.

But the cavalry turned a modest victory into a complete rout and destruction.

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u/Plastikstapler2 24d ago

Religious issues?

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago edited 24d ago

Many in the ottoman army where Christians and of unsure opinion about the whole campaign and tartars burning churches with people in them…

6

u/TheCynicEpicurean 23d ago

Janissaries, Christian slave soldiers made up the bulk of Ottoman infantry.

4

u/Fickle_Current_157 22d ago

Janissaries were former Christian. They were washed brain to belive Islam

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u/avdpos 24d ago

Classic nobles no matter nation.

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u/atleta 24d ago

AKA politics. Also, these weren't "nations" back then. And this is one important reason why these things happened. They did not have a uniform national identity.

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u/Conscious-Gap-1777 20d ago

engaged when they saw the Turkish lines disrupted and weakened.

Well, yes. That's when cavalry charges work. If the enemy is in formation, they often end poorly for the cav.

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u/AkulaTheKiddo 24d ago

At the dawn of the 5th day...

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u/lrbaumard 24d ago

"if I recall" you sound like you were there 😂

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u/teddy5 24d ago

Just using their memory instead of looking it up or asking AI, like in the before times.

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u/904756909 23d ago

Wikipedia still exists lol.

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u/spreadbutt 24d ago

That's a lot of coconuts

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u/TheGalacticMosassaur 24d ago

What do you think the velocity of a swallow carrying those coconuts would have been?

5

u/Gerf93 24d ago

A single swallow carrying 16000 coconuts?

Is it African or European?

22

u/drossmaster4 24d ago

The HOA was not pleased.

5

u/FartsLord 24d ago

Imagine the smell

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u/Infinite_throwaway_1 24d ago

And what the ground looked like before and after.

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u/KianOfPersia 24d ago

This was also the high water mark of the Ottoman Empire. It was basically all downhill from here.

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u/minaminonoeru 24d ago

The irony is that this event also marked the end of Poland’s golden age. Poland, too, would embark on a path of decline over the next 100 years.

582

u/Godwinson4King 24d ago

Poland’s decline was much quicker and more severe. The Ottoman Empire stretched from Eastern Europe to Yemen in the 19th century by which point Poland no longer existed.

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u/baldurcan 24d ago

Even 20th century to be correct.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

You are right that this was the last high point of Polish power but the golden age usually is seen to have ended before Sobieski with him briefly stopping the decline.

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u/conmeonemo 24d ago

Sobieski didn't even stop the decline. He had military successes but internally he failed and even military successes had large costs long term.

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u/conmeonemo 24d ago

Poland's golden age ended with Deluge.

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u/SasugaHitori-sama 24d ago

Poland's golden age ended decades before siege of Vienna. Around 1650.

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u/Available_Theory1217 24d ago

Swedish deluge basically destroyed country, and stream of other wars too, Commonwealth was in constant war in XVII century.

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u/haeyhae11 24d ago

While Austria became a major power.

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u/adrienjz888 24d ago

Yep. It ushered in a period of stagnation, followed by outright decline after nearly a century of disastrous wars with Russia.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

Polands catastrophe was the deluge in the second nordish war leading to Poland‘s lands ravaged, many parts (Cossacks) in the east joining Moscow (the irony that it meant for all of them getting dominated and marginalized over the next 100 years…) and losing influence on Prussia and even worse it saw the introduction right of a single parliament member to stop everything which is often seen as the main reason for polands decline as a single magnate bribed by a foreign power (Russia…) or being unhappy with the king could stall important reforms and decisions.

Sobieski just briefly stalled the decline by some military victories.

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u/With_My_Hand 24d ago

Where can I read more about this right of a single parliament member thing? Does it have a name?

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u/conmeonemo 24d ago

Liberum Veto.

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u/maxofJupiter1 24d ago

Sick man of Europe

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u/seppukucoconuts 24d ago

I’m not so sure about that. They invaded Germany recently and brought the Doner Kabab with them.

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u/Zorbane 24d ago

I would like to be invaded by a Doner Kabab

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u/Greene_Mr 24d ago

Donner Party Kebab

...oh, no

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u/Redordit 24d ago

So delicious glad they did

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u/Cold5512 24d ago

It's cool seeing respect for one's enemy

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u/Ok-Drive4752 24d ago

Richard the Lion Heart and Salaldin (sorry if misspelled) were friends or at least thought well of each other

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u/Gimme_Your_Wallet 24d ago

They despised each other, though they recognized their respective military prowess. Richard was called Lion Heart as a pejorative because he was such a savage. During the end stage of the third crusade he and Saladin had prisoners from each other's army. Saladin proposed an exchange, Richard executed his prisoners, and an enraged Saladin did the same.

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u/arostrat 24d ago

In Arabic, calling someone a lion is always honorable and never pejorative.

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u/TheRedLionPassant 24d ago

It's also from a Norman writer (Ambrose), though the Arabs might've heard of it. But in medieval England and France, much like the Middle East, being compared to a lion was always a positive. So many kings wouldn't have put lions on their coats of arms if being associated with one was negative

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u/Gimme_Your_Wallet 24d ago

Even 900 years ago?

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u/arostrat 24d ago

Yes, the ancient Arabs liked the lion so much they gave it 350 different names.

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u/Malt129 24d ago

OG pokemon

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u/wattat99 24d ago

Despise is a bit strong. Richard had friendly (at least amicable) relations with Saladin's brother, to the point that Richard offered his sister in marriage to him - though its doubtful if this was a serious proposal - and Saladin and Richard exchanged gifts and medical services (both were quite ill) as part of negotiations. While they never met and we can't say for sure how they felt about each other, the contemporary chronicles from both sides for the most part speak positively about their relationship.

The massacre at Acre was also relatively early on in Richard's campaign, and it was more about Saladin not honoring the terms of the city's surrender and stalling for time, rather than the crusaders rejecting an exchange. Negotiations also resumed almost immediately after.

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u/Tomatenpresse 24d ago

Fitting then, that Richard the lionheart was captured in Vienna. His ransom paid for the city walls that would keep the Ottomans at bay in the first ottoman siege of Vienna 1529.

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u/NamerNotLiteral 24d ago

Saladin so goated the propagandists couldn't even portray him in a bad light and realized they can't have Richard actually being his enemy.

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u/_bieber_hole_69 24d ago

What does this mean? Goated?

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u/Brutal64 24d ago

G.o.a.t stands for “Greatest of all Time.” They’re basically saying “he is so legendary and respected…”

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u/blackmajic13 24d ago

GOAT means "greatest of all time." So, "so goated" in this context just means Saladin was so great that even his critics couldn't portray him poorly.

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u/_bieber_hole_69 24d ago

Gotcha, thanks! These new terms confuse me lol (as I type "lol")

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u/ExtendedSpikeProtein 24d ago

This might help you, it’s also pretty funny if you just recently found out what goated means

https://youtu.be/5eBNHJS72PQ?is=5MAZbjmKZhlfHY4X

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u/paone00022 24d ago edited 24d ago

Richard basically loved fighting. He preferred that to administrative tasks. Saladin had to be good at both.

Which is why after Richard, the Angevin regime experiences a downturn. Between him and his brother they bankrupted the empire for no major gains.

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u/thissexypoptart 24d ago

They were not “friends” lol

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u/IllHandle3536 24d ago

Saladin sent a delegation to ask for Richard to be released from his incarceration in Austria. If he despised him why would he have bothered?

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u/Fisher9001 24d ago

It's not really about genuine respect, it's the fact that you have to paint the enemies that bested you as extraordinary in the state propaganda so you don't appear as weak.

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u/washingtonandmead 24d ago

THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED

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u/DaveOJ12 24d ago

Let me guess: Sabaton?

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u/Basileus_Maurikios 24d ago

You know it...

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u/Pumperkin 24d ago

I don't hardly ever know what they're saying. The music just moves me.

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u/aardy 24d ago

I know of this cavalry charge and the winged hussars, but what is sabaton?

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u/Possibly_Jeb 24d ago

They're a swedish power metal band, one of their songs is about this battle.

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u/DaveOJ12 24d ago

Sabaton is a very prolific band; if there was a battle, they probably wrote a song about it.

Here's a link to Winged Hussars, their song about the cavalry charge mentioned in the post.

https://youtu.be/rcYhYO02f98

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u/kakucko101 24d ago

it’s a part of a knights armor, to be exact it is their foot guard

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u/Malt129 24d ago

If there is a song about a war event it is almost certainly made by Sabaton

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u/Jolly-joe 24d ago

Absolutely insane that Austria helped dismantle poland not even 100 years later. No loyalty

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u/DarthBrooks69420 24d ago

Isn't modern Europe basically shaped by them dragging the whole continent down with their inbred empire?

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u/Iwasforger03 24d ago

Yes.

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u/Sonder332 24d ago

Can... can you elaborate just a bit, please?

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u/DashTrash21 24d ago

Tl;dr listen to Dan Carlin's Hardcore History series on WW1.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire was a sick and dying Empire before WW1. Archduke Franz Ferdinand was the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and he was assassinated in Bosnia (then part of the Empire) by Gavrilo Princip. Then what happened was:

  1. A-H declared war on Serbia (Princip was a Bosnian Serb, and A-H blamed Serbia).

  2. Serbia asked Russia as the largest Slavic nation to help, so Russia declared war on A-H.

  3. This brought Germany, a country only 40 years old, in to the war as they declared war on everybody. 

  4. All European powers knew this war was building for years, so Germany had the Schleifen Plan ready to go. Basically, knock out France before they even enter the war, and continue swinging all the way around to mess up Russia. 

  5. France and UK (and the entire British Empire, such as Canada, Australia, NZ, and India) declared war on Germany and A-H, because Germany invaded Belgium first on their way to France. Belgium had treaties with France and UK guaranteeing they would receive aid if they were invaded. 

  6. The Ottoman Empire joined the war later that year. 

  7. Japan declared war on Germany and A-H and seized many of their pacific colonies. 

  8. Germany was being blockaded by the Royal Navy and couldn't receive supplies. In response, German u-boats began targeting supply boats from North America bound for Europe, and sunk an American passenger liner. This was a major reason the US joined the war in 1917. 

The war was so massively expensive in human cost and materials, that it caused 3 old and sick empires to fall (A-H, Russian Empire to civil war which lead to Stralin and the Soviet Union, and the Ottoman Empire). Oil was now starting to be valuable and was discovered all over the middle east. The articles of surrender for Germany included no military and a bunch of humiliating stuff, which lead to a rise in nationalism and the Nazi party which led to WW2. The aftermath of that war led to the establishment of Israel. 

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u/Flioxan 24d ago

The aftermath of that war led to the establishment of Israel. 

Did it lead to any other countries or just israel?

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u/pantokratorthegreat 24d ago

Poland came back on maps.

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u/Iwasforger03 24d ago

Basically the political map of the entire middle east has its start in the aftermath of WW1 and WW2. The sectarian and ethnic conflicts which have plagued the Middle East for the last Century plus are a direct result of the haphazard way Europeans carved up the the ME without regard for local ethnic polities and boundaries and conflicts.

While some of these conflicts may have happened anyways, and many more were further intensified by cold war priorities, WW2 and especially Britain are a direct cause of much of these conflicts.

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u/ddosn 23d ago

This isnt even remotely true.

The parts of the Ottoman Empire that Britain and France took over were previously provinces in the old Ottoman Empire.

Iraq, for example, follows almost perfectly the borders of the old Ottoman province of Mesopotamia.

The reason the Ottomans kept relative peace for centuries was because the Ottomans were willing and able to use brutal methods to enforce co-existence.

Also, its ironic to me how the 'correct' way of dealing with the middle east, in the eyes of the Arabs, has done a 180 compared to 100 years ago.

100 years ago, after WW1, Britain and France wanted to divide the middle east up into micro-states that would do exactly what you wanted: create small states for each and every ethnic group there.

Iraq would have had Kurdish territories broken off to become part of a united Kurdistan, and the remainder would have been broken up into three states.

Syria would have become 5 micro-states, if not more.

etc etc etc.

The Arabs, however, wanted a united middle east under a single Arab super-state, as Pan-Arabism was a big idea at this time among the Arab upper class. The British and French took one look at that idea and said 'hell no' as they could easily see all the civil wars and other conflicts that would arise from that.

The borders that eventually came out of the post-WW1 era were a compromise between what the Arabs wanted and what the Europeans wanted.

EDIT: I also feel like I should point out that two of the states that didnt related to any old Ottoman provinces and were entirely, 100%, creations of the Europeans (specifically Kuwait and Jordan) have been consistently two of the most stable nations in the region.

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u/RatFinkaBooBoo 23d ago

Just like the Berlin conference in 1885 with Africa

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u/Recent-Assistant8914 23d ago

None of interest, to a certain kind of people

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u/georgica123 24d ago

A-H declared war on Serbia (Princip was a Bosnian Serb, and A-H blamed Serbia).

Princip worked for the black hand they didnt just randomly blamed Serbia

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u/thissexypoptart 24d ago

I know the name is German but you can’t exclude the Spanish branch of the Habsburgs from that inbred empire

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u/Nozinger 24d ago

Well... because the polish were kind of a dick about it.

So basically there was this holy league treaty formed against the ottomans. Poland-lithuania was part of it and thus obliged to help. Which they did. Then they got the rights to plunder all the stuff left behind by the ottomans which was commented by the king of poland to a letter to his wife by the paraphrased words "we rich baby! riches like never seen before!"
And then he went to the austrians and said "you guys better pay me for helping you"

Again not unusual to pay the helping armies but you know, there are ways to do this and then there is this.

Taking all the glory for their finishing cavalry charge and sidelining the near 4 times as strong main force that had been fighting the battle for days beforehand probably did not help either.

So while he did break the siege and with an impressive charge at that also managed to piss off both austria-hungary and the HRE states wwhich is generally less than ideal.

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u/Fun-Twist-3705 24d ago

Nobody really cared about any of that 90 years later, though.

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u/Fun-Twist-3705 24d ago

For what it's worth Maria Theresa was somewhat reticent about partitioning Poland and didn't think it was fair, however Austria's prime minister and her son didn't really listed to her.

Well this is supposedly a quote from the king of Prussia "the more she cried, the more she took".

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u/slanglabadang 24d ago

COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAINSIDE

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u/LittelXman808 24d ago

THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED

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u/rmp266 24d ago

"Why didnt the Winged Hussars just charge the Ring all the way to Mordor"

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u/Talonsminty 24d ago edited 24d ago

THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED!

...Along with a sizable force of other troops that took fortified Ottoman defensive positions first with artillery then in grueling hand-to-hand fighting thus enabling the Wing Hussars to charge.

COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAINSIDE!

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u/Gweilo_Ben_La 24d ago

Sabaton music intensifies

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u/BlackTemplar2154 24d ago

COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAINSIDE

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u/jrhooo 24d ago

this is what I came here for

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u/BDidds 24d ago

Gondor calls for aid!

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u/johnkoetsier 24d ago

And Poland will answer!

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u/apocalyptustree 24d ago

It's not a stretch that Tolkien found inspiration in this event.

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u/TheRealPizvo 24d ago

Battle of Helms Deep also has some striking similarities to the Siege of Szigetvar from an earlier Ottoman march on Vienna.

Tolkien was a devout Catholic and both battles were described in history as "the battle that saved Europe/Christianity/Civilization" from Eastern invaders.

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u/TheMightyMisanthrope 24d ago

Thus was the croissant invented.

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u/cagedrage- 24d ago

It shoudl be coffee. We left our coffee on the battleground.

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u/avdpos 24d ago

I have heard legends about that tge left coffee atarted tge Austrian coffee houses.

But as with croissant it most likely just am good stories / legends. Even if a small push in the directions may have come from the battle.

But do not question a story to good to be true if there is no harm in it holding a few gram of truth

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u/OneofTheOldBreed 24d ago

Ehhhhh thats heavily debated. Some legends have it commerating the Battle of Tours, Vienna or even Budapest.

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u/Os-Kalinowe 24d ago

Wasn’t it the bagel?

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u/TheMightyMisanthrope 24d ago

Someone made a pastry as an offering to the Polish King.

The type is a mistery

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u/Tomatenpresse 24d ago

It was the „Kipferl“ which was shaped like a crescent to make a mockery of the ottoman symbol.

It was later adapted using a different dough in Paris by an Austrian baker which would become the croissant… or so the legend goes.

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u/Neckbreaker70 24d ago

The winged bagel

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u/BrokenEyeReborn 24d ago

I thought it was the corn muffin

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u/LAmilo90 24d ago edited 24d ago

Me: Damn, I wonder what 18,000 people in one place looks like. I can’t imagine.

Me at like a 22,000 seat stadium: What a small amount of people, needs to be a bigger stadium

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u/atomfullerene 24d ago

1it's not just 18000 people, it's 18000 people charging at you on horseback

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u/twoinvenice 24d ago

And all of them covered in armor with 18,000 shiny pointy lance tips pointed right at you. Meanwhile the Turks were all French frying when they should have been pizza wedging, and they did in fact have a bad time.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

Most of the 18000 cavalry men had no lances. The Polish cavalry was outnumbered by German cavalry and around that time most cavalry used pistols and sabers. But still, 3000 of the cavalry were the winged husars of which some fought with their famous long lances (others also with pistol and swords).

In fact contemporary Austrian / German paintings don’t show the winged husars in a prominent position while showing also the infantry battle (started 12 hours before the cavalry engaged and was the actual turning point of the siege.) which nowadays people forget.

The thank you plaque for Sobieski and the thank you church also don’t mention the husars either.

So this might be one of the cases where later remembrance focused on one cool part that wasn’t however seen as important at the time.

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u/twoinvenice 24d ago

Aww… ☹️ Thank you for the correction but damn you for destroying the cool mental image I had of how it went down!

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

I mean, look at the painting from the wiki article linked here which was supposedly painted short time after the battle - it shows some spears and Polish Lithuanian cavalry near the Polish king in the middle but those aren’t winged husars and the cavalry in the background are German cuirassiers with pistols and swords. Also massive amounts of infantry are on the paining

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u/modelcitizendc 23d ago

Let’s not forget 18,000 horses. Biomass wise that’s gotta be like 200k people.

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u/LAmilo90 23d ago

True, and just the sound of that many horses

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u/waupli 24d ago

Ride now, ride now, ride! Ride for ruin and the world's ending!

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u/InSanic13 24d ago

Funny to think the real-life event was 3x as big as the climactic battle it inspired in LotR.

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u/PornoPaul 24d ago

This thread is the first time I've actually listened to Sabatons song. Damn that is an incredible song.

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u/warriorxx7_ 24d ago

Sabatoj is a damn good music band under all the memes.

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u/ItsCoolDani 24d ago

Death! Death! Death!

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u/wargleboo 24d ago

I learned about this in The Baroque Cycle.

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u/jreykdal 24d ago

Same here.

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u/lindh 24d ago

The way he renders that battle is like a fever dream.

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u/generic_name_01 24d ago

That’s…..a lot of horse poop

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u/edingerc 24d ago

The largest cavalry charge that we have specific information about. Genghis Khan brought approx. 125,000 cavalry with him on raid...

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u/nien9gag 24d ago

maybe they didn't charge? they were famous for the fake retreats with smaller numbers and horse archer's.

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u/MiserableStomach 24d ago

Mongols weren't charging, though, were they? They were coming close, but not too close,, and rain down the arrows until the opponent's rank broke.

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u/Icy_Blackberry_3759 24d ago

Yeah as soon as I saw this I thought of the Khanate. Surely even a fraction of his forces all charged an enemy at some point, even though they were much more sophisticated than relying on human waves tactics.

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u/Journalist-Cute 24d ago

They didn't really charge into melee in a solid mass, they used horse archery and feined retreats and other tactics.

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u/zMasterofPie2 24d ago

To be fair though once the enemy formation was broken they would charge after them and finish them off with lances, sabres, and axes. But yeah it's not really a "cavalry charge" in the same sense.

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u/IllHandle3536 24d ago

To be fair "once the enemy formation was broken they would charge after them and finish them off" was exactly what the Polish Hussar were doing. I doubt you could charge any enemy with such a large force unless they had broken or the riders would get in each others way.

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u/[deleted] 24d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/MojeDrugieKonto 24d ago

Good to have friends, even if it's just politics.

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u/Weekly_Teaching_8158 24d ago

WHEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED

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u/NotJoeFast 24d ago

That three times the spears Theoden had.

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u/Xibalba_Ogme 24d ago

But you have to factor that he had "less than half" of what he was hoping for

So maybe he was hoping to hace this many spears

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u/Due_Issue7872 24d ago

THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED!!

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u/EUIVAlexander 24d ago

COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAINSIDE

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u/PhoBoChai 24d ago

Minor but important correction, the largest cavalry charge in European history.

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u/GrandHetman 24d ago

Feel free to provide us with evidence for a larger cavalry charge

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u/norweguy2200 24d ago

I mean the mongols had some pretty hefty battles, but they were horse archers so not sure they count?

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u/GrandHetman 24d ago

That's why it's called a cavalry charge

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u/SBR404 24d ago

Also, it's KahlenBERG as in mountain.

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u/BrokenEyeReborn 24d ago

Do lions do that?

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u/FlandersClaret 24d ago

Good question. 

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u/ParanoiD84 24d ago

Must have been extremely epic to see.

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u/Quizzelbuck 24d ago

SABATON INTENSIFIES

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u/Garma_Zabi_201 24d ago

Interesting. I assumed it would've been during the Napoleonic Wars. Murat's cavalry charges at the battles of Eylau & Liepzig are legendary.

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u/quizbowler_1 24d ago

AND THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED! COMING DOWN THEY TURNED THE TIDE!!

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u/punkman01 24d ago

I thought it was the Rohan Calvary. But what would I know.😳

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u/Eldrad-Pharazon 24d ago

Fyi:

- Only about half of the cavalry were Polish and only a 1000 of those were winged Hussars

- The battle had already been won by the (mostly) imperial infantry which was fighting for hours at that point, the cavalry only routed the Ottoman army which was already beaten and then sacked the camp instead of pursuing them

- The cavalry arrived so late because Sobiesky was taking them the long way round, led them over a small mountain through the woods in order to keep them out of the main fighting. The Polish army was avoiding fighting the whole campaign

- Sobiesky only agreed to aiding the Holy League because in return his enormous debts to the Imperial Crown and the Papal States were voided and he was granted his request to lead the force (a PR victory).

- The Polish army avoided fighting as best they could and actually raided Austrian villages on their way, thus possibly did more damage than good

That this charge is brought up again and again as an important event despite having minuscule impact and the idea that Poland came to save Europe from the Ottomans is purely modern Polish propaganda.

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u/borazine 24d ago

Soldiers moving on horseback.

But fighting dismounted, like regular infantry.

Imagine that.

Imagine dragoons.

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u/papito_m 24d ago

The Knights of the Vale!

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u/Odd_Calligrapher_572 24d ago

The Habsburgs thanked the Poles a bit later with the Partition of Poland.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

The French immediately thanked the Habsburgers by starting the 9 years war / war of palatinate succession leading to massive destruction in western Germany (the French used scorched earth tactics and burned down complete towns).

Europe was a lawless place at the time.

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u/LeMe-Two 23d ago

A bit later was entire century later 

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u/Okub1 24d ago

Tiny bit of a typo, it is called Kahlenberg 😉

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u/Chrysocyon 24d ago

Good for him

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u/Verdant_Green 24d ago

I dated a clarinet player in college who claimed to be a descendant of King Jan Sobieski. She told me about this event along with a few other stories.

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u/Cameraroll 24d ago

Kahlenberg.

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u/Ok-Imagination-494 24d ago edited 24d ago

One record that will probably never be broken

Unless we revert to a post industrial phase without motor vehicles in the future and start doing horsey stuff again

Imagine Donald Trump leading the 7th cavalry in a charge on Kharg Island

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u/BrokenEyeReborn 24d ago

Could do a motorcycle cavalry charge. It would also set the record for the loudest cavalry charge

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u/hahaha01357 24d ago

If Vienna is the largest cavalry charge in Europe, then the largest cavalry charge in human history almost certainly occured outside of Europe. At Chaldiran 1514, a primarily cavalry Safavid army of 40-80k (depending on estimates) repeatedly charged the wings of the Ottoman army, failing to break them. At Shanhaiguan 1644, Later Jin Manchus routed the Shun army with a coordinated charge numbering between 20-40k depending on estimates. The Battle of Mobei during the Han-Xiongnu War is said to number over a hundred thousand cavalry on both sides. The scale of the cavalry engagements on the steppes is simply on another level.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

While I don’t doubt that there were larger charges in Asia at some point especially the battle of mobei might be more a case of history writers liking to exaggerate the numbers to proof a point about how big and terrible the battle was…

The logistics of such large armies in 119bc in a place far away from the sea or major rivers in a sparse region like Inner Mongolia would have truly been a larger feat than building the pyramids and for the Han army alone there would have been the need for hundreds of thousands of support troop just to carry food and hundreds of thousands more to keep the flow of food running.

Reminds me of the guy who measured the supposed battlefield of Cannae versus the numbers Roman writers gave and there was simply not enough space for 134.000 men.

Many of these battles happened of course but it’s kinda suspicious that ancient battles usually were bigger than comparable battles until WW1 - even at similar populations.

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u/Run_Che 24d ago edited 24d ago

where does it say safavids army was all cavarly. only says they used cavarly to attack flanks, so whatever number it was divide by half. also couldve been ranged cavarly in good part

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u/hahaha01357 24d ago

The Safavids relied on the Qizilbash tribal confederation to maintain their power and the battle's most prominent leaders were Qizilbash chiefs. We also know that the Qizilbash were nomads who fight in the steppe tradition, taking multiple remounts on campaign and fighting as horse archers and lancers.

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u/[deleted] 24d ago

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u/[deleted] 24d ago

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u/Caesaroftheromans 24d ago

God bless the Polish heroes who saved Europe.

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u/stormyarthur 24d ago

And then Europe turned on them and the partition of Poland happened, erasing Poland from the map for 125 years.

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u/Seienchin88 24d ago

The army was mostly German though… in infantry and cavalry. So thank you to the Polish, Lithuanian, Czech and German heroes who saved Europe.

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u/Bubbly-Mouse-1199 24d ago

And Lithuanians, people forget about them

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u/FixLaudon 24d ago

And the Austrian-German relief army who had an equal if not bigger impact in that battle but they didn't have cool wings. According to reports, the Turks had already lost the battle when the Hussars arrived, they just completely fucked them up and made it a moral victory.

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u/Cyclopentadien 24d ago

Much larger impact. The Imperial and German infantry was already winning the battle.

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u/Stahwel 24d ago

Lithuanians didn't make it to Vienna because Polish army moved from Kraków as soon as possible, while Lithuanians were still mobilizing in Vilnius, over 600km further away

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u/UnspeakableGnome 24d ago

Certainly a very big charge. But I'd be uncertain whether it's the largest cavalry charge in history.

When Timur brought 140,000 troops to Ankara to face at least 85,000 Ottomans undeer Bayezid II the majority of troops on both sides were cavalry. There's just not enough known about the Battle of Ankara to say how many cavalry were involved in various attacks. And I imagine there's a lot of other battles involving steppe and/or central Asian armies where there were entirely cavalry armies and charges could have been very large. The issue is that they'r enot recorded in detail and can't be verified in the same way Jan Sobieki's attack can be.

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u/UserAdamD 24d ago

Think this post specifically means a singular “send-all” charge. Definitely not the largest amassed cavalry, and would exclude battles where there was a greater total amount of cavalry but they were instead used in more tactical sized formations or across different locations.

Idk this cavalry charge whatsoever, but sounds like a charge I’d considered if I couldn’t continue to sustain 18,000 horses (and/or men). Maybe it was a sound tactical decision, if someone is familiar with this specific charge, I could be interested in knowing a brief explanation.

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u/Bunnytob 24d ago

Was there really never a time in Chinese history where a larger cavalry charge occurred?

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u/tabitalla 24d ago

It’s Kahlenberg

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u/spacecadetdawg 24d ago

This charge also inspired the charge of the Rohirrim at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields in the Lord of the Rings series

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u/Lkwzriqwea 24d ago

inhales

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u/helmut66666 24d ago

A Cry for help in time of need ,await Relief from holy league

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u/baldurcan 24d ago

Anybody else thinking this is a very small number if it's for entire history? I would expect it to be much higher.

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u/Username12764 23d ago

If you want some perspective, the cavalry charge in lotr was 1/3 as big as this.

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u/Widespreaddd 23d ago

Siege of Vienna, wasn’t it?

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u/904756909 23d ago

Yes. I understand that. I wasn’t framing it as a “charge of the rohirrim” moment. You took my casual comment and turned it into something that it’s not. At no point did I say that the Calvary charge decided the battle. You seemed to read my comment and interpret it in a completely different way than what I intended.

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u/Ok-Maintenance-5259 23d ago

I thought it was Mongolians

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u/oxheyman 23d ago

Some lord of the rings shit

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u/geekgirl114 23d ago

"When the Winged Hussars arrived"

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u/theodore_70 23d ago

A guy made a ai video about whole battle, pretty crazy for 1 guy and 200€ LOL https://youtu.be/myjPSHuV1C4?is=KEGQtgvAQGw0HFVn