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Mehmed II

1432 CE – 1481 CE

Retrace Mehmed II's life across the map — 35 events in chronological order, from a cinematic flythrough to a full timeline.

Life journey

1. Battle of Varna1444 CE
   The Battle of Varna took place on 10 November 1444 near Varna in what is today eastern Bulgaria. The Ottoman army under Sultan Murad II defeated the Crusaders commanded by King Władysław III of Poland and Hungary, John Hunyadi and Mircea II of Wallachia. It was the final battle of the unsuccessful Crusade of Varna, a last-ditch effort to prevent further Ottoman expansion into the Balkans.
2. Lower Danube Campaign1445 CE
   1445 military campaign
3. Siege of Svetigrad1448 CE
   The siege of Svetigrad or Sfetigrad began on 14 May 1448 when an Ottoman army, led by Sultan Murad II, besieged the fortress of Svetigrad. After the many failed Ottoman expeditions into Albania against the League of Lezhë, a confederation of Albanian Principalities created in 1444 and headed by Skanderbeg, Murad II decided to march an army into Skanderbeg's dominions in order to capture the key Albanian fortress of Svetigrad. The fortress lay on an important route between present-day North Macedonia and Albania, and thus its occupation would give the Ottomans easy access into Albania.
4. Battle of Kosovo1448 CE
   The Second Battle of Kosovo was a land battle between a Hungarian-led Crusader army and the Ottoman Empire at Kosovo field that took place from 17–20 October 1448. It was the culmination of a Hungarian offensive to avenge the defeat at the Battle of Varna four years earlier. In the three-day battle the Ottoman army under the command of Sultan Murad II defeated the Crusader army of regent John Hunyadi.
5. Siege of Krujë1450 CE
   The first siege of Krujë occurred in 1450 when an Ottoman army led by Sultan Murad II and his crown prince Mehmed II tried to besiege the Albanian town of Krujë. The League of Lezhë, led by Skanderbeg, experienced low morale after losing Svetigrad and Berat between 1448 and 1450. Nevertheless, Skanderbeg's exhortations and the support of the clergy, who claimed to have had visions of angels and victory, motivated the Albanians to defend the capital of the League, Krujë, at all costs. After leaving a protective garrison of 4,000 men under his trusted lieutenant Vrana Konti, Skanderbeg harassed the Ottoman camps around Krujë and attacked the supply caravans of Sultan Murad II's army. By September, the Ottoman camp was in disarray as morale sank and disease ran rampant. The Ottoman army acknowledged that the castle of Krujë would not fall by strength of arms, lifted the siege, and made its way to Edirne. Soon thereafter, in the winter of 1450–51, Murad died in Edirne and was succeeded by his son, Mehmed II.
6. Fall of Constantinople1453 CE
   The Fall of Constantinople, also known as the Conquest of Constantinople, was the capture of Constantinople, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire, by the Ottoman Empire. The city was captured on 29 May 1453 as part of the culmination of a 53-day siege which had begun on 6 April.
7. Siege of Novo Brdo1455 CE
   The siege of Novo Brdo was a successful siege led by Mehmed the Conqueror and Ishak Bey on Novo Brdo, defended by Demetrios Jakšic, during the Second Serbian campaign in 1455.
8. Siege of Belgrade1456 CE
   The siege of Belgrade, or siege of Nándorfehérvár was a military blockade of Belgrade that occurred 4–22 July 1456 in the aftermath of the fall of Constantinople in 1453 marking the Ottomans' attempts to expand further into Europe. Led by Sultan Mehmed II, the Ottoman forces sought to capture the strategic city of Belgrade, which was then under Hungarian control and was crucial for maintaining control over the Danube River and the Balkans.
9. Battle of Corinth1458 CE
   The Battle of Corinth or Siege of Corinth was a battle that took place during Mehmed II's first invasion of the Peloponnese. It describes the siege of the largest and strongest fortress in the Peloponnese. After a four-month siege, the fortress surrendered.
10. Siege of Smederevo1459 CE
    The siege of Smederevo was Mehmed II's assault on the Smederevo Fortress during his fourth Serbian campaign.
11. Siege of Trebizond in 14611460 CE
    The siege of Trebizond was the successful siege of the city of Trebizond, capital of the Empire of Trebizond, by the Ottomans under Sultan Mehmed II, which ended on 15 August 1461. The siege culminated a lengthy campaign on the Ottoman side, which involved coordinated but independent manoeuvres by a large army and navy. The Trapezuntine defenders had relied on a network of alliances, which would provide them with support and a workforce when the Ottomans began their siege. Still, it failed when Emperor David Megas Komnenos most needed it.
12. Siege of Kastritza1460 CE
    The Siege of Kastritza was the most intense battle during Mehmed II's second Morea campaign in 1460. Because the city was destroyed by Mehmed II, its exact location is unknown today. However, it is believed to be a fortress in the Arcadia region.
13. Siege of Salmeniko1460 CE
    The Siege of Salmeniko was the last stronghold where Mehmed II encountered resistance during his second campaign in Morea. It was the final center of resistance for the Byzantine Empire. After a year-long siege, the fortress fell, marking the complete collapse of the Eastern Roman Empire.
14. Siege of Gardiki-Arcadia1460 CE
    The Siege of Gardiki-Arcadia was the fall of a fortress besieged by the Ottoman army under the command of Mehmed II in the Peloponnese in 1460. The castle surrendered after a one-day siege. It was the largest and most formidable castle in the region.
15. Siege of Amasra1460 CE
    The siege of Amasra was the land and sea besiegement that resulted in the Ottoman Army, under the command of Fatih Sultan Mehmed, and the Ottoman Navy, under the command of Grand Vizier Veli Mahmud Pasha, capturing the Genoese colony of Amasra, and annexing it into Ottoman lands in 1460.
16. Battle of Koyulhisar1461 CE
    The Battle of Koyulhisar was fought between an Aq Qoyunlu army commanded by Uzun Hasan and an Ottoman army under Mehmed II at Koyulhisar in 1461. Mehmed II was planning to advance against Trebizond and wanted to secure his flank against attack. Mehmed II and Uzun Hasan would fight each other repeatedly in the following decades.
17. Battle of Turnu1462 CE
    The Battle of Turnu was a military conflict in 1462 between the army of Vlad III, who sought to prevent the crossing of the Danube, and the Ottoman army of Mehmed II. What began as an amphibious crossing operation evolved into a full-scale battle. Vlad retreated from the battle and adapted a new tactic.
18. Ottoman conquest of Lesbos1462 CE
    The Ottoman conquest of Lesbos took place in September 1462. The Ottoman Empire, under Sultan Mehmed II, laid siege to the island's capital, Mytilene. After its surrender, the other forts of the island surrendered as well. The event put an end to the semi-independent Genoese lordship that the Gattilusio family had established in the northeastern Aegean since the mid-14th century, and heralded the beginning of the First Ottoman–Venetian War in the following year.
19. Battle of Buzău1462 CE
    The Battle of Buzău was an engagement that took place during Mehmed II’s Wallachian campaign of 1462. As a result of the battle, the Wallachians were defeated and lost a significant portion of their forces.
20. Night attack at Târgoviște1462 CE
    The night attack at Târgoviște was a battle fought between forces of Prince Vlad III of Wallachia and Sultan Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire on Thursday, 17 June 1462. The battle started after Mehmed II, who already had tense relations with Vlad, discovered his alliance with Hungary's king Matthias Corvinus and ordered his forces to ambush him. Vlad foiled the attack and invaded Bulgaria. In response, Mehmed raised a great army with the objective to conquer Wallachia. The two leaders fought a series of skirmishes, the most notable one being the conflict where Vlad attacked the Turkish camp in the night in an attempt to kill Mehmed. The assassination attempt failed and Mehmed marched to the Wallachian capital of Târgoviște, where he found a few men with cannons. After leaving the capital, Mehmed discovered 23,844 impaled Turks whom Vlad had killed during his invasion of Bulgaria. The number is mentioned by Vlad himself in a letter to Matthias Corvinus. The sultan and his troops then sailed to Brăila and burned it to the ground before retreating to Adrianople. Mehmed's forces returned home with many captured slaves, horses, and cattle.
21. First Ottoman–Venetian War1463 CE
    The First Ottoman–Venetian War was fought between the Republic of Venice with its allies and the Ottoman Empire from 1463 to 1479. Fought shortly after the capture of Constantinople and the remnants of the Byzantine Empire by the Ottomans, it resulted in the loss of several Venetian holdings in Albania and Greece, most importantly the island of Negroponte (Euboea), which had been a Venetian protectorate for centuries. The war also saw the rapid expansion of the Ottoman navy, which became able to challenge the Venetians and the Knights Hospitaller for supremacy in the Aegean Sea. In the closing years of the war, however, the Republic managed to recoup its losses by the de facto acquisition of the Crusader Kingdom of Cyprus.
22. Battle of Kljuc1463 CE
    The Battle of Kljuc is a pitched battle which took place during the conquest of Bosnia in 1463.
23. Siege of Jajce1464 CE
    The siege of Jajce took place between 10 July and 22 August 1464, during the Ottoman conquest of Bosnia and Herzegovina, when an Ottoman army under Sultan Mehmed II made a new attempt to conquer Bosnia and take control of the strategic fortress of Jajce, south of Banja Luka, at the time under Hungarian control.
24. Siege of Krujë1467 CE
    The second siege of Krujë took place from June 1466 to 23 April 1467. Sultan Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire led an army into Albania to defeat Skanderbeg, the leader of the League of Lezhë, which was created in 1444 after he began his war against the Ottomans. During the almost year-long siege, Skanderbeg's main fortress, Krujë, withstood the siege while Skanderbeg roamed Albania to gather forces and facilitate the flight of refugees from the civilian areas that were attacked by the Ottomans. Krujë managed to withstand the siege put on it by Ballaban Badera, sanjakbey of the Sanjak of Ohrid, an Albanian brought up in the Ottoman army through the devşirme. By 23 April 1467, the Ottoman army had been defeated and Skanderbeg entered Krujë.
25. Siege of Krujë1467 CE
    The 1467 Albanian campaign by Mehmed II and the Ottoman Empire took place in the summer of 1467 in Albania. As a result of the campaign, the fortresses and regions of Albania were divided between Venice and the Ottomans. The Albanian resistance forces were destroyed and the rebellion collapsed. The rebel Albanian leaders continued their lives under Venetian rule.
26. Battle of Larende1468 CE
    The Battle of Larende, fought in 1468, was the last major confrontation between the two great Anatolian Turkish states of the time—the Karamanids and the Ottomans. The battle symbolized which power would ultimately remain dominant in Anatolia. The lands of Larende, over which the two Turkish rulers fought, have today become one of the settlement areas of Syrians.
27. Siege of Negroponte1470 CE
    The siege of Negroponte was fought between the forces of the Ottoman Empire, led by Sultan Mehmed II in person, and the garrison of the Venetian colony of Negroponte (Chalcis), the capital of the Venetian possession of Euboea in Central Greece. The Ottoman sultan Mehmed II laid siege to the fortress at Negroponte. The siege lasted for almost a month, and, despite great Ottoman casualties, ended in the capture of the city and the island of Euboea by the Ottomans.
28. Battle of Otlukbeli1473 CE
    The Battle of Otlukbeli was fought between the Aq Qoyunlu and the Ottoman Empire on 11 August 1473.
29. Battle of Erzincan1473 CE
    Battle of Erzincan was fought in 1473 near Erzincan, Turkey. It was a preliminary battle where Ottoman sultan Mehmed II and Uzun Hasan, the sultan of Aq Qoyunlu, tested each other before the Battle of Otlukbeli.
30. Siege of Sebinkarahisar1473 CE
    The siege of Sebinkarahisar, is a siege that Mehmed II made upon his return from the Otlukbeli Campaign against Aq Qoyunlu's forces.
31. Battle of Valea Albă1476 CE
    The Battle of Valea Albă, also known as the Battle of Războieni or the Battle of Akdere, was an important event in the medieval history of Moldavia. It took place at Războieni, also known as Valea Albă, on 26 July 1476, between the Moldavian army of Stephen the Great and an invading Ottoman army which was commanded personally by Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror.
32. Siege of Neamţ Citadel1476 CE
    The Siege of Neamț Citadel took place during the Moldavian–Ottoman War. It was conducted by the Ottoman army of Mehmed the Conqueror against the Moldavian garrison of Stephan the Great. It took place on c. August 1476.
33. Siege of Krujë1477 CE
    The fourth siege of Krujë by the Ottoman Empire of Krujë in Albania took place from early 1477 to June 1478, almost ten years after the death of Skanderbeg, the main military commander of the Albanian rebellion against the Ottomans. The long siege resulted in the capture of the city after three previous failed sieges.
34. Siege of Shkodra1478 CE
    The siege of Shkodra took place from May 1478 to April 1479 as a confrontation between the Ottoman Empire and the Venetians together with the League of Lezhë and other Albanians at Shkodra and its Rozafa Castle during the First Ottoman-Venetian War (1463–1479). Ottoman historian Franz Babinger called the siege "one of the most remarkable episodes in the struggle between the West and the Crescent".
35. Ottoman invasion of Otranto1481 CE
    In the summer of 1480, the Ottoman Empire invaded southern Italy, and laid siege to Otranto, finally capturing it on 11 August. This was their first outpost in Italy. According to a traditional account, more than 800 inhabitants were beheaded after the city had been captured, because they would not renounce their Christian faith. The Martyrs of Otranto are still celebrated in Italy. A year later, Otranto was surrendered by the Ottomans to Duke Alfonso of Calabria after a siege by Neapolitan troops, supported by a Papal fleet and Hungarian forces, and amid uncertainty upon the death of sultan Mehmed II.

Event data from Wikipedia/Wikidata (CC-BY-SA). Spotted a mistake? Email [email protected].