Battle of Vienna

The Battle of Vienna in 1683 (Turkish: ?kinci Viyana Ku?atmas?) (as distinct from the Siege of Vienna in 1529) was the first large-scale battle of the Habsburg-Ottoman Wars, yet with the most far-reaching consequences. The battle pitted a Habsburg army of about 100,000 troops and their allies, led by Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine, a 30,000-man relief force under Jan III Sobieski, King of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, against the Ottoman army, commanded by Grand Vizier Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha, which numbered approximately 140,000 men, although a large number of them played no part in the battle. The siege itself began in July 14, 1683, and the decisive battle took place on September 12, 1683.

Battle

At 4 in the morning, on September 12, the Austrian army on the left, and the German forces in the center moved forward, in an attack (which was aimed at preventing another long siege) against the Turks. Mustafa Pasha launched a counter-attack, with most of his force. Then the Polish infantry launched a massive assault upon the right flank. After 12 hours of fighting, Sobieski's Polish force held the high ground on the right.

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At about five o'clock in the afternoon, four cavalry groups, one of them Austrian-German, and the other three composed of Polish hussars, totaling 20,000 men in all and led by the Polish king, charged down the hills. In the confusion, they made straight for the Ottoman camps, while the Vienna garrison sallied out of its defenses, and joined in the assault. In less than three hours, the Habsburg and Polish forces won the battle, as the Turkish army beat a hasty retreat to the south and east.

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The Turks lost about 15,000 men in the fighting, compared to approximately 4,000 for the Habsburg-Polish forces.

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