TRANSYLVANIA

Third of the Roumanian principalities, Transylvania was an Hungarian vassal throughout this period, and as a result of the exodus to found Wallachia under Radu Negru late in the 13th century it had the smallest Roumanian population of the three. Its voivode Stephen Laszkovic led allegedly, albeit improbably, 16,000 men at Nicopolis in 1396, but other than that it was only towards the middle of the 15th century, following the commencement of Ottoman raids in 1420, that Transylvania briefly entered the military limelight under its most famous voivode, the celebrated Janos Hunyadi (1440-56).

Traditional military service appears to have been identical to that found in Moldavia and Wallachia, with a lesser army of vassals and mercenaries, backed up by a general levy of able-bodied men when necessary. In Hunyadi’s time the mercenary elements were Poles, Germans (including Hungarian ‘Saxons’), Bosnians, Italians and Bohemians; the latter even included Taborite Hussites during 1443, commanded by Jenick of Meckov, Uhersko, and Jan Capek of San, and Bohemians fought in addition at Varna, Kossovo and Belgrade. It is probably the lesser army that is intended by a reference to the ‘entire’ nobility of Transylvania fielding

3,000 men for Sigismund in 1430. In 1456 Hunyadi put 6,000 ‘veterans’ into Belgrade under his son Ladislaus, again probably the lesser army but this time backed up by a larger proportion of mercenaries.

Hunyadi made considerable use of the general levy: in 1442 he raised 15,000 ‘peasants, townsmen and Szeklers’ to confront and defeat an invading Ottoman army, and in 1456 he raised 10,000 from his own estates round Hunedoara and Banat for the relief of Belgrade. In addition Transylvanian peasant levies fought in Hunyadi’s armies at both Varna and Kossovo, and he raised a total of 12,000 foot and 1,000 horse from amongst them for the relief of Belgrade. One further source of troops, referred to in 1443, 1444, 1448 and 1456, was provided by crusaders, many of whom were similarly peasants; according to the ‘Historia Boemica’ only a third were or became skilled at handling arms, while the rest fought with slings and scythes. Most were from Poland, Germany and Austria, and allegedly as many as 20,000 assisted in the defence of Belgrade in 1456.

See also the following section on Hungary.