WALLACHIA

Wallachians, or Vlachs (Byzantine Vlachoi), are first mentioned in Byzantine sources — retrospectively — in Cedrenus’ 11th century chronicle, referring to c.976. From the late-lOth century onwards they frequently appear in the context of Byzantino-Bulgarian conflicts, and it was the Wallachian leaders Peter, Assen and Kalojan or loannitsa who were responsible for the foundation of the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1186. According to legend Wallachia itself came into existence in 1290 when the Transylvanian voivode Radu

Negru led many Roumanins to settle there. In c.1307 or 1310 it became an Hungarian banate under a Cuman16 chieftain, Basarab (d. 1352), under whom it achieved independence following his defeat of King Charles Robert at Posada in 1330. This independence was shortlived, however, since in 1392/3 the principality became tributary to the Ottoman Turks, under whom, despite frequent rebellions throughout the 15th century, it nevertheless retained its autonomy, even after it had become a vassal state in 1476.

Its armed forces were comprised of two distinct elements, called the ‘lesser army’ and the ‘greater army’ respectively. Whereas the latter constituted the arriere-ban, the former was an infantry and cavalry force comprised of the voivode’s (prince’s) retinue and standing troops, the troops of the slugi or boyars, and the so-called ‘district banners’, made up of fortress garrisons and landowning peasants led by their individual district pircalabi (sheriffs). Principal element was the curteni, the court bodyguard of infantry and cavalry, its name being derived from curte (‘court’); the same term could also indicate men serving the local military administration. Under the infamous Dracula (Vlad Tepes, ‘Vlad the Impaler’, 1456-62 and 1476) many of the curteni were provided by viteji, landowning peasants promoted to the lesser nobility as a reward for bravery on the battlefield, and it is doubtless these to whom a contemporary account alludes when it describes how he ‘enlisted a number of noble and faithful horsemen and foot-soldiers whom he gave the money and riches of those killed’. Nevertheless, it is clear that the viteji were less numerous and their role less important than in neighbouring Moldavia (see below). Standing troops seem to have originated under Vlaicu Voda (Vladislas I, 1364-C.1377). It is claimed that under his grandson Mircea cel Batran (Mircea the Old, 1386-1418) they numbered as many as 18,000 infantry and 17,000 cavalry, but a more accurate idea of their numbers can probably be drawn from the establishment of a bodyguard of just 1,000 men, including 100 cavalry, by Dan II (1420-31), and a reference by Doukas to Vlad Dracul’s curteni on one occasion numbering just 300 men. The small number of chiefly foreign mercenaries to be found in Wallachian employ from the beginning of the 15th century usually formed part of the curteni, as for instance did the Hungarians and Moldavians provided to Dracula by King Matthias Corvinus and Stephen the Great. One cavalry element of Mircea the Old’s standing forces called the scutelnici or ‘substitutes’ indicates that some mercenaries at least were maintained by scutage.

The ‘greater army’ appears to have first, been called up under Basarab, though the term itself is only first to be found in Wallachian sources at the beginning of the 15th century, being mentioned especially under Mircea the Old and Dracula. Requiring the voivode’s personal presence in the army, it was a call to arms used in times of national emergency, involving the military service of all men aged 12 or over capable of bearing arms. It is recorded by two Italian ambassadors that when Dracula utilised this levy in 1462 he raised his forces to 22,000 or 24,000 men thereby, though another account claims 30,900. Its officers appear to have been provided by the viteji. An additional contribution made by Wallachia’s peasantry to the armed forces was that of providing the ‘district banners’ mentioned above, a selective levy which formed part of the lesser army. These were raised on the basis of fixed quotas of men being supplied from each town and village when required, these being recruited by the voivode’s sheriffs rather than the local boyar, which meant, therefore, that the boyars’ troops were comprised solely of their own retainers, and that the chances of dissent amongst the nobility were minimised by this limitation of their armed strength. (Even so, under a weak voivode the power of the boyars was such that their consent was often required before military action could be taken.) It seems probable that the quotas of men required from the villages were very small, since even large towns appear to have supplied only 50, 100 or 200 men. Organisation was clearly decimal.

Wallachian field-armies were never particularly large, and often included a considerable proportion of infantry. Western chroniclers’ estimates of 10,000 Wallachians at Nicopolis in 1396 can probably be dismissed out of hand — modern estimates would have it that there were no more than 2-3,000. The Italian traveller Torzelo estimated in 1439 that the Wallachian army numbered 15,000 men ‘ranking among the most valiant in the world’, doubtless referring to the combined elements of the lesser army. Vlad Dracul led 6-7,000 men to join Hunyadi’s army in October 1444, and at least 4,000 (organised in 4 companies, i. e.

1,000 men in each) were present at the Battle of Varna, while Vladislas II led a similar number (7-8,000) at Kossovo in 1448. The largest figure for a Wallachian army in this period belongs to Dracula’s reign, for as we have already seen he allegedly raised 22-24,000 men in 1462 (though Chalkokondyles says he had only 7-10,000, probably referring only to the lesser army). Whatever it lacked in size, however, the Wallachian army made up for in reputation. Mihailovic, present in the Ottoman army during the campaign of 1461-62, says that ‘we were greatly afraid, even though the Wallachian voivode had only a small army, and therefore we always advanced with great caution in fear of them, and every night surrounded ourselves with ditches.’

Dracula, incidentally, appears to have been the first voivode to introduce artillery into Wallachian field-armies; its effectiveness is testified by Mihailovic, who tells us that the army opposing Mehmed IPs crossing of the Danube in 1462 ‘killed 250 Janissaries with cannon-fire’. Other sources tell us that Dracula’s total armed forces comprised a potential 10,000 cavalry and 30,000 infantry.

Chief military officers after the voivode were the ban of Oltenia on the Danube, responsible for frontier defence against the Turks, and the Spatar (from the Byzantine spatharios), effectively the Marshal, who in the earlier part of this period was responsible for the army’s horses but later became the voivode’s commander-in-chief