Diaconescu, Marius (szerk.): Mediaevalia Transilvanica 1998 (2. évfolyam, 2. szám)
Relaţii internaţionale
270 Marius Diaconescu The Sultan would not leave without reply Mircea’ implication in the struggle for succession. After Mustafa's defeat at Salonic in December 1416, Celebi Mehmed initiated an extensive campaign against the Wallachian voivode. The Sultan initially wanted to stop the manoeuvres carried out in favour of Mustafa at the Wallachian borders. According to the Venetian Admiral Pietro Loredano's report, in the naval battle of Galipoli (May 29th, 1416) he destroyed the very Turkish fleet which was to go up the Danube to prevent Mustafa's troops from crossing the river. However, the combat continued until the end of the year but soon after that the Sultan went back towards the Danube to punish Mircea. We must situate this campaign during the spring of 1417 because, as it has been said, the Turkish narrative sources corroborate this operation with the Wallachian voivode's intervention in favour of Mustafa and before the expedition to the northwest of Anatolia146. After conquering Dobrudja, the Turkish army assaulted the fortress of Giurgiu and entered Wallachia. Mircea was forced to submit and, by means of a Turkish refugee from his court, he paid homage to the Sultan. He promised to pay the tax regularly, to send his sons as hostages and support the Sultan in his campaigns147. The Turkish success and the submission of the Wallachian voivode brought about prompt Hungarian retort. However, it is interesting to notice that the Hungarian army was no longer sent to support Wallachia. On the contrary, in July 1417, after the success of the Turkish campaign, the Transylvanian army was mobilized against the Romanians from Wallachia {"presentem mocionem exercitus contra Volahos Transalpinos")148. Whatever the effect of this campaign meant to bring Mircea back under Sigismund's suzerainty, it did not lass long because the old voivode would die soon, after a three-decade reign. The increasing Ottoman pressures and the duplicity of the leaders of the states at the Hungarian southern borders gradually destroyed the system of buffer states Sigismund had created after 1400. At first it was Bosnia which was taken away from the Hungarian domination and several military campaigns were carried out in order to recuperate it. Similarly, after Mircea's death and the campaign led by the Sultan in 1419-1420149, Wallachia went off the Hungarian sphere of influence. 146 T. Gemil, Românii şi otomanii (see note 47), p. 99. N. Pienaru, Relaţiile lui Mircea cel Mare (1386-1418) cu Mehmed 1 Celebi (1413-1421), in RI, tom 39, 1986, no. 8, pp. 782-784. 147 P. P. Panaitescu, Mircea cel Bătrân, pp. 341-344. V. Ciocîltan, Competiţia pentru controlul Dunării inferioare (1412-1420) (II), in R1, tom 35, 1982, no. 11, p. 1197. M. Maxim, Ţările Române (see note 58), pp. 220-223. 148 The information on this campaign has not been published yet. We have come across it in a “litterae prorogatoriaethe trial was postponed because of the military campaign against the Romanians from Wallachia: The Hungarian National Archives, Budapest, Dl. (=Diplomataria=The Diplomatics Archives)) 62.792. 149 Viorica Pervain, Lupta antiotomană a Ţărilor Române în anii 1419-1420, in A1IA Cluj-Napoca, XIX, 1976, pp. 55-78.
