Battle of Zbaraż

Siege of Zbarazh
Part of the Khmelnytsky Uprising
Zbarazh Castle
Date 10 July 1649 (1649-07-10)– 22 August 1649 (1649-08-22) Location Zbaraż, Volhynian Voivodeship Result Polish forces withstood, Treaty of Zboriv
Belligerents
Zaporozhian Cossacks Crimean Tatars	Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth mercenaries
Commanders and leaders
Bohdan Khmelnytsky İslâm III Giray	Jeremi Wiśniowiecki Andrzej Firlej Władysław Dominik Zasławski-Ostrogski Jan Zamoyski Aleksander Koniecpolski Stanisław Lanckoroński Mikołaj Ostroróg
Strength
70,000 Cossacks 70,000 Tatars	10,000 or 15,000
Casualties and losses
Unknown estimated up to 50,000	2,000–6,000

The Siege of Zbarazh (Polish: Zbaraż, Ukrainian: Збараж) was a 1649 battle of the Khmelnytsky Uprising. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth forces held their positions besieged in the Zbarazh Castle until in the aftermath of Battle of Zboriv and the Treaty of Zboriv the hostilities paused and the siege ended. These events were described by Henryk Sienkiewicz in his novel With Fire and Sword (1884).

In the first half of 1649, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth negotiations with the rebellious Cossacks fell through, and the Polish-Lithuanian military begun gathering near the borders with the insurgent-held Ukraine. While the king organized the main Polish army, and Janusz Radziwill commanded the Lithuanian army along the Horyn River, an army under three regimentarzs (Andrzej Firlej, Stanisław Lanckoroński and Mikołaj Ostroróg) was located in Zbarazh from 30 June, where prince Jeremi Wiśniowiecki would arrive with reinforcements on 7 July. Wiśniowiecki's arrival raised the morale of the royal army, and despite having no official rank, both the common soldiers and the new regimentarz promised to heed his advice, and even offered him the official command (which he however refused).

Zbarazh Castle was rebuilt in the decades preceding the siege under the Netherland engineer Henryk van Peene, who finished his project in 1626. The castle was built as a square, which each side of about 88 meters, and surrounded by an earthen wall and a moat. It was a relatively modern and resilient construction, whose major weakness was its small size, and correspondingly, little space for any extensive army and required supplies. Built with the Tatar raids in mind, it was not meant to withstand a prolonged siege by a large army. The town itself had relatively poor defenses. The Polish-Lithuanian fortified camp incorporated the town defenses and the castle.

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