Crusade of Nicopolis

Battle of Nicopolis
Part of the Ottoman Wars in Europe
miniature by Jean Colombe (c. 1475)
Date 25 September 1396 Location Nicopolis, Bulgarian Empire 43°42′21″N 24°53′45″E / 43.70583°N 24.89583°E / 43.70583; 24.89583Coordinates: 43°42′21″N 24°53′45″E / 43.70583°N 24.89583°E / 43.70583; 24.89583 Result Decisive Ottoman victory
Belligerents
Ottoman Empire Moravian Serbia	Holy Roman Empire  Kingdom of France Kingdom of Hungary Kingdom of Croatia  Wallachia Knights Hospitaller  Republic of Venice  Republic of Genoa Bulgarian Empire  Kingdom of England
Commanders and leaders
Bayezid I Çandarlı Ali Pasha Stefan Lazarević Evrenos	Sigismund Stibor of Stiboricz Nicholas II Garai Philip, Count of Eu (POW) Jean Le Maingre (POW) John the Fearless, Count of Nevers (POW) Enguerrand VII (POW) Jean de Vienne † Jean de Carrouges † Mircea the Elder Stephen II Lackfi
Strength
Heavily disputed but credibly estimated at perhaps 15,000- 25,000. See the Strength of forces section.	Heavily disputed but credibly estimated at perhaps 12,000-16,000. See the Strength of forces section.
Casualties and losses
Heavy casualties, including the massacre of ~1,000 civilian hostages (Turkish and Bulgarian) by the Crusaders the night before the battle.	Most of the Crusader army was destroyed or captured; a small portion, including Sigismund, escaped. 300-3,000 prisoners were executed.

The Battle of Nicopolis (Bulgarian: Битка при Никопол, Bitka pri Nikopol; Turkish: Niğbolu Savaşı, Hungarian: Nikápolyi csata, Romanian: Bătălia de la Nicopole) took place on 25 September 1396 and resulted in the rout of an allied crusader army of Hungarian, Croatian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, French, English, Burgundian, German and assorted troops (assisted by the Venetian navy) at the hands of an Ottoman force, raising of the siege of the Danubian fortress of Nicopolis and leading to the end of the Second Bulgarian Empire. It is often referred to as the Crusade of Nicopolis as it was one of the last large-scale Crusades of the Middle Ages, together with the Crusade of Varna in 1443–1444.

There were many minor crusades in the 14th century, undertaken by individual kings or knights. Most recently there had been a failed crusade against Tunisia in 1390, and there was ongoing warfare in northern Europe along the Baltic coast. After their victory at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389, the Ottomans had conquered most of the Balkans, and had reduced the Byzantine Empire to the area immediately surrounding Constantinople, which they later proceeded to besiege (in 1390, 1395, 1397, 1400, 1411, 1422 and finally conquering the Byzantine capital in 1453).

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