Moldavian military forces

Moldavia had a military force for much of its history as an independent and, later, autonomous principality subject to the Ottoman Empire (14th century-1859).

Under the reign of Stephen the Great, all farmers and villagers had to bear arms. Stephen justified this by saying that "every man has a duty to defend his fatherland"; according to Polish chronicler Jan Długosz, if someone was found without carrying a weapon, he was sentenced to death. Stephen reformed the army by promoting men from the landed free peasantry răzeşi (i.e. something akin to freeholding yeomen) to infantry (voinici) and light cavalry (hânsari) — to make himself less dependent on the boyars — and introduced his army to guns. In times of crises, The Small Host (Oastea Mică) — which consisted of around 10,000 to 12,000 men — stood ready to engage the enemy, while the Large Host (Oastea Mare) — which could reach up to 40,000 — had all the free peasantry older than 14, and strong enough to carry a sword or use the bow, recruited. This seldom happened, for such a levée en masse was devastating for both economy and population growth. In the Battle of Vaslui, Stephen had to summon the Large Host and also recruited mercenary troops.

In the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, the Moldavians relied on light cavalry (călărași) which used hit-and-run tactics similar to those of the Tatars; this gave them great mobility and also flexibility, in case they found it more suitable to dismount their horses and fight in hand-to-hand combat, as it happened in 1422, when 400 horse archers were sent to aid Jagiellon Poland, Moldavia’s overlord against the Teutonic Knights. When making eye-contact with the enemy, the horse archers would withdraw to a nearby forest and camouflage themselves with leaves and branches; according to Jan Długosz, when the enemy entered the wood, they were "showered with arrows" and defeated. The heavy cavalry consisted of the nobility, namely, the boyars and their guards, the viteji (lit. "brave ones", small nobility) and the curteni — the Court Cavalry (all nominally part of the Small Host). In times of war, boyars were compelled by the feudal system of allegiance to supply the prince with troops in accordance with the extent of their manorial domain.

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