Warfare in the Medieval World by Carey Brian Todd & Joshua B. Allfree & John Cairns

Author:Carey, Brian Todd & Joshua B. Allfree & John Cairns [Carey, Brian Todd]
Language: zho
Format: epub
Tags: Military History
Publisher: Pen and Sword Books
Published: 2016-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

Looking down from a hilltop above the Hungarian encampment, Batu and his officer corps surveyed the terrain. On the right of the Christian position were the marshes of the Tisza, ahead of them was the Sajo, and on their left and behind them the hills and forests of the Lomnitz and Diosgyor. He must have felt as though he had his enemy ‘trapped like cattle in a corral’. The only escape route was back west through the gorge from which they came.

When night fell, Batu ordered Subotai to take 30,000 cavalry through the hills and quickly build a wooden bridge across the Sajo beyond the heath (Map 4.3(c)). The movement of such a large force should have alerted the Hungarian defenders, but Bela’s scouts detected nothing. Batu’s strategy was a simple one: engage the Hungarian king’s front, while Subotai secretly moved into position and attacked the rear. The battle of Sajo River began just before dawn on 11 April when Batu with 40,000 men launched a cavalry attack against the stone bridge (Map 4.3(d)).

King Bela’s guard held the bridge until reinforcements arrived from the camp, and it seemed as though the dense ranks of defenders could hold out forever against the narrow column of Mongol cavalry. But Batu solved the problem by bringing up seven light catapults to bombard the far side of the bridge with incendiaries and grenades (Map 4.3(e)). Confused by the tactical use of siege artillery on the battlefield, the Hungarian ranks drew back from the bridge in disorder, allowing the Mongol horse to cross the stone bridge safely behind a ‘rolling barrage’.

Batu Khan’s steppe horsemen pushed off the bridge and formed up on the centre of the heath slowly, consciously turning the Hungarian army and orientating it so that Subotai’s force could strike it in the rear (Map 4.3(f)). Outnumbering the Mongol force arrayed in front of him by two to one, Bela launched wave after wave of Hungarian heavy cavalry charges against the nomads. For two ferocious hours, the Mongols fought off the Hungarian nobility with missile fire, but casualties were high. At this moment, Batu inexplicably ordered his dangerously depleted ranks to stretch out into a half circle as if to surround the Christian troops (Map 4.3(g)). And just as the Hungarian heavy horse were preparing to finally break through the thin Mongol line, Subotai arrived on the battlefield and arrayed his fresh 30,000 cavalry in a matching half circle behind the defenders. As the two crescents converged behind a rain of arrows, the Hungarians realized that they had lost the initiative, and withdrew in good order back into their fortified camp. The Mongols surrounded the circled wagons and pressed their attack.

Batu now ordered Mongol artillery forward to pound the Hungarian encampment with incendiaries (Map 4.3(h)). Sensing this danger, Bela rallied enough knights to charge the siege weapons, but they were driven back. Consequently, the Hungarian encampment suffered several hours of pounding, with most of the tents burned and the integrity of the wagon fortification wrecked.

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