Culters Of 1200-1400 Ad

[skel]

i really know very little about the middle ages, and i am about to join the SCA and i am wanting to make a persona of someone from the eastern parts of europe, no farther then middle east. can someone help me find the names of some people that might be worth doing some research on from that time frame?

[Fatboy]

Here's a couple of interesting dudes from Eastern Europe

 

13th Century

 

John Ducas Vatatzes ( 1193 - 1254 )

Reigned as John III over the Empire of Nicea, a successor state formed by the dispossed Greeks in the wake of the Latin conquest of Constantinople in 1208. Against incredible odds he fought off pressure from the Turks, Huns, Latins and the other Greek successor states in order to form a powerful independant Kingdom, one which would retake Constantinople in 1260 under the Emperor Micheal VIII Palaeologus.

 

Rudolf von Hapsburg ( 1218 -1291 )

A Count of the minor House of Hapsburg, Rudolf was elected Holy Roman Emperor in 1273 by the princes of Germany. His relative unimportance secured his election - he was seen as someone who could be controlled, but he soon proved to be a far formidable figure than the princes had anticipated. He defeated rival claimant King Ottokar of Bohemia and then proceeded to lay the foundations for the mighty Dynasty the Hapsburgs would become.

 

14th Century

 

Dmitri Ivanovich Donskoi ( 1350 - 1389 )

Ruled as Grand Duke Dmitri I of Moscow from 1359 to 1389. His defeat of the Golden Horde at the Battle of Kulikovo in 1380 was the first Russian success against the Tartars since the Mongol conquest.

A national Hero on the strength of this, he was also astute enough to restablish peaceful relations with his more powerful neighbour allowing him to deal with various other threats.

 

Lazar Hrebeljanovic ( 1371 - 1380 )

A Sebian Prince, he is a legend in Serbia as the heroic loser of the Battle of Kosovo. He strengthened and to a degree unified the Serbs in order to face the showdown with the Turks he forsaw as inevitable.

His armies fought the Turks to a virtual standstill and both he and the Turkish Sultan Murad I were killed. Although strategically a defeat, it is the heroic sacrifice of his death which has cementd his place in the folklore of the region.

 

15th Century

 

Janos Hyunadi ( 1387 - 1456 )

A tenacious Hungarian General who was for the Turks most implacable enemy in Europe. At times almost single handedly defending South Eastern Europe his finest moment came in 1456 when his troops, combined with a force of Crusaders he had attracted from the rest of Europe defeated the forces of Sultan Mehmet II at Belgrade. His son Matthias Corvinus would become King of Hungary and establish it as the most powerfull state in central Europe.

 

Sultan Murad II ( 1402 - 1451 )

Overshadowed by his illustrious successor Mehmet the Conqueror, Murad was an interesting and complex character. A lover of the arts and not naturally warlike, he several times tried to step down from his thrown but events forced him to continue on each occaision. Despite this personality he was a formidable opponent when need be. Although unsuccessful in his seige of Cinstantinople in 1422, six years later he seized Salonika from Venice, which beyond the victory itself was an important statement of Ottoman naval power. He achieved another crucial victory when defeating the Christian forces, Hunyadi included, at Varna in 1444, setting the scene for his successors final conquest of Constantinople.

 

Of course Skenderbeg, a contemporary of the last two is a particularly interesting bloke, I'm sure there is somebody on this forum more qualified to give you the goods on him