Adalékok a török 1683. évi magyarországi felvonulásához (Gyöngyösi Nagy Ferenc vicegenerális levelei alapján)
Additions to the Operations of the Turkish Army in Hungary in 1683 (from the Letters of Vice General Ferenc Gyöngyösi Nagy)

Summary/Abstract: After the Ottoman Empire’s unsuccessful campaign against Vienna in 1683, the period of the so called reconquering wars began. The Ottoman attacks that year were one of the last trials of the Hungarian defense system, and increased the pressure on the border lands fac-ing Kanizsa in Western Transdanubia, which were to protect Austria as well. The captain-general of the border lands was Kristóf Batthyány at the time, while Ferenc Gyöngyösi Nagy, captain of the castle of Szentgrót, which itself was part of the border fort system, was appointed his deputy in 1681. Gyöngyösi Nagy held this position for one and a half dec-ades. In the paper I analyze his letters written between June 4 and June 21, 1683 to his supe-rior. In these, the vice captain-general describes in detail the state of the border forts, the preparations for the campaign and the steps taken to counter the Ottoman advances until the auxiliary forces from the border forts joined the Hungarian army gathering in a camp at Vát. These sources show that the military resources available in the border land facing Kanizsa could fulfill their duty in smaller skirmishes along the border only and were insuf-ficient to resist a large-scale Ottoman attack. The possibilities of the vice captain-general, heading a border fort army small in number and poorly supplied, were limited. Espionage, which had played an important role in the organization of the defense at the border lands, started late and was insufficient this time. From the correspondence of the vice captain-general we can learn valuable pieces of information about not only the reasons that led to the collapse of the border lands facing Kanizsa in 1683, but also why it became necessary at the end of the century to restructure the border fort system.

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