Original subtitles

(angelic choir sings)

- In September 1983, the Polish Pope, John Paul II

came to this church to pray.

He did so because almost exactly 300 years

earlier to the day, on the 11th of September, 1683,

a regiment of Polish Hussars also gathered

at this same spot to offer prayers.

It was the eve of the tremendous battle

between two great armies.

On the one hand, the military might

of the Muslim Ottoman Empire.

And on the other, an alliance of Christian forces

from across Europe.

In which the Polish contingent play a pivotal role.

The battle which commenced in the early hours

of the following morning would come to be seen

as one of the defining moments in European history.

The after effects of which continue

to reverberate to this day.

(angelic choir sings)

(friendly instrumental music)

The Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453

was a devastating blow to Christian Europe.

From an insignificant tribe of Turkish nomads,

fired up by the flame of Islam,

the people of Ottoman had transformed themselves

into a great imperial power.

With Constantinople, with Christians, Istanbul

as their capital, the Ottomans stood on the threshold

of a golden era largely brought about

by the vision of one man.

Sultan Suleiman the First.

Known by many as Suleiman the Magnificent.

(playful instrumental music)

In 1520, Suleiman inherited a sprawling empire

that stretched from the borders of Hungary in the northwest,

to Crimea in the northeast,

and across the levant, into Egypt.

- Suleiman was one of the greatest Ottoman Sultans.

He was a very intelligent man and a patient man.

And he had huge resources on his side.

- He brought the Ottoman Empire

to the height of civilization.

He did a lot of building projects, mosques,

bath houses, social institutions.

- We know that he sponsored the production

of loads of beautiful arts and artworks.

And when people went to visit him, they described him

sitting on cloths of gold and wearing a ruby

the size of a hazelnut with a pearl

the size of a hazelnut dangling from his ears.

So he was a man who obviously enjoyed

the good things of life.

- Suleiman's nickname was Suleiman the Lawgiver.

What he did was get the administration

and the legal structure of this vast

and expanding territory working well.

(upbeat instrumental music)

- [Host] One of Suleiman's greatest achievements

was to bring stability and prosperity

to a vast and culturally diverse empire.

To get an idea of daily life during Suleiman's time,

I'm visiting the tiny village of Cumalikizig

here in northern Anatolia.

Unchanged for hundreds of years,

this is about as close as you can get

to traveling back in time.

(man sings in foreign language)

Before film, TV, and of course the internet,

shadow puppet theater was the number one entertainment

across the empire.

(speaks in foreign language)

Following time honored plots and characters,

the plays offer a unique insight into the nature

of Ottoman society.

I'm watching this one with Ugo Jelico,

who comes from a long line of Turkish puppeteers.

(puppets speak foreign language)

- Corigoose and Hajavat, the main characters of the play,

Corigoose, represents somebody in the Sweden,

and Hajavat.

He's an educated man.

So these two men first of all,

are organizing all these finer things.

In this play for example, Corigoose and Hajavat

are in collaboration in order to earn money.

So they put up a swing.

And Hajavat sends different characters to Corigoose.

(puppets speak foreign language)

- What were the kind of regional differences?

I mean, was there a special kind of theater for the Balcans?

- Well I think it was almost the same throughout the empire.

But as you know, Ottoman Empire started growing

and many different nationalities were living together

as a result of that we can see Albanians.

We have Greek characters.

We have Arabs.

We have Kurdish.

We can see a Jewish character for instance.

(puppets speak foreign language)

We have all these different nationalities and characters.

(puppets speak foreign language)

Here we have the tax collector.

And he's the Ottoman official.

The whole place is going really funny

but right in the middle of everything,

he says don't forget to pay your tax.

(puppets speak foreign language)

- The theater must have performed a very valuable role

as a sort of safety valve for letting off steam.

And also for actually changing things around.

- I think so.

It was like a television.

People were getting news from there.

A puppeteer can speak about everything.

Even he can criticize the governmental system,

the Sultan himself, so I think that's very important.

And maybe this is something we don't have today.

(speaks foreign language)

- One secret of the success was the tolerance.

There was no pressure on turning

Christian populations into Muslims.

Because Christians did pay higher taxes than Muslims.

- Ethnicity is not important.

As long as you pay your taxes, nobody is going

to interfere with you because of your religious beliefs.

- The Ottoman government was effective,

it was by and large, less oppressive of the ordinary

common people than the previous

Christian governments had been.

For the ordinary people, life was okay.

(playful instrumental music)

- [Host] In spite of the Empire's stability,

Suleiman was bent on expansion.

But a formidable rival was emerging in Europe

that would complicate his plans.

The Hapsburg King Charles the Fifth.

Appointed Holy Roman Emperor by the Pope in 1519,

Charles presided over a vast territory including Spain

and its emergent American colonies, the Netherlands,

and swathes of Germany, Italy, Austria and Hungary.

(ominous instrumental music)

As the two leaders prepared for war,

the scene was set for a clash of egos and ambitions

that would play out on an epic scale.

- Charles the Fifth and Suleiman the Magnificent

were intense rivals.

This was in some respects, a grudge match between neighbors.

- I'm not sure if Suleiman regarded Charles the Fifth

as a worthy rival because during the reign

of Charles the Fifth, they never accepted

the Hapsburg Emperors as equal.

- The Ottomans believed they had the title of Caesar.

They were inheritors of the Roman Emperor.

And Charles also claimed that title.

So there was a grudge as to who had this title really.

So it was kind of personal.

- Charles the Fifth had some ideas of a crusade.

He still had the idea of the Conquista in Spain

so you could fight Islam.

And with the help of God, you would be victorious.

- Charles staged an elaborate coronation

of himself with Holy Roman Emperor, the Caesar.

A huge display really, to show Suleiman

that he had this title.

And Suleiman actually responded by having

an elaborate gold helmet made for himself in Venice.

Which the munitions claimed belonged to Alexander the Great,

they were very good at selling fake jewelry to people.

And staging his own celebrations.

So there's a great propaganda war

going on for both sides really.

- [Host] In 1521, Suleiman made his first move in Europe

by taking the city of Belgrade

on the fringes of the Hapsburg Empire.

But Suleiman had a much bigger prize in his sights.

Vienna.

A key city in the heart of the eastern heart

of Charles' holy Roman domains.

(playful instrumental music)

Known as the Golden Apple,

Vienna was the gateway to central Europe.

And its capture would not only open the door

to further European incursions,

but deliver a powerful blow

to Hapsburg hedgemen in the region.

Success however, would require patience and a strategy.

Suleiman had both.

- Suleiman was looking for allies against the Hapsburgs.

And the natural aly is the King of France.

- France was surrounded by Hapsburg territories.

They really felt menaced by this overwhelming power.

And it's a very old political trick.

The enemy of your enemy is my friend.

- The French and the Ottomans agreed trade treaties

which allowed the French a presence in Istanbul

and the ability to trade.

The quid pro quo for this is the French give Suleiman

the use of ports in the south of France

from which to raid the Mediterranean.

And this does a great deal of damage.

And there are times when the Ottomans are using cannon balls

with the fleur de lis on them.

- It happened also Suleiman in weakening the Hapsburgs

because the Hapsburgs could never

concentrate on one frontier.

They could not concentrate all the troops to fight the Turks

because at the same time, they had campaigns

against the French.

- The Perfidious Alliance of the 16th century

as it was called, which was a scandal of Europe,

made life harder for the Hapsburgs.

(playful instrumental music)

- [Host] At the same time, the Protestant Reformation

was sweeping across Christian Europe.

Affording Suleiman further divisions to exploit.

- The Ottomans saw the Protestants as being natural allies

and they did make overtures

to the Protestants in northern Europe.

After England becomes a Protestant country,

there were overtures made on the basis that

Spain is now England's enemy,

and Elizabeth sent ambassadors

and gifts to the Ottoman Sultans.

- A woman called Saphie, who's in the Ottoman court,

writes to Elizabeth I and says,

I hear you make these really beautiful perfumes

and ointments and makeup.

Can I get some of your English makeup?

So it's this fantastic moment where you have high politics

in action and something very, very female as well.

- A lot of Protestant rulers or noblemen

preferred an Ottoman rule than the Hapsburg Catholic rule.

Because of tolerance.

If you had to pay higher taxes to the Ottomans

or being burned on the stake, you preferred higher taxes.

- But what we see here really, is Europe breaking down

from a pan Christian front or the Crusadean idea has died.

And people are now nation states.

And so the deals that they're making

are in their personal national interests.

- [Host] Kings exploit European disunity.

Suleiman initiated his plan of attack

by taking on the defiant Kingdom of Hungary.

Allied with Austria, it was the one obstacle

that stood between him and Vienna.

(fast-paced drumming music)

As Suleiman and his armies crossed the Danube,

the Hapsburg Hungarian force rallied to meet them here,

outside the tiny village of Mohacs, in southern Hungary.

What became known as the Battle of Mohacs

would be a national tragedy for Hungary

that reverberates to this day.

(suspenseful instrumental music)

(birds chirp)

25 years of misrule by a weak and ineffectual King

had left Hungary divided.

The peasants were in near revolt,

the aristocrats, they were fighting amongst each other.

The incoming King, Louis II,

he was just 19 years of age and he was inexperienced

in the art of state craft and military campaigning.

He managed to raise the fighting force of 30,000 men,

but that was just half the number of the Ottoman force.

The field of the battle is memorialized here

in this rather strange and disquieting monument.

The terrible battle that ensued is seared

into the Hungarian collective consciousness.

The Hungarian forces were no match

against the superior might of Suleiman's armies.

And within just a few hours of the battle's commencement,

they were destroyed.

In a final tragic twist, the young Hungarian King Louis,

while attempting to flee to safety,

was thrown from his horse and died.

- Mohac was the moment that shattered Hungary.

It's remembered by the Hungarians almost in the same way

that Kosovo is remembered by the Serbians.

It forms a moment of grief, of mourning,

of national lament.

- The Battle of Mohacs is absolutely fundamental here.

Because in one battle, Hungary is effectively

knocked out of the equation.

(somber instrumental music)

- [Host] The Battle of Mohacs was a tragedy for Hungary

but a resounding victory for the Ottomans.

Suleiman now controlled the southern half of the Kingdom

providing him with a strong base for further campaigns

into Hapsburg territory.

And just three years later,

his armies were on the move again.

In the summer of 1529, they swept northward.

Capturing the Hungarian capital of Buda

and by September, they were outside

the gates of Vienna itself.

It was an audacious act that took the city by surprise.

- Vienna was very ill-prepared for this siege.

It still had a medieval fortress,

it had not too many troops in it,

and the Turkish Army was enormous.

It was about 200,000 men.

- [Host] From their headquarters in St. Stephen's Cathedral,

the Viennese commanders looked on in horror

as the Ottomans began to bombard their city.

The defenders for their part put up a heroic resistance

and they kept the Turkish Army a bay for several weeks.

But there was a limit to how long they could hold out.

Defeat seemed inevitable.

Until the 11th hour, fortune came to them

in the form of bad weather.

(thunder claps)

Torrential rain and early snowfall forced the Ottomans

to abandon the siege.

According to some defenders, defying providence

had favored the Christians.

(angelic choir sings)

- Heaven helped the Viennese.

It was pouring rain.

If the Turkish Army would have been smaller,

maybe Vienna would have fallen.

But you had to feed 200,000 men

and a hundred thousand beast.

And this by very bad roads,

mud, great difficulties in supply lines.

- The problem for the Ottomans really,

was it took a hundred days to get to Vienna.

And they were always at the outer limit

of what they could achieve.

And in 1529, they left too late in May,

they didn't reach there til September.

It rained all the way up, and it snowed early.

So their window of opportunity when they got there

was short, really.

- The failure of the first siege of Vienna

was more important than the siege of Vienna.

It's not the siege itself which really surprised people,

or surprised so many people,

it was the fact that the Ottomans failed.

They had been stopped.

- After their first siege and this failure in Vienna,

Suleiman did become obsessed with Vienna

because Vienna did become more important.

And because of this reinforcement of the importance

of Vienna for Suleiman, it becomes a more important aim

to conquer Vienna again.

(angelic choir sings)

- Suleiman's failure to Vienna

proved at least one thing.

That the Ottoman military machine was not invincible.

And the Viennese, along with half of Europe,

breathed a hefty sigh of relief.

But Suleiman was nothing if not determined.

And over the next 25 years, he made

at least one further attempt to take the city.

But this time he didn't even get there.

His armies were bogged down in Hungary,

stalled by bad weather and a defiant resistance

of the Hungarians.

It seemed that Suleiman's dream of plucking the golden apple

from its bow was doomed.

But his resolve was undiminished.

Suleiman the Magnificent would take Vienna, or die trying.

It wasn't until the summer of 1566 that Suleiman,

at the ripe old age of 72, would assemble

the largest Ottoman Army to date,

and set off in the direction of Vienna once again.

- What was interesting was that Suleiman went on campaign.

He hadn't been on campaign for, I can't remember,

for over a decade.

And suddenly, at the end of his life,

he feels the need to go out there

and show his face to the troops, really.

And I read that as being something significant

about his presence or lack of presence in the public eye.

- Suleiman was very old to go to a campaign.

But he believed that he himself is the ultimate commander.

He should lead his army.

And so he felt himself as being a soldier,

as the center of his meaning as a ruler.

- [Host] Crossing the Danube, Suleiman's forces

descended on the relatively insignificant

fortress town of Szigetvar.

(upbeat instrumental music)

It should have been an easy victory,

but Szigetvar had been a thorn

in the Ottoman's side for decades.

Resisting capture time and time again,

which prevented previous campaigns from reaching Vienna.

At the center of its defense, was a well fortified citadel.

In Suleiman's mind, it was time

this annoying molehill was leveled.

But few could have predicted at the outset of the siege,

the extraordinary events that were about to unfold.

Events that would see the little town of Szigetvar

go down as the stuff of legends.

With less than 3,000 soldiers,

Szigetvar was no match for Suleiman's forces.

But it did have some advantages.

Surrounded by a lake, the town was laid out

across three fortified islands.

The Ottomans managed to take

the first two islands relatively quickly.

Forcing the surviving townsfolk and soldiers

to take refuge in the citadel.

With only 300 soldiers remaining,

the defenders' Croatian commander, Nikola Zrinyi,

faced an impossible task.

To get a Hungarian take on this legendary battle,

I'm meeting author and journalist, Cecelia Hussa.

Cecelia, these are pretty impressive fortifications.

Tell me something about their arrangement, how they worked.

- So what you see today is not what it once was.

Imagine it was surrounded by a huge lake.

The Ottomans, when they arrived here,

they started drying this whole water up.

Took them a good two and a half, three weeks

before they could actually start attacking the fort.

- Tell me what happened next.

- The Turks fired into the fort

and a massive fire broke out because they actually

attacked their artillery equipment.

So this fire was burning.

Hope was dying.

So the only way for the Hungarian defenders

was to break out of the fort

and sacrifice their lives.

They talked about it, they prepared for it,

mentally, they dressed up, prayed,

and just opened the gates

and charged out of the fort to certain death.

Zrinyi was shot twice, and the Turks swiftly grabbed him,

put him over a cannon and beheaded him.

- [Host] It's obviously a very heroic

if kind of gruesome death for Zrinyi.

- Absolutely, but the Hungarian boys left

a nice little surprise for the Ottomans,

because they knew they would charge into the fort,

so they stuffed this one room with a bunch of explosives.

The Ottoman soldiers came into the fort,

or what remained of it, opened this room

and this just blew up and thousands died.

- And of course Suleiman himself

had died that very same morning.

- Yes, but nobody knew about it.

They had to keep it secret.

If the soldiers, the Ottoman soldiers find out

that the Sultan has died,

looting, rebellion, you can imagine what happens.

They managed to keep it secret for over two weeks.

They had him buried quickly,

it was still summer, it was warm.

You know, the dead body rots in half an hour.

They took the heart out as well as some inner organs

and legend has it that they put it in some golden bowl

and buried that separately.

(soft instrumental music)

- Suleiman's army captures Szigetvar, but at a price.

Not only had they suffered enormous losses,

but their Sultan had died.

Not in battle, but of illness.

The push to Vienna was abandoned.

Suleiman's dream left unfulfilled.

- It's a kind of melancholy conclusion to Suleiman's life.

And what the last words in his journal are,

smoke is still coming from the chimneys of Szigetvar.

And that he dies trying to conquer this tiny little place,

which is only defended by 2,000 people.

And almost like a failure.

It sort of represents a failure of the conquest project.

(playful instrumental music)

- [Host] But the story doesn't end there.

Searches for a tomb containing Suleiman's heart

and that mythical golden cup

have occupied Turkish and Hungarian authorities

and treasure seekers for centuries.

Despite many excavations and false claims,

no one has been able to locate it until now.

(playful instrumental music)

Recent excavations in the back garden

of this Szigetvar suburb look promising.

So I'm meeting archeologist,

Erica Hunts on site to see what's been found.

Erica, you're responsible for this

very big hole in the ground.

It looks like you've uncovered

some really interesting stuff.

- Yes, we are in a very interesting place now.

It is from the 16th century.

And we can say that it was buried by the Turks

and after the Turks were leaving a place, it disappeared.

It is a rectangular building with an entrance

at the other side.

And this building faces the Mecca.

- So probably a mosque.

- Yes, we are thinking that it is a mosque.

We can say that this mosque belonged

to the tomb of sultan Suleiman the Magnificent.

- Really, you think so.

People have been looking for this for centuries, perhaps.

So that means his tent was also located at this site.

This is where his encampment was.

- Yes, because according to written sources,

he was buried exactly at that place where he died,

and where his tent was.

- Right, okay well, the story goes,

that when they disemboweled him,

they put his insides into a golden receptacle

and then built this tomb over the top.

Have you found any evidence of this wonderful treasure?

- Yes, we had excavation that unfortunately,

we didn't find that golden cup.

But according to my opinion, it wasn't any golden cup at all

because according to the Islamic traditions,

the buried bodies or inner organs

should mix with the mother nature.

So that's why the golden cup legend cannot be true.

- Right.

A bit of a shame.

I was hoping I might get lucky.

Suleiman may have failed to capture Vienna,

but he is widely regarded at the Empire's

most successful Sultan.

During his 46 year rule, he expanded Ottoman territory

on every front.

Absorbing Tunisia and Algeria in north Africa,

and consolidating gains in Hungary, Romania,

and Moldavia.

He pushed east into the Caucasus beyond the Black Sea,

and in the Middle East, secured Iraq

and the holy Islamic cities of Mecca and Medina.

(upbeat drumming music)

Suleiman's legacy was far reaching.

Not only in the Middle East, but also across Europe.

And in particular, Vienna.

Where many artifacts of the period can still be found.

I'm visiting Vienna's Imperial Armory,

with Matthias Pfaffenbichler, who's also its curator,

to explore some of the city's

prized treasures from Suleiman's time.

This looks like a very sort of Turkish,

what I imagine Turkish helmets to be like.

- No, they are not.

They are just European, made in south Germany.

It was made for the Austrian nobility.

They used to have mock battles where half of the mobility

was disguised as Christian, and the other half as Turks.

- When you say mock battles, I mean,

was this some kind of spectacle?

I mean, were there spectators watching?

- Yes, spectators watching, the whole court watching.

- [Host] So a bit like a--

- It was part like a Touilleries, like a child,

but it was dangerous, very dangerous.

Therefore, they had visors in the form of Turkish faces.

This is a visor I can show you.

- [Host] Yeah.

- If you look, so exchange the visor on your helmet

with this and through these holes you can look.

It's heavy and solid metal.

And if you look you can see quite a lot.

If you look through this.

- [Host] Oh yeah, I mean it's surprisingly good

field of vision considering the narrow slits.

But I'm not sure I'd like to be behind this mask for long.

- This is the saber of Suleiman.

You see, here is his tubera.

- [Host] Oh, right there--

- This is the stamp with his name.

- [Host] It's remarkably small and insignificant really.

- Yes, if you're a ruler who rode three continents,

and you're so powerful, he doesn't have to show off.

- [Host] This is a made out of what?

- This made of leather.

- [Host] Leather, right.

- [Curator] And this is silver.

And steel.

- [Host] Right.

- This is a very practical weapon.

You can draw it and it could have killed anybody.

- Yes, looks exceedingly sharp.

- Normally a Commander in Chief doesn't come

in the opportunity of killing anybody.

He has men who do this.

- Yeah, how does it come to be here?

I mean, was it captured in battle?

Or something like--

- No, at the time we never did win a battle

against Suleiman himself.

The Austrians had an embassy in Istanbul.

And it was one of the tasks of the ambassadors

to try to get objects for the Hapsburg family.

- And would the Austrian Emperor,

would he be handing out things like this himself, or no?

- The Austrian Emperor would send

presents to the Turks, yes.

A lot of clocks.

- [Host] Clocks.

- Maybe not swords, but clocks,

pistols would go as a present to the Turks.

- So you say this was a gift.

There were exchanges between them though they were enemies?

- The idea that these two empires

always raged war is wrong.

They were enemies for some time,

but they had very long peace periods.

Because it was much cheaper for both empires.

After the loss of Suleiman they negotiated

an armistice and this lasted for more than 40 years.

(playful instrumental music)

- [Host] Any enduring peace between the Ottomans

and the Hapsburgs was doomed to fail.

By the late 17th century, circumstances and key players

had changed, bringing renewed zeal on both sides.

(fast-paced music)

Spread on by the enthusiastic support

of Pope Innocent the Eleventh,

the conflict was once again cast as a religious struggle.

- The Pope was much afraid of the Ottomans.

A bit like now we are afraid of ISIS.

The Hapsburg used this religious implication

to organize support.

(fast-paced instrumental music)

- [Host] On the Ottoman side, the new Sultan,

Mehmed the Fourth, and his Grand Vizier, Kara Mustafa,

became obsessed with capturing Vienna.

Their motives were complex.

- By the time we get to the 17th century,

the rhetoric of holy war is still

being used by the Ottomans.

But it's kind of a bit more measured by this time.

It's more Imperial.

The grudge match is still going on with the Hapsburg Dynasty

and that this is a place, this obsessive return

to this place that is just beyond reach really.

That will legitimize an empire which is starting

to fall behind.

- When Kara Mustafa came to power, he had to one,

create disadvantage.

He was not a professional general.

He was a courtier.

So he wanted to prove to all these great generals

who came from Yanicha Court that he's as good as they are

and so he wanted to conquer something

which was very prestigious.

Which was Vienna.

- [Host] In the summer of 1683, Kara Mustafa

and an Ottoman Army of several hundred thousand

set off from Ederne to capture Vienna.

It would become the largest army

to have ever besieged a European city.

(upbeat drumming music)

As news of the Ottoman advance reached Vienna,

panic swept across the city.

Tens of thousands evacuated,

including reigning Holy Roman Emperor,

Leopold the First and his family.

The task of defending the city fell to seasoned

Viennese Field Marshall, Ernst Rudiger von Starhemburg.

He was faced with a formidable logistical challenge.

It was a little over one and a half centuries

since Suleiman had laid siege to Vienna.

And in the intervening years,

the Viennese had completely upgraded their defenses.

They rebuilt the city walls, incorporating

the latest advances in military engineering.

This is one of the last surviving sections of those walls.

But even at the moment of their completion,

they were redundant.

The art of warfare had moved on and the rules of engagement

had changed completely.

So, in spite of the evidence sturdiness

of these great city walls,

Vienna was really in no position to withstand

a full frontal attack by the might of the Ottoman Army.

(ominous music)

(bell tolls)

On July the 14th, 1683, the watchmen of Vienna

looked out from their perch atop St. Stephen's Cathedral.

The Ottomans had the city surrounded.

A vast army, the length of which few Viennese

had ever seen.

The Battle commenced with a thunderous cannonade

directed at the city walls.

But many of the cannon balls also flew

into the heart of the city, bringing down church spires.

For the faithful praying for salvation below,

it was a hellish din.

The sound of Armageddon.

As the bombardment raged above ground,

the strange subterranean campaign

was unfolding beneath the city.

The Ottomans did hundreds of sappers

who built a network of trenches,

which enabled them to move the infantry and the artillery

close up to the city walls.

(labored breaths)

The trenches were effective to a point.

If it got too close to the fortifications,

the men inside would be sitting ducks,

open to fire from the parapets above.

So the sappers dug tunnels deep underground

in an effort to reach the foundation of the city walls.

Once there they would plant explosives

to bring the walls down.

These Ottoman sappers were real professionals.

Many of them were recruited from the Serbian mines,

so they knew a thing or two about digging holes.

Laying explosives.

And they could work really fast with great precision

to take them under the city walls.

It was a curious kind of subterranean warfare

waged in the dark, but it could prove devastating

when it came off.

(fast-paced music)

(distant explosion)

- [Man] So, let's go downwards,

to the exciting parts of the city.

- [Host] The sappers posed tremendous problems

for Viennese defenders.

But there was a way to counteract them.

And it laid deep beneath the city.

In a labyrinthean network

of underground cellars and passageways.

Local guide, Peter Hobiger is showing me a section

of the old tunnels that runs beneath a bakery

in the heart of the city.

- This tunnels, as you can see,

played an important role in the time of the Ottoman siege.

Because we are now here very close

to the city's fortifications.

And the idea was to sit down here and listening,

if some counter digging of the Ottoman miners

could be heard here down in the cellar.

- So you said the Viennese were down here in these tunnels

listening, so would they just press their ears to the wall?

- No, they have special measures.

Special methods for example, drums,

they were placed here in front of the wall

with dry peas on it.

- Peas.

- Peas, yeah, they were dried peas.

And there were on the surface of the drum.

And when there was a digging, when the Ottoman miners

started digging, and the mines blasting,

then suddenly the peas began to rattle.

And the rattling of the peas indicates

there is someone coming.

- Okay, so they know there's someone out there,

coming through the earth.

What do they do next?

- Yeah, they started their digging

from the inside of the wall.

So they could find the Ottoman miners

and they could defeat them and kill them in there.

- So it means what we see here,

is behind the brick facing of the tunnel,

and we're into solid rock.

So very difficult to penetrate.

- [Guide] Lots of hard work, yeah, yeah.

They used gunpowder to get in there.

So they're always in danger that something might happen.

Some shooting, some fire, some explosion.

Maybe the tunnel crushing down.

Yeah, so it must be a tremendous situation down there.

- Yeah, I mean what you've described is hellish scenario.

I mean, confined space, these tunnels

that they were building were narrow, and dust

and just the flickering flames and then suddenly

you meet your enemy face to face,

underground, and you kill them.

- Yeah.

So we have a very famous legend in Vienna.

And that is the story of a young baker boy.

Who was working down here, because we are now

here in the cellar of a bakery.

And he was working during the night,

three or four o'clock in the morning,

as bakers usually do, and he was the first.

He was standing here we have

these drums with the peas on.

And he heard the drums.

He heard the rattling of the drums.

So he knew there was danger coming.

He was the first.

And he was, he gave alarm and said alarm, they are coming.

And so later on, the bakers were honored for this reason.

Because they helped the city.

And this story is told to every child

everyday in school for example.

So it's a very famous one.

And we like it because it's a nice idea

being saved by a baker boy.

- Baker boy.

- Yeah, exactly.

(solemn instrumental music)

(distant explosions)

- [Host] The Ottomans bombarded the city,

both above and below ground for two months.

Despite their best efforts, the defenders

couldn't hold out for much longer.

The writing was all over the city's crumbling walls.

Without a game changer, Vienna was doomed.

- The Turkish were able to almost conquer

one of the bastillons and destroy a second bastillon.

The last wall was one day or two day

before it would have been breached.

So it was very, very close.

(fast-paced music)

- [Host] Salvation, if it were to come,

would be riding a horse.

Long awaited relief forces were heading to Vienna.

And among them was one of the most accomplished

and respected cavalry in Europe.

The Polish Hussars.

Under the command of King John Sobieski,

the Hussars were renowned for their bravery

and horsemanship in battle.

Today they're still a source of great pride in Poland.

And the living history re-enact the group of Gniew,

are dedicated to keeping their history alive.

But before we see them in action,

I'm getting a lesson in 17th century Polish warfare.

Well I'm here with Yarrick and his Hussars.

And Yarrick, I want to go back 300 years

to the eve of the Battle of Vienna.

So turn me into a Hussar please.

- We will have to prepare you for battle.

Kristian, zupon, the name of this part is zupan.

(playful instrumental music)

- [Host] The Hussar's uniform is built for speed

and versatility.

Their armor weighed roughly 15 kilos,

was actually considered lightweight for its day.

I feel like a lobster now.

Maneuverability was essential

for the range of weaponry used.

- And now I would like to give you

the most beautiful weapon of all Poland.

Noble, polished saber.

- [Host] For those higher ranking soldiers, like me,

animal pelts were worn and of course

a solid piece of headgear.

- [Man] How do you feel?

- Very encumbered.

- [Man] Yeah?

- Yeah, how can you fight like this?

I can't move my head.

(man chuckles)

- Firstly, you will have to practice with the pistols.

- [Host] And this is carried on the side of the horse?

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- So you only really have one shot.

- Yeah, only one.

If you've got two pistols--

- Yeah, you have two shots.

- So we can try.

- Okay, so right.

Better not point it at anybody.

And I would just...

(gun fires)

Great.

I like that

- Yeah.

- [Host] But the Hussar's most important weapon

was the lance.

Some of the longest lances ever used in battle,

the Hussars were feared for their terrifying charges.

- And now I will like to give to your hands,

the queen of Polish (speaks foreign language),

the Polish lance.

- [Host] And the length of this?

- About six meters long.

- Right. - Do it.

- [Host] Okay.

- The right hand is for the lance,

the left for the horse.

- [Host] For the horse.

- You feel the power of Polish Army?

(host chuckles)

- I feel the weakness in my right arm.

(both chuckle)

I'm curious about spiking the enemy through.

Okay--

- We've got one experience in 1660,

with the Battle of Polonka.

One Polish Hussar, spiked six soldiers.

- [Host] On his lance.

- On his lance.

- I mean, he must've been very strong to carry six men

all on the lance at the same, like a kebab.

- Yeah, without onion.

(men laugh)

(fast-paced instrumental music)

- [Host] By early September, Sobieski and his Hussars

reached the outskirts of Vienna.

Where they joined a large force of Hapsburg Armies

drawn from other parts of the Empire.

As the city walls were beginning to crumble,

the relief force sprang into action.

Time was of the essence.

And the Hapsburg relief force needed to engage their enemy

at the very first opportunity.

And so it was decided that they would launch their attack

on the Ottoman encampment from these heavily wooden hills

to the west of the city, (speaks foreign language).

But it was a risky strategy.

Because in order to reach the summit,

they had to pass through dense forest,

and along narrow ravines.

Which could've been disastrous had they been ambushed.

But Kara Mustafa was so engrossed with his siege

of the city, his focus was on Vienna,

that he completely neglected to consider

the possibility of an attack from without.

And so, the relief forces were able

to gain the higher ground unopposed.

Spreading out across the hilltops northwest of Vienna,

the Hapsburg relief armies were able to gain

a commanding view of the enemy

and the bombardments of the city below.

And a pretty daunting sight it must've seemed as well.

With a vast Ottoman host encamped in the valley,

surrounding Vienna.

And a constant cannonade of Ottoman artillery

blasting away at the walls,

billows of smoke rolling up the hills.

And this is where the main army had to come down,

descending through vineyards and crossing stony ground

and then at the bottom, the Ottomans.

Okay, they may not have been prepared for this attack,

but when they were there, it was a huge army of soldiers

waiting to meet the relief force.

But then, further along the ridge

was King Sobieski's Polish Hussars.

And they were gonna charge down a valley

and attack the Ottoman host from the flank.

This was gonna be a game changer.

(suspenseful music)

On the night of September the 11th, 1683.

King Sobieski and his Hussars came to the sight

of St. Joseph's church here in the hills overlooking Vienna

to pray before commencing their attack.

The Poles were staunch Catholics.

Loyal to the Pope, defenders to their dying breath,

of Christendom at the Holy Roman Empire.

For them this was a conflict

between the forces of good and evil.

Whose outcome could only be decided by God.

The bulk of Hapsburg forces made the first assault

from the hills to the north of the city.

As Kara Mustafa rallied his troops to meet them,

the Polish Hussars made their move.

(suspenseful music)

Reaching a valley to the southwest,

they began their terrifying charge

directly into the rear of the Ottoman encampment.

(chaotic clashes)

Panic spread amongst the Ottoman troops

who were unprepared for the double-pronged attack.

As for Kara Mustafa, realizing the disaster

unfolding before him, he retreated in disarray.

His armies overwhelmed by the surprise attack,

followed closely behind.

(loud shouts)

In an astonishing act of bravery,

not least on the part of the Polish Hussars,

Vienna was saved.

- Kara Mustafa made a lot of mistakes

because he was not a trained soldier.

He didn't concentrate all his troops

in defending his camp against the assaulting relief army.

But continued the assault to the city

because it was so close to the fall.

So he divided his force.

Which was technically a mistake.

- [Host] From the sumptuous interior

of the Grand Vizier's tent, King Sobieski penned letters

of the triumphant victory for the leaders of Europe.

His immortal words inspired by Julius Caesar,

came to define the victory for Christendom.

We came, we saw, God conquered.

(bells chiming)

For most Europeans, this was a defining moment.

Christianity had prevailed.

And Europe had been saved from the infidel Turk.

This was the rhetoric of churchmen and princes,

but it was also a popular sentiment.

Good had triumphed over evil,

it was divine providence, they had God on their side.

(angelic instrumental music)

- I think it's a watershed moment.

There was a great deal of rejoicing throughout Europe

as far away as Barcelona and England and so on.

It also really put the Austrians on the front foot.

- The second siege didn't unite Christian Europe.

But it helped enormously,

the prestige of the Austrian Empire.

(ominous music)

- [Host] In their hasty retreat,

the Ottoman Army left behind a wealth of artifacts.

And you can find many of them on display

here in the Vienna Museum.

To get a better understanding of the battle,

I'm visiting the museum

with historian, Matthias Pfaffenbichler.

- This is very interesting because those are horse stays.

And they are signs of command

for high ranking Turkish commanders.

The number of horse stays

would tell all the people his rank.

- How would've these been carried?

- A standard horse. - On the horse.

- [Curator] Yes.

On a horse.

- So this looks like a very intriguing device

with lots of spikes.

It looks like some terrible weapon, but perhaps it's not.

- No no, it's no weapon.

The spikes are just to hold

some inflammable material around it.

So you can easily ignite it and it's a signal passed.

And then you can inflame it and it gives a fire.

If there's a fire, everybody has to rush to his cannons.

- [Host] These lances over here.

- [Curator] Yeah, they're very nice.

- Beautifully decorated.

They were recovered from the field of battle.

- Yes, they were recovered from the field of battle

because the Turkish cavalry fled in panic

and they left these wonderful lances

and it was the Polish who started plundering the camp.

- Even before the battle was resolved?

- Well it was finished, yes.

Because for everybody, if you could plunder

and get something very rich, it's for your lifetime.

So the Polish got really the best things out of it.

Kara Mustafa made this mistake of not counterattacking.

Because the whole Polish troops

was useless because of plundering.

So if he would have counterattacked,

maybe he would have won the battle.

- [Host] As for Kara Mustafa, his failure

was not well received by the Sultan.

He was executed the traditional way.

Strangled with a silk cord and then beheaded.

According to some accounts, the head of Kara Mustafa

was stolen and brought back to Vienna

where it became an object of amusement

in Royal Court circles.

It was used as a football in polo matches,

that kind of thing.

And there was actually a head kept at this museum

until about 10 years ago.

Allegedly, that of Kara Mustafa.

But I believe since then it's been buried

as more modern sensibilities prevailed.

And he's got a rather mournful expression.

It's almost as if he had a premonition of his fate.

Tough luck.

(solemn instrumental music)

The legacy of the siege is not confined to museums.

It has left its mark everywhere in Vienna.

And stories surrounding the battle have come to define

the city's character in many ways.

One legend claims that while Hussars were ransacking

the Ottoman encampment, they came across a curious cache.

Sacks filled with small bean-like pellets.

Little did they realize it was coffee.

As a result, Vienna opened its first coffee house,

using the very coffee discovered in the Ottoman encampment.

Another legend holds that those baker boys

who saved Vienna devised a commemorative cake

to celebrate the victory.

Designed to mock the Ottoman emblem,

the cake was crescent shaped.

Thereby giving birth to the croissant.

A century later, the love of cake would be introduced

to France by the Hapsburg princess, Marie Antoinette.

And the rest is history.

(speaks foreign language)

Fantastic, great.

Hm, jolly good.

Well, if local legend is to be believed,

the enduring legacy of the Battle of Vienna

is the continental breakfast.

We have the coffee,

and the croissant.

(celebratory bells ring)

The Ottoman failure to take Vienna knocked a turning point

to the fortunes of both Austria and the Ottoman Empire.

As the Hapsburg new capital, Vienna entered

an imperial and cultural golden age.

(lout trumpeting music)

While the city celebrated its fortunes with evermore

grandiose buildings and monuments,

the Ottomans it seemed, had hit a wall.

And for a brief period, Europe seemed united

in its determination to rid the continent

of the dastardly Turk.

In 1686, European forces retook Buda and by the beginning

of the 18th century, regained most of Hungary.

- It was awareness within the Ottoman state that they

would no longer were ahead of everybody.

Maybe they were even falling behind.

Maybe their military systems were a bit passe.

- The pendulum is starting to swing back the other way.

And so there's a feeling that the Ottoman threat

is starting to recede.

- The Ottoman Empire had reached the geographic limits

of their expansion.

- [Host] The tables appeared to have turned

in Europe's favor.

But the conflict was far from over.

The Ottomans were still a formidable force.

No one however could have foreseen the unlikely alliance

they would forge with western Europe.

In the face of a new menace, rising in the east.

In the third and last episode, we follow

the Ottoman Empire's final centuries.

A period defined by a desperate power stuggle

with czarist Russia.

(fast-paced instrumental music)