The “Battle of Ujëbardhë” took place, a battle of the Ottoman army under the command of Isa bey Evrenoz and the Albanian soldiers led by Skanderbeg. After the battle of Berat in 1455, the internal political situation of Albania worsened temporarily. The annihilation of Muzak Topia’s forces in Berat caused shock and fear among some Albanian nobles, some of whom also went over to the Ottoman side, as was the case of Moisi Golem (Arianite) and Skanderbeg’s nephew, Hamza Kastriot. In July 1457, a powerful Ottoman army entered the Albanian lands (for which the sources of the time give an exaggerated number of 80 thousand people) under the command of Isa bey Evrenoz, who had just acquired a very special position administrative for the direct control of the eastern and northern peripheral regions of the territories which were under the control of Skanderbeg and other Albanian nobles. In this campaign he was accompanied by Hamza Kastrioti, who was a very good connoisseur of the Albanian army and its martial art. On September 2, 1457, when the Ottoman soldiers were resting carelessly in the field of Ujëbardha, near Mamurras, Skanderbeg, after quickly gathering and organizing his forces, suddenly struck the enemy army in several directions. Occurring in the midday sleep, without weapons and with unsaddled horses, the Ottoman troops suffered a complete disaster. Most of them were killed and captured by the Albanians. The victory surprised the contemporaries, who wrote in those days that “Skanderbeg with a handful of soldiers broke, defeated and crushed an immense army of Turks”. Among the many captives was Hamza Kastrioti, whom Skanderbeg put in Italian prisons and later allowed to go to live in Turkey. The victory in the battle of Ujëbardha had numerous positive political and military consequences in Albania. It influenced the strengthening of Skanderbeg‘s political power over all the free Albanian provinces. (In the photo: Engraving of an Albanian attack on the Turkish camp, during the battle.)
Text: The history of the Albanian people – Vol. I , Academy of Sciences of Albania, “Toena“, Tirana, 2002, page 420-421.
Graphic processing: AHCF
