Petru Aron, Iancu de Hunedoara şi Mehmed al II-lea în ajunul bătăliei de la Belgrad: informaţii dintr-un „raport veneţian de sinteză” de la sfârşitul lunii aprilie 1456

On 28 April 1456, an unknown Venetian scribe authored a “synthesis” of the main reports that had reached the Republic of Saint Mark and of the main events that had occurred in the Laguna over the past couple of days. The report was sent to Zuan Canal, the son of commander and diplomat, including at Murad II’s court, Niccolò, and the castellan of the Garzetta at the gates of Venetian Brescia, at the border with the Duchy of Milan (the report was intercepted and copied by the former mortal enemies of the Serenissima, thus surviving in the State Archives of Milan). Redacted under the impact of the recent arrest of the Venetian bailo in Constantinople, Bartolomeo Marcello, accused of secret dealings with Sultan Mehmed II, the “synthesis” featured prominently a – verified/ “vetted” – information regarding Moldavia. Following an Ottoman raid on Mytilene, the centre of Lesbos, the sultan had sent a Gattilusio lady (either the daughter of the recently deceased Dorino I or the offspring of his son and successor Domenico) to Peter Aaron, the contested lord of Moldavia, who had recently agreed to pay tribute to Mehmed. The “matrimonial gift” was intended to strengthen Mehmed’s influence over Moldavia, for the sultan made ready to attack the Kingdom of Hungary at Belgrade, as John Hunyadi had already been informed – via Ragusa (on 15 April 1456) – by the said Bartolomeo Marcello. The complexities encompassed by this bundle of information are rather self-evident and speak of the highly volatile nature of the years that followed the fall of Byzantium. The present paper attempts to survey the implications of the edited and unedited coeval records.