page_title: Ottoman Serbia
section_title: Wars for Serbia (1389–1540)
hierarchical_section_title: Ottoman Serbia / History / Wars for Serbia (1389–1540)
context_page_description: The territory of what is now the Republic of Serbia was part of the Ottoman Empire throughout the Early Modern period, especially Central Serbia, unlike Vojvodina which has passed to Habsburg rule starting from the end of the 17th century.
  Ottoman culture significantly influenced the region, in architecture, cuisine, language, and dress, especially in arts, and Islam.
  In the 14th and 15th centuries, the Serbian Despotate was subdued by the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. The Ottomans defeated the Serbs at the Battle of Maritsa in 1371, making vassals of the southern governors. Soon thereafter, Serbian Emperor Stefan Uroš V died; as he was childless and the nobility could not agree on the rightful heir, the Empire was subsequently ruled by semi-independent provincial lords, who often were in feuds with each other. The most powerful of these, Lazar of Serbia, the Duke of a region now encompassing present-day central Serbia and that had not yet fallen under Ottoman rule, stood against the Ottomans at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. The outcome of the battle was indecisive, but Serbia did eventually fall to the Ottomans.
context_section_description: The Turks defeated the Serbian army in one crucial battle: on the banks of the river Maritsa in 1371, where the forces of Vukašin and Jovan Uglješa Mrnjavčević from today's Northern Macedonia were defeated, destroying any hope for a reunified Serbian Empire. From then on, Serbian state was on the defensive, and this war culminated in the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. This battle pitted Lazar of Serbia, Vuk Branković, and Vlatko Vuković against the best troops of Sultan Murad I. Both Sultan Murad I and Prince Lazar lost their lives in this battle, which ended in an inconclusive bloodbath.
  The Battle of Kosovo defined the long-term fate of Serbia, because now it had no force capable of standing up to the Turks directly. This was an unstable period marked by the rule of Prince Lazar's son — despot Stefan Lazarević — a true European-style knight, a military leader, and a poet. Stefan was at first a vassal of Bayezid, distinguishing himself in Nicopolis in 1396 and Ankara in 1402, later gaining independence after the loss of Sultan Bayezid I. His cousin and heir Đurađ Branković moved the capital to the newly built fortified town of Smederevo. The Turks continued their conquest until they finally seized all of northern Serbian territory in 1459 when Smederevo fell into their hands. The only free Serbian territories were parts of Bosnia and Zeta. After the fall of Principality of Zeta in 1496, Serbia was ruled by the Ottoman Empire for almost three centuries. A Serbian principality under Hungarian protection was created after the fall of the Serbian Despotate by the Branković family (later other Serbian noblemen assumed the throne) in what is now Vojvodina, Slavonia, and Bosnia. The subordinate state spent its entirety fighting the Ottomans and represented the heritage of what was left of the Serbian Kingdom. It fell in 1540 when the Ottoman conquest of the Serbian lands, which lasted about 200 years of continuous warfare, was finally complete.
caption: Kosovka devojka (The Kosovo Maiden), a picture by Uroš Predić
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