Byzantine Battles: Capture of Adrianople

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Capture of Adrianople	year: 1369
The Ottomans captured the city and settled permanently and oficially in the Balkans	★ ★ ★ ★ ★

enemy: Ottoman Turks	location: Adrianople (modern Edirne, Turkey) in Eastern Thrace near the borders with Greece and Europe.	accuracy: ●●●●●
battle type: City Capture	war: Byzantine-Ottoman Wars	modern country: Turkey

	▼ The Byzantines(emperor: John V Palaiologos)	▼ The Enemies
Commander:	Unknown	Lala Shahin Pasha
Forces:	Unknown	Unknown
Losses:

Background story:

The Ottoman Turks took Gallipoli after an earthquake in 1354. It was their first stronghold in Europe and it became a springboard for raids in Thrace against the Byzantines and Bulgarians.
Most of eastern Thrace was overrun by Ottoman forces within a decade and permanently brought under Orhan's control by means of heavy colonization. The initial Thracian conquests gave to the Ottomans the strategic control of all of the major overland communication routes linking Constantinople to the West, facilitating their expanded military operations. Byzantium was cut from any of its potential allies in the Balkans or in Western Europe.
Byzantine Emperor John V Palaiologos was forced to sign an unfavorable treaty with Orhan I in 1356 that recognized his Thracian losses.
In 1360 Orhan I died and Murad I became Sultan. Murad’s first major objective was Adrianople, the most important Byzantine military, administrative, and economic center in Thrace.

The Battle:

Adrianople

Murad I organized a campaign in Europe sending Lala Shahin Pasha into Thrace. Lala Shahin became the first Beylerbey of Rumelia. He captured Dydimoteichon (Demotika) in 1360 and in 1369 defeated a weak Byzantine army outside Adrianople after which the city surrendered.
The Ottoman capital moved from Bursa to Didymoteichon first and later to Adrianople which remained the capital until the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

Noteworthy:

Before, most Europeans regarded the Ottoman presence in Thrace as merely the latest episode in the endless barbarian raids in the Balkans. After Murad moved his capital there (first Dydimoteichon, then Adrianople), they realized that the Ottomans were there to stay.

Aftermath:

The capture of the city was not the result of a historic battle or a long siege. But it was a milestone. Murad then defeated the Serbs, and Turkish rule was established in the Balkans for the next 500 years.