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The remains of the Martyrs in the Cattedrale di Santa Maria Annunciata
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As Americans prepare to reaffirm their vow to "Never forget" the heinous attacks of September 11, 2001, we recall the horrifying assault on our ancestral homeland and it's valiant reconquest.
On September 10, 1481 a Neapolitan army under Duke Alfonso of Calabria with his Hungarian allies recovered the city of Otranto from the Ottoman Turks. A year earlier the city had fallen to the invaders in a bloodbath of wanton cruelty in their overambitious attempt to reduce the Italian peninsula into a Muslim Caliphate. The rampaging Turks sacked the city and pillaged the surrounding region. None escaped their wrath: Priests were murdered, nuns were raped, elderly were slain, and the women and children were sold into slavery. The surviving men were offered a chance to convert to Islam, but to a man the eight captives refused. They were butchered en masse.
On September 10, 1481 a Neapolitan army under Duke Alfonso of Calabria with his Hungarian allies recovered the city of Otranto from the Ottoman Turks. A year earlier the city had fallen to the invaders in a bloodbath of wanton cruelty in their overambitious attempt to reduce the Italian peninsula into a Muslim Caliphate. The rampaging Turks sacked the city and pillaged the surrounding region. None escaped their wrath: Priests were murdered, nuns were raped, elderly were slain, and the women and children were sold into slavery. The surviving men were offered a chance to convert to Islam, but to a man the eight captives refused. They were butchered en masse.
If not for the timely demise of the Turkish Sultan Mehemt the Conqueror in 1481, and the subsequent withdrawal of the Ottoman commander Pasha Ahmet with the bulk of his forces into Albania, the Italian peninsular could have suffered the same cruel fate as the Balkans.The remaining Ottoman garrison of about 2,000 soldiers were to hold Otranto until Pasha Ahmet returned with reinforcements. However, Duke Alfonso at the head of the Holy League retook Otranto by force, slaughtering the invaders and destroying their beachhead in the Kingdom of Naples. Fittingly, Pasha Ahmet was recalled to Istanbul (Constantinople) and executed by the new Sultan.
Today we remember Duke Alfonso and the brave men who saved Southern Italy from the yoke of Ottoman oppression. To be sure, Southern Italy continued to fall prey to rapacious Muslim corsairs over the centuries, suffering unknown losses, but the threat of a full blown invasion by the Turks was no longer a possibility.
