First things first - DON'T MIND ME! Whatever I call it, it's the River Raab not the River 'Raba'. I think the phlegm has moved into my brain!

In our latest episode examines the moment when Kara Mustafa finally did it. Overcoming the expectations and assumptions of the high command of the Habsburgs in their Vienna seclusion, the Ottomans outmanoeuvred Charles of Lorraine completely, heading due north-west, crossing the River Raab, bypassing Gyor and utterly flummoxing the Habsburg family. As Leopold and his entourage fled the city on 7th July 1683, a Turkish storm was coming. 

Thanks to procrastination, misinformation, internal division, arrogance and ignorance, the greatest threat to the Holy Roman Empire was marching virtually unopposed towards the Golden Apple. Only time would tell if Kara Mustafa’s attempt to take the city would be as terrifyingly unstoppable as his march across the Hungarian plains had been, but the odds certainly did not look to be in the favour of Vienna’s residents, who now took up shovels for the long, arduous test ahead. 

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