Battle of Lepanto

The Battle of Lepanto was a naval battle fought on 7 October 1571 in the Gulf of Patras, off western Greece, between the fleet of the Holy League, an alliance of Catholic states, and the fleet of the Ottoman Empire. The allies won an overwhelming victory, destroying or capturing most of the Ottoman galleys. It was one of the largest naval battles in European history and the last great battle fought mainly between oared warships.

In 1570 the Ottoman sultan Selim II invaded Cyprus, then a colony of the Republic of Venice. Nicosia fell that year, and the fortress of Famagusta surrendered on 1 August 1571 after a long siege; its Venetian commander, Marco Antonio Bragadin, was then put to death. Pope Pius V had meanwhile assembled the Holy League. Its main members were Venice, the Spain of Philip II with its Italian territories, the Papal States and Genoa, together with several smaller Italian states and the Knights of Malta. Command went to Don John of Austria, Philip's young half-brother.

The allied fleet gathered at Messina in Sicily and sailed east in September. It had over 200 galleys, more than half of them Venetian, and six galleasses, large Venetian galleys carrying heavy guns, along with some 30,000 soldiers. The Ottoman fleet under the admiral Ali Pasha, based at Lepanto (today Nafpaktos), was of similar or slightly larger size, with more than 200 galleys and many smaller vessels. Both sides were looking for battle, and the fleets met at the entrance to the gulf on the morning of 7 October.

The galleasses, placed ahead of the allied line, opened fire as the Ottoman galleys approached and broke up their formation. On the northern wing, near the shore, the Venetians under Agostino Barbarigo, who was mortally wounded, pressed the Ottoman right against the coast and destroyed it. In the centre, Ali Pasha's flagship rammed Don John's, and fierce hand-to-hand fighting followed between Spanish infantry and Janissaries. With help from neighbouring galleys, the allies took the Ottoman flagship and killed Ali Pasha. On the southern wing, the Algerian corsair Uluç Ali outmanoeuvred the Genoese commander Giovanni Andrea Doria and captured several galleys, but when the centre collapsed he escaped with part of his squadron. Among the wounded on the allied side was the young Miguel de Cervantes, who lost the use of his left hand.

Figures vary between sources. The Holy League lost perhaps 7,500 to 10,000 dead and only a handful of galleys. Ottoman losses were far heavier, with estimates of 20,000 or more killed and around 200 galleys sunk or captured. Many thousands of Christian galley slaves rowing in the Ottoman ships were freed.

The victory caused great celebration across Catholic Europe and became a powerful symbol, commemorated in paintings, poems and the Catholic feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. Its practical effects were more limited. The Ottomans rebuilt their fleet within about a year, and the League soon broke apart after the death of Pius V in 1572. In March 1573 Venice made a separate peace, recognising the loss of Cyprus and paying an indemnity. Even so, the loss of so many experienced crews was hard to replace, and Ottoman naval initiative declined sharply after about 1580.

Our 1600 map shows the Mediterranean after the war, with Cyprus inside the Ottoman Empire and the Spanish Empire holding southern Italy and Sicily.