What the Ottoman Empire saw pulling up to Ankara in 1402 after Bayezid got a little too brave in the diplomatic group chat.
Sultan Bayezid I — "the Thunderbolt" — was on a winning streak. He’d conquered most of Anatolia and the Balkans, crushed the Crusaders at Nicopolis, and was besieging Constantinople. Then Timur (Tamerlane) showed up, and Bayezid made the mistake of treating him like just another rival.
Timur’s army pulled up to Ankara with war elephants, Mongol horse archers, and a grudge. Bayezid’s troops — many of whom were from recently conquered Anatolian beyliks — defected mid-battle when they saw their former lords fighting for Timur.
The result: Bayezid was captured, carried around in a cage (probably apocryphal but great imagery), and the Ottoman Empire went into a decade-long civil war called the Ottoman Interregnum.
Moral of the story: don’t get too brave in the diplomatic group chat when Tamerlane is on the other side.
Gorgocutie says: Bayezid learned the hard way that there is always a bigger fish. And that fish has war elephants.
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