Morean War | |||||||||
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Part of the Great Turkish War and the Ottoman–Venetian Wars | |||||||||
Medal commemorating the Venetian victories in the Morean War, struck by Georg Hautsch in Nuremberg in 1687. It shows the main Venetian commanders (Francesco Morosini, Otto Wilhelm Königsmarck, Girolamo Cornaro) on the obverse, and the main fortresses captured by the Venetians on the reverse. | |||||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||||
Republic of Venice Knights of Malta Duchy of Savoy Papal States Knights of St. Stephen Greek rebels Montenegrin volunteers Mani Morlachs Military support: Holy Roman Empire |
Ottoman Empire | ||||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
Francesco Morosini Girolamo Cornaro Hannibal von Degenfeld Otto Wilhelm Königsmarck Stojan Janković † Bajo Pivljanin † Pavlos Makris Limberakis Gerakaris (Early 1696 until Late 1696) |
Mehmed IV Suleiman II Ahmed II Ismail Pasha Mahmud Pasha Mezzo Morto Limberakis Gerakaris (1688 until Early 1696) |
The Morean war (Italian: Guerra di Morea), also known as the Sixth Ottoman–Venetian War, was fought between 1684–1699 as part of the wider conflict known as the "Great Turkish War", between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire. Military operations ranged from Dalmatia to the Aegean Sea, but the war's major campaign was the Venetian conquest of the Morea (Peloponnese) peninsula in southern Greece. On the Venetian side, the war was fought to avenge the loss of Crete in the Cretan War (1645–1669). It happened while the Ottomans were entangled in their northern struggle against the Habsburgs – beginning with the failed Ottoman attempt to conquer Vienna and ending with the Habsburgs gaining Buda and the whole of Hungary, leaving the Ottoman Empire unable to concentrate its forces against the Venetians. As such, the Morean War was the only Ottoman–Venetian conflict from which Venice emerged victorious, gaining significant territory. Venice's expansionist revival would be short-lived, as its gains would be reversed by the Ottomans in 1718.