Today in History, September 12th
On September 12, 1683, a relief army under John III Sobieski broke the Ottoman siege of Vienna. Plus Lascaux's discovery and Mae Jemison's flight.
Published · Last updated
September 12 is best known for 1683, when a relief army that included Poland’s King John III Sobieski broke the Ottoman siege of Vienna. The date also saw teenagers discover the Lascaux cave paintings in France in 1940 and Mae Jemison become the first African American woman in space in 1992.
The big story: The Siege of Vienna is broken (1683)
In July 1683, an Ottoman army of roughly 150,000 men under the grand vizier Kara Mustafa surrounded Vienna, home of Emperor Leopold I. Leopold fled the city. Help was slow to come together. Pope Innocent XI could not get France’s Louis XIV to join, but he sent money to Poland and coaxed reluctant allies into one force. By September, about 80,000 troops had gathered, including the army of Poland’s King John III Sobieski, imperial forces under Charles of Lorraine, and soldiers from Saxony, Bavaria and dozens of German princes. On September 12, 1683, they attacked at dawn. After roughly 15 hours of fighting, the Ottomans were driven from their siege lines and their camp was overrun. Kara Mustafa got away, but thousands of his men were killed or captured, and it reportedly took about a week to haul off everything left behind. Britannica calls the lifted siege the start of the end of Ottoman dominance in eastern Europe.
More events on September 12
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1846 | Poets Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning married in secret. A week later they left for Pisa, Italy. |
| 1919 | Italian nationalist poet Gabriele D’Annunzio led an occupation of the port city of Fiume, now Rijeka, Croatia. |
| 1940 | Four teenage boys discovered the Lascaux caves in France’s Dordogne region, with their prehistoric paintings and engravings of animals. |
| 1943 | German commandos freed Benito Mussolini from captivity and flew him to Munich. |
| 1953 | Senator John F. Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier in Newport, Rhode Island. |
| 1959 | The Soviet Union launched Luna 2, the first space probe to hit the Moon. |
| 1974 | Ethiopia’s Emperor Haile Selassie was deposed by the Derg, a committee of revolutionary soldiers. |
| 1974 | Protests against court-ordered school busing in Boston turned violent on the first day of classes. |
| 1977 | South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko died of injuries he suffered in police custody. |
| 1992 | Astronaut Mae Jemison became the first African American woman in space, aboard the space shuttle Endeavour. |
| 2000 | The Dutch parliament passed a law allowing same-sex couples to marry. When it took effect in 2001, the Netherlands became the first country to legalize same-sex marriage. |
| 2003 | Country music star Johnny Cash died at 71. |
Born on September 12
- 1818: Richard Gatling, American inventor of the hand-cranked, multi-barrel Gatling gun, born in Maney’s Neck, North Carolina.
- 1913: Jesse Owens, American track star who won four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, born in Oakville, Alabama.
- 1980: Yao Ming, Chinese basketball player and Houston Rockets star, born in Shanghai.
Sources
- Siege of Vienna (1683), Encyclopaedia Britannica
- On This Day: September 12, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- This Day in History: September 12, History.com
- Robert Browning, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Richard Jordan Gatling, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Jesse Owens, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Yao Ming, Encyclopaedia Britannica
