Battle of Balansiyah

The Battle of Balansiyah (Valencia) took place on 23 September 1443 near Balansiyah, which had previously been besieged by the Imperial armies for 11 days. It was the largest and the last battle of the Andalusian Crusade.

Background
Upon receiving word that Caliph Muhammad VII was still marching his army northwards, Francis I Carolingian, Holy Roman Emperor agreed with his advisors that there was sufficient time to capture the strategically important city of Balansiyah. Knowing that the defenders were significantly outnumbered, the Frankish forces had hoped to force them out of the city within a week, by which point Caliph Muhammad would be close to the Crusaders' formation. Balansiyah was besieged for eleven days by the Imperial Army, with the Frankish vanguard already beginning to exploit the crumbling city walls for openings.

Battle
On the morning of the 23rd of September 1443, Italian scouts reported a large Andalusian army approaching from the south. Word never reached the Imperial Army as most of the Italian rear guard quickly withdrew, leaving an unprepared force of Iberian Christians and German Landsknecht to cover defence.

Caliph Muhammad VII's army crested some nearby hills to the sight of Italian mercenaries slipping off in the opposite direction. Seeing the Crusaders exposed, his cavalry broke into full gallop, catching the Imperial forces unaware. Most of the German soldiers were run down or forced into the Frankish lines, though for a time the Iberians held their ground in isolated pockets. The Franks themselves were quickly packed closely together as the Andalusian cavalry continued charging in waves.

When Emperor Francis I was made aware of the Andalusian counterattack, he ordered Prince Philip to take command of the rear guard and reorganise the backlines. Within half an hour, the Frankish army had regained its organisation and began taking appropriate measures to counter the mobility of Andalusia's cavalrymen. A final Andalusian charge was made at mid-day, though Frankish pikemen proved competent enough to hold them off sufficiently.

Muhammad VII's infantry force then proceeded to advance from the south-west. While Frankish cavalry may have been effective at running down the lightly-armoured Andalusian infantry, Emperor Francis recognised that any mobile advantage would be nullified by attempts at heading uphill. He instead split the Frankish Knights off from his own retinue to better cover the rear guard and Prince Philip.

Andalusia's archers shortly thereafter got into range and launched numerous volleys of arrows upon the besieging army, heavily impacting morale among the Frankish light infantry, who lacked the excellent protection of their aristocratic counterparts. This was followed by an infantry charge into the west flank of the Frankish formation, which had already started to buckle under the earlier cavalry onslaught and hail of projectiles. A gruesome then took place, in which a significant number of light infantry and skirmishers on both sides took tremendous losses.

Francis I, still leading his army's vanguard, broke off more of his retinue out of concern that his only heir may be lost in an Andalusian charge. Noticing that the Holy Roman Emperor's guard was thoroughly reduced by this point, a wing of Andalusian shock cavalry veered off from their formation and charged directly at the Emperor. At the same time, the defenders of Balansiyah had started to sally out in the hope that they could encircle or drive a wedge into the Franks. Such an opportunity came at the point when the Andalusian shock cavalry's charge was slowed down by the Emperor's elite pikemen, a unit comprised of elite Swiss volunteers under the Papacy's employ.

With the pikemen busy holding off Muhammad VII's cavalry, the defenders of Balansiyah brought their own cataphracts into a brief charge, slamming into the already-embattled retinue of Francis I. The Emperor is at this point believed to have been unhorsed by a lance or javelin, and entered into a square formation with his remaining knights and pikemen on foot. It is debated over who managed to slay Emperor Francis, though a cataphract charge from Caliph Muhammad VII's own royal guard split the Frankish vanguard from the rest of the army. It is believed that in the late afternoon, Francis I was either the last man standing in his formation, having been cut down en masse by the encircling cavalry, or fell alone from his numerous wounds after forcing his way to Caliph Muhammad's own retinue.

Regardless of how Emperor Francis I was felled, Caliph Muhammad VII's men proceeded to spread word across the battlefield that the Emperor was dead. The levies and Germans proceeded to flee at this point, though Prince Philip and his knights resolved to bring the Emperor's remains back to Francia for a state burial in Aachen. The Crown Prince is believed to have led the Frankish cavalry in a charge towards where Francis I's royal standard was still being flown, having been planted firmly in the ground the night before. In the late afternoon, Prince Philip is said to have retrieved his father's remains and standard, only for an Andalusian nobleman to charge on horseback from behind and run the young Prince through with a spear before being impaled by the Frankish knights himself.

With the death of both the Emperor and Crown Prince, the Frankish cavalry made an attempt to retrieve the Carolingians' remains, but Andalusian harrassment forced the knights to retreat with just the war chest and imperial standard. In a highly controversial move amongst the Andalusian court, Caliph Muhammad VII ordered his men to take prisoners, and not to pursue the fleeing Imperial army. Though hated by the nobility for this decision, it can be argued that Muhammad VII recognised the Andalusian losses were nearly as heavy as the Franks', and so wished to reduce further deaths.

Aftermath
The aftermath of the Battle of Balansiyah saw a tremendous aftershock ripple through Europe. The deaths of not only Emperor Francis I, but also his only male heir, Crown Prince Philip of Francia, would see the last surviving male Carolingian, widely hated Prince Lothair the Cruel, placed on the Frankish and Holy Roman thrones. The losses endured over the campaign - particularly by the nobility - had taken their toll on the Frankish treasury, as a large number of loyal, taxpaying feudal lords were left to be ransomed off to the Holy Roman Empire alongside the remains of the late Emperor and Crown Prince.

The depletion of manpower and funding on both sides saw a noticeable economic hit, as a large number of men who would have otherwise worked the fields had been slain either in the battle, or from heatstroke and exhaustion during the route. In particular, so few men returned to the Christian Iberian kingdoms following the Battle of Balansiyah that for several months it was feared that famine would begin to take hold, though this was ultimately averted following the slaughter of livestock.

The Treaty of Barcelona, which was signed by representatives of the Imperial Court in Aachen and the Caliphate on the 2nd of October 1443, provided even greater sources of controversy and outrage. On one hand, the Andalusians believed that the treaty was too fair on the Franks due to the lack of territorial exchanges. On the other, the Frankish nobility were furious that the Imperial representatives, hand-picked by incumbent Emperor Lothair, agreed to a one-off reparations payment, but not to ransom off the remains of the late Emperor and Crown Prince. The remains of the dead nobility and monarchs were, however, exchanged on the 24th of December 1443 after Emperor Lothair pried a large jewel from the Reichskrone as a bribe.

Furthermore, relations between the Holy Roman realms was severely impacted by the battle. Both the Germans and Franks saw the Italian mercenaries as cowardly, weak, and perfidious, whilst the Italians began to view the Germans and Franks as dull and vainglorious. Venice, which had sent the bulk of the Italian mercenaries to the Franks, was embargoed by the Holy Roman Empire until they repaid what the Franks had lost due to the reparation agreement with Andalusia.