Renaissance · Middle East · War

1645

Venetians Besiege Ottoman Crete

1645

Ottoman forces landed on Crete and began a siege of the Venetian fortress of Candia that would drag on for twenty-one years, the longest siege in history. Venetian galleys blockaded, Turkish sappers tunneled, and the garrison slowly starved behind walls that crumbled and were rebuilt in an agonizing loop of endurance.