The Battle of Prague, 1129
The Battle of Prague is a story that begins a couple of years before it took place. The Poles, defended only by the Catholic church's threat of excommunication if attacked, had sneaked in a small army to scavenge and pillage Bohemia under a captain by the name of Miron. This had not gone unnoticed in Magdeburg. Lord Theodericus der Bartige, margrave of Brandenburg-Bohemia, had sent a messenger to his general Harold Merode, who was then travelling through Bohemia, to take the garrison of Prague and chase out the Poles. It was thus a surprise when he instead, in the closing of the season, showed up at the gates of Magdeburg. Apparently, the message never got to him - the messenger presumably dead, either by bandits or intercepted by Poles.
As a result, the Polish captain Miron was able to get reinforcements and lay siege to Prague.
This time margrave Theodericus der Bartige went with the wisdom of "if you want something done right, you will have to do it yourself", and so leaving a small garrison for Harold Merode to command in defence of Magdeburg, he set out with the majority of his army to take care of this threat. However, realizing that he could not get his infantry to Prague quick enough to avoid any risk of an assault, he took his cavalry regiments and moved out ahead of them and forced captain Miron to battle.
The battle itself was mostly memorable to the soldiers themselves. Theodericus immediately saw that he had the ability not only to get the high ground, but by doing so also come at the Poles from two opposing sides. With superior numbers, this battle was thus over before it began. Still, it took some good and brave fighting by his cavalry to win the day.
In the end, captain Miron was dead, his men either scattered or captured (and later executed) and Prague was saved.
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