Hungary has built up an expensive but…

Hungary has built up an expensive but obsolete army, structured similarly to that of King Francis I at the Battle of Pavia mostly reliant on old fashioned heavily armored knights on armored horses (gendarme knights).

The Hungarian line consists of two lines, the first with a center of mercenary infantry and artillery and the majority of the cavalry on either flank.

The second line is a mix of levy infantry and cavalry.

The Ottoman army is a more modern force built around the elite, musket-armed Janissaries, and artillery.

The rest of the army consists of feudal Timari cavalry and conscripted levies from Rumelia and the Balkans.

Like the uncertainty over the number of actual combatants, there is debate over the length of the battle.

Its starting time is generally placed between 1:00 PM and 2:00 PM, but the endpoint is difficult to ascertain.

As the first of Suleiman's troops, the Rumelian army, advance onto the battlefield, they are attacked and routed by Hungarian troops led by Pál Tomori.

This attack by the Hungarian right is successful in causing considerable chaos among the irregular Ottoman troops, but even as the Hungarian attack presses forward, the Ottomans rally with the arrival of Ottoman regulars deployed from the reserves.

While the Hungarian right advances far enough at one time to place Suleiman in danger from Hungarian arrows that strike his cuirass, the superiority of the Ottoman regulars and the timely charge of the Janissaries, the elite troops of the Ottomans, probably overwhelms the attackers, particularly on the Hungarian left.

The Hungarians take serious casualties from the skillfully handled Turkish artillery and musket volleys.

The Hungarians cannot hold their positions, and those who do not flee are surrounded and killed or captured.

The result us a disaster, with the Hungarians advancing into withering fire and flank attacks.

The king leaves the battlefield sometime around twilight but is thrown from his horse in a river at Csele and dies, weighed down by his heavy armor.

Some one thousand other Hungarian nobles and leaders are killed also.

It is generally accepted that more than fourteen thousand Hungarian soldiers were killed in the initial battle.

The Ottoman army does not retreat from the field and enter camp after the battle; instead, they remain on the field all night without food, water, or shelter.

Given that the Ottoman historians all note that it was raining, it seems likely that had the battle been short and ended early in the afternoon, by 5:00 PM at the latest, when the Sultan would have ordered his army to camp or at least to return to their baggage.

The few reliable sources indicate that Louis left the field at twilight and made his escape under cover of darkness; since the sun would not have set until 6:27 PM on August 29, 1526, this would imply that the battle lasted significantly longer than two to three hours (perhaps as long as four or five).