The 1546siege of Diu, also known as thesecond siege of Diu[a] was conducted by joint forces of theOttoman Empire andGujarat Sultanate against thePortuguese Indian city ofDiu. It ended with a major Portuguese victory.
At the beginning of the 16th century, the MuslimSultanate of Gujarat was the principal seapower in India. Gujarat fought the Portuguese fleets in collaboration with theMamluk Sultanate. The Portuguese were defeated by a combined Mamluk-Gujarati fleet in 1508, which was in turn destroyed by a Portuguese fleet in theBattle of Diu (1509).
The Portuguese again attempted tocapture the city in 1531. While the Ottoman-Gujarati defenders successfully withstood the siege, victory was short-lived. In 1535Sultan Bahadur of Gujarat concluded a peace treaty with the Portuguese, allowing them to build a fort at Diu. By 1536, the Portuguese had gained complete control of Diu, while the Sultanate of Gujarat was under attack from theMughals.[6]
After the failed first siege of 1538, the Gujarati General Khadjar Safar besieged Diu again in an attempt to recapture the island. The siege lasted seven months from 20 April 1546 to 10 November 1546, during which João de Mascarenhas defended Diu.[7]
A large fleet dispatched bySuleiman would also arrive in Diu and help in the struggle against the Portuguese defenders.[1][5]
The siege ended when a Portuguese fleet under GovernorJoão de Castro arrived and routed the attackers.[7]
Khadjar Safar and his son Muharram Rumi Khan (who were probably of Albanian origin[citation needed][relevant?]) were both killed during the siege.[8]
Siege of Diu (1538) – The "first siege", so called as the first successful Portuguese defence of Diu against a Gujarati-Ottoman attempt to recapture Diu
Siege of Diu (1531) – The earlier siege in which Gujarati and Ottoman forces succeeded in defending the city against Portuguese besiegers
^abTwo earlier sieges of Diu occurred. The 1546 siege is traditionally referred to as thesecond, not third,siege of Diu: this follows the terminology of early historiography that counts only the two successful Portuguese defences of Diu in assigning ordinal titles to the sieges. The 1538 siege is known as the "first". The siege prior to 1538 – in 1531 – was conducted by the Portuguese against Gujarati-Ottoman defenders, who withstood the attack.[9][10]
^abTony Jaques, ed. (2007).Dictionary of Battles and Sieges: A Guide to 8,500 Battles from Antiquity Through the Twenty-first Century. Vol. 1 (A–E). Greenwood. p. 304.ISBN978-0-313-33537-2.
^Antunes, Luís Frederico (2009)."Diu". In Alexandra Pelúcia (ed.).Enciclopédia Virtual da Expansão Portuguesa (Séculos XV–XVIII) [Encyclopaedia of Portuguese Expansion (15th–18th centuries)] (in English and Portuguese). Lisbon: CHAM.ISBN978-989-8492-38-8.
