Serbian manpower was depleted and had no capacity to field large armies against future Ottoman campaigns, which relied on new reserve forces from Anatolia.

Vidovdan is celebrated on June 28 and is an important Serbian national and religious holiday as a memorial day for the Battle of Kosovo.

[13] Prince Lazar, ruler of the northern part of the former empire (of Moravian Serbia), was aware of the Ottoman threat and began diplomatic and military preparations for a campaign against them.

Though longer than the alternative route through Sofia and the Nišava Valley, this led the Ottoman forces to Kosovo, one of the most important crossroads in the Balkans.

Having stayed in Kratovo for a time, Murad and his troops marched through Kumanovo, Preševo, and Gjilan to Pristina, where he arrived on June 14.

Contemporary sources are written from widely diverging points of view and not much is discussed in them about battle tactics, army size and other battleground details.

[17] According to historian Noel Malcolm, Ottoman writers were most likely eager to build up the size and significance of Lazar's army, which they described as vastly outnumbering Murat's, in order to add to the glory of the "Turkish victory".

In comparison, in the battle of Agincourt (1415) even by assuming the higher estimate of army size as correct, around 10,000 fewer soldiers were engaged.

[35][36][37] According to historian Dejan Djokić, it is improbable that Lazar commanded a broad coalition composed of Albanians, Bulgarians, Czechs, Hungarians, Germans and Vlachs, in addition to his and Vuk Branković’s armies and reinforcements from Bosnia.

[39] A group of crusaders linked to the Knights of Rhodes, led by John of Palisna, has been suggested as participants on Lazar's side by Croatian historian Neven Budak, who quotes in the Italian Chronicles Annales Forolivienses, "Domino Johanne Banno cum Crucesignatis" (Ban John with those marked by a cross).

[43] Based on Neşri's account, Đurađ II Balšić has also been linked to the Christian coalition which fought in the battle of Kosovo.

The hypothesis about his participation is considered to be "almost entirely false" as he had become an Ottoman vassal; he was in hostility with Lazar's ally Tvrtko I; and at the time of the battle he was most likely in Ulcinj.

[44][45] The wings were fortified with around 1,000 archers, while the Janissaries held the central position, supported by Murad and his cavalry guard standing behind them.

Both flanks still held, with Vuković's Bosnian troops drifting toward the center to compensate for the heavy losses inflicted on the Serbian infantry.

In popular oral tradition, however, Branković is said to have fled and betrayed Lazar, a theory which was first presented by the writer Mavro Orbini in a 1601 work but is largely seen as unfounded.

[50][51][52] Sometime after Branković's retreat from the battle, the remaining Bosnian and Serb forces yielded the field, believing that a victory was no longer possible.

Not much attention was paid to the outcome in these early rumors which circulated, but they all focused on the fact that the Ottoman Sultan had been killed in the battle.

Some of the earliest reports about the battle come from the court of Tvrtko of Bosnia who in separate letters to the senate of Trogir (August 1) and the council of Florence claimed that he had defeated the Ottomans in Kosovo.

[59] The response of the Florentines to Tvrtko (20 October 1389) is an important historical document as it confirms that Murad was killed during the battle and that it took place on June 28 (St. Vitus day/Vidovdan).

And blessed are all those who gave their lives and blood through the glorious manner of martyrdom as victims of the dead leader over his ugly corpse.

Murad's son Bayezid killed his younger brother, Yakub Çelebi, upon hearing of their father's death, thus becoming the sole heir to the Ottoman throne.

Branković himself died as an Ottoman prisoner, although in all later "Kosovo myth" narratives first created by Stefan Lazarević, he is portrayed as a betrayer of the Christians.

This move led Mehmed to punish the Serbian and all other vassals who supported the other claimants to the throne by campaigning against them to directly annex their lands.

[84] The day of the battle, known in Serbian as Vidovdan (St. Vitus' day) and celebrated according to the Julian calendar (corresponding to 28 June Gregorian in the 20th and 21st centuries), is an important part of Serb ethnic and national identity,[10] with notable events in Serbian history falling on that day: in 1876 Serbia declared war on the Ottoman Empire (Serbian–Ottoman War (1876–78); in 1881 Austria-Hungary and the Principality of Serbia signed a secret alliance; in 1914 the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was carried out by the Serbian Gavrilo Princip (although a coincidence that his visit fell on that day, Vidovdan added nationalist symbolism to the event);[85] in 1921 King Alexander I of Yugoslavia proclaimed the Vidovdan Constitution; in 1989, on the 600th anniversary of the battle, Serbian president Slobodan Milošević delivered the Gazimestan speech on the site of the historic battle.