[3] In 1241, a Mongol army under Subutai and Batu Khan invaded central and eastern Europe, including Poland, Bulgaria, Croatia, and the Kingdom of Hungary.

By the end of their campaign, the king was put to flight, around a quarter of the population of Hungary had been killed, and most of the kingdom's major settlements had been reduced to rubble.

First and foremost, he amalgamated the servientes and iobagiones castri into a new class of heavily armored, well-trained knights of the western type, where previously Hungary's defenses had relied almost entirely on wooden castles and light cavalry.

[7] In 1259, he requested that the Pope put him into contact with Venice, as he wanted to hire at least 1,000 crossbowmen (crossbows having also proven a very effective weapon against the Mongols, despite the relatively small numbers of them actually deployed by the Hungarians in 1241).

[10] During the first invasion the wooden, clay, and earth[11] defenses that made up the walls of most towns and forts fell easily to the Mongol siege engines.

Berke made similar demands: if Hungary would submit to the Mongols and grant them a quarter of its army for the planned invasion of Europe, it would receive tax exemption and 1/5 of the plunder.

The invasion paths seemed to mirror those taken by Batu and Subutai 40 years earlier, with Talabuga going through Verecke Pass and Nogai going through Brassó to enter Transylvania.

[28] Peter Jackson, using contemporary Hungarian charters, concludes that the Mongol army was very large, but is unsure if it was larger, smaller, or comparable in size to the 1241–42 invasion force.

[31] The Galician-Volhynian Chronicle puts the size of the Mongol army in the hundreds of thousands, saying that Talabuga's column alone lost 100,000 men during the march through the Carpathians.

On the march up, his force was devastated by logistical factors, namely a shortage of food which caused the deaths of thousands of his soldiers, as attested to by the Galician-Volynian Chronicle and certain contemporary Polish sources.

[36] During this event, members of Queen Elizabeth's household launched a spirited and effective sally against the Mongols, while she watched from the safety of the walls of Buda.

[39] One such battle took place near the castle of Turusko (Trascău), where the Mongols suffered a sharp defeat with heavy casualties, including 1,000 taken prisoner.

By the time he made it back to friendly territory, his army had effectively ceased to exist, with the majority of the soldiers he brought dying in the failed raid.

However, like Talabuga, he failed to take any major fortifications, with the exception of the Saxon castle of Ban Mikod in the Aranyos(Arieș) Valley, the former royal stronghold of Torda (today Turda, Romania).

His army arrived too late to make a significant difference, as Nogai's forces had already suffered a serious defeat at the hands of local Hungarian troops--mostly the Saxons, Vlachs, and Székelys, commanded by Voivode Roland Borsa.

After proving their military skills, the efficiency of their fortifications and armed forces, and their ability to ensure the safety of their subjects to a greater degree than the king or his dignitaries, various local elites expanded their net of supporters and deemed themselves entitled to rule large regions of the kingdom.

[49] The heavy losses suffered by the Mongols in this war, combined with their defeat in Poland shortly after (though they did successfully re-vassalize Bulgaria between these expeditions), contributed to the lack of major Golden Horde operations in central Europe outside of the 1280s.

[50] By the 14th century, the Golden Horde and much of the Mongolian Empire posed no serious threats thereafter to Hungary, despite frontier raids continuing under Öz Beg Khan.

This tactic, described in historical chronicles, allowed the Hungarian scouts to blend seamlessly with the Mongol forces, gathering intelligence that proved advantageous for Hungary’s defenses.

By acquiring detailed information on Mongol movements and tactics, the scouts played a significant role in preparing the main Hungarian army for subsequent battles.

The intelligence gathered by Hungarian spies is believed to have contributed to a devastating defeat for the Golden Horde, representing a major victory for the Kingdom of Hungary.