Christian I of Denmark had inherited the Duchy of Schleswig, a Danish fief, when the Holstein-Rendsburg line of the Schauenburg counts became extinct in 1459 with the death of his uncle Adolf VIII of Holstein-Rendsburg (and in personal union as Adolf I Duke of Schleswig).

Through the Treaty of Ribe (1460) Christian had been elected Count of Holstein-Rendsburg, then still a Saxe-Lauenburgian subfief within the Holy Roman Empire.

Lauenburg's liege lord Emperor Frederick III in 1474 elevates Christian I as Count of Holstein-Rendsburg to Duke of Holstein, thus becoming an immediate imperial (reichsunmittelbar) vassal.

Both Holstein and Schleswig are ruled from 1474 by the Danish crown.

The envoys of Matthias and Casimir IV sign a peace treaty in February 1474 and a three-year truce between Matthias and Vladislaus Jagiellon is also declared.

Within a month, however, Vladislaus enters into an alliance with Emperor Frederick and Casimir IV joins them.

Casimir IV and Vladislaus invade Silesia and lay siege to Matthias in Breslau (now Wrocław in Poland) in October.

He prevents the besiegers from accumulating provisions, forcing them to raise the siege.

Hereafter the Silesian Estates willingly elect Matthias's new candidate Stephen Zápolya as captain-general.

The Moravian Estates elect Ctibor Tovačovský as captain-general.

Matthias confirms this decision, although Tovačovský had been Vladislaus Jagiellon's partisan.

Stephen is hoping to gain support from the West, and more specifically from the Pope.

Fearing a new Ottoman invasion, he swears fealty to Matthias Corvinus of the Hungarian Kingdom on August 15, 1474.

However, the help that he receives is modest in numbers.

Matthias sends eighteen hundred Hungarians under the command of Blaise Magyar, while Casimir IV of Poland sends two thousand horsemen.

Stephen recruits five thousand Székely soldiers.

The Moldavian army consists of twenty cannon; light cavalry (Călăraşi); elite, heavy cavalry—named Viteji, Curteni, and Boyars—and professional foot soldiers.

The army reaches a strength of up to forty thousand, of whom ten thousand to fifteen thousand comprise the standing army.

The remainder consists of thirty thousand peasants armed with maces, bows, and other homemade weapons.

They are recruited into Oastea Mare (the Great Army), into which all able-bodied free men over the age of fourteen are conscripted.

The invading army enters Moldavia in December 1474.

In order to fatigue the Ottomans, Stephen had instituted a policy of scorched earth and poisoned waters.

Troops who specialize in setting ambushes harass the advancing Ottomans.

The population and livestock are evacuated to the north of the country into the mountains.

Ali Bey Mihaloğlu, Bey of Smederevo, pillages eastern parts of Hungary, destroys Várad, and takes sixteen thousand prisoners with him in January 1474.

Laiotă takes the Wallachian throne in the spring of 1474 for the second time; in June, he decides to betray his mentor by submitting to Mehmed.

Stephen now invests his support in a new candidate, named Ţepeluş (little spear), but his reign is even shorter, as it only lasts a few weeks after being defeated by Laiotă in battle on October 5.

Two weeks later, Stephen returns to Wallachia and forces Laiotă to flee.

Mehmed, tired of what transpires in Wallachia, gives Stephen an ultimatum to forfeit Chilia to the Porte, to abolish his aggressive policy in Wallachia, and to come to Constantinople with his delayed homage.

The prince refuses and in November 1474 writes to the Pope to warn him of further Ottoman expansion, and to ask him for support.

Mehmed had ordered his general, Suleiman Pasha, to end the siege of Venetian-controlled Shkodër, to assemble his troops in Sofia, and from there to advance with additional troops towards Moldavia.

For these already exhausted Ottoman troops, who had besieged the city from May 17 to August 15, the transit from Shkodër to Moldavia is a month's journey through bad weather and difficult terrain.

According to to the Polish chronicler Jan Długosz, Suleiman was also ordered that after inflicting defeat on Stephen, he was to advance towards Poland, set camp for the winter, then invade Hungary in spring, and unite his forces with the army of the Sultan.

The Ottoman army consists ofjanissaries and heavy infantry, which are supported by the heavy cavalry sipahis and by the light cavalry (akinci), who would scout ahead.

There are also Tatar cavalry and other troops (such as the Timariots) from vassal states.

Twenty thousand Bulgarian peasants are also included in the army; their main tasks are to clear the way for the rest of the army by building bridges over waters and removing snow from the roads, and to drive supply wagons.

In total, the Ottoman cavalry numbered thirty thousand.

In September 1474, the Ottoman army gathers in Sofia, and from here, …

…Suleiman marches towards Moldavia by crossing the frozen Danube on foot.

His first stop is Wallachia, which he enters via Vidin and Nicopolis.

His army rests in Wallachia for two weeks, and is later met by a Wallachian contingent of seventeen thousand under Basarab Laiotă, who has changed sides to join the Ottomans.

Giuliano da Maiano, working in the architectural tradition of Filippo Brunelleschi and Michelozzi Michelozzo, designs the Cathedral of Faenza, begun in 1474.