Skanderbeg

Skanderbeg, born Gjergj Kastrioti (c. 1405–1468), was the Albanian nobleman who led the longest resistance to the Ottomans in the Balkans. Sent as a hostage to the Ottoman court, he served Sultan Murad II for twenty years. The Turks called him İskender Bey, a comparison with Alexander the Great. In 1443 he deserted, seized Krujë and returned to Christianity.

In 1444 he gathered the Albanian houses at Lezhë into the League of Lezhë. That summer, on the plain of Torvioll, hidden cavalry encircled Ali Pasha's army, one of the few Ottoman defeats in a pitched battle on European soil. For twenty-five years he fought using the mountains for hit-and-run raids, and the sieges of Krujë failed in 1450 and 1466.

He fell ill in January 1468, probably of malaria, and died. Krujë starved and surrendered to Mehmed II in 1478, and Naples gave his family lands in southern Italy.