1330-1600 CE
From 1330 to 1600 CE, the Wallachians held the line where Christendom met the Ottoman tide — Mircea the Elder defying sultans, his descendant Vlad earning his epithet by impaling Turkish armies on forests of stakes. Voivodes rose and fell with dizzying speed, some paying tribute to Constantinople, others dying in hopeless defiance, until Michael the Brave briefly united all Romanian lands before assassination ended the dream.