1571 Lepanto 5

Today is October 7.  On this date in history, in 1571, we witness the naval Battle of Lepanto, where the forces of the Christian Holy League destroyed the fleet of the Turkish Mohammedan forces in the Ionian Sea just west of the Greek mainland in the larger Mediterranean Sea.

The battle was the largest defeat suffered by a naval power in 1500 years, and ended Turkish control of the Mediterranean Sea.  The Turkish land forces would not be turned back until 100 plus years later after the Siege of Vienna ended, in 1683.  Only then, as our learned former President, GW Bush was wont to say, the "Religion of Peace," Mohammedanism, was sent scurrying back to its Asiatic haunts.