Background
Some historians claim that the Cumans aided the Wallachians in the battle. In 1324, Wallachia was a vassal of Hungary, and Robert referred to Basarab as "our Transalpine Voivode".
The war started with encouragement from the Voivode of Transylvania and a certain Dionisie, who later bore the title Ban of Severin. In 1330, Robert captured the long disputed Wallachian citadel of Severin and handed it to the Transylvanian Voivode.
Basarab sent envoys who asked for the hostilities to cease, and in return offered to pay 7,000 marks in silver, submit the fortress of Severin to Robert, and send his own son as hostage. According to the Viennese Illuminated Chronicle, a contemporary account, Robert would have said about Basarab: "He is the shepherd of my sheep, and I will take him out of his mountains, dragging him by his beard." Another account writes that Robert said that: "...he will drag the Voivode from his cottage, as would any driver his oxen or shepherd his sheep."
The King's councillors begged him to accept the offer or give a milder reply, but he refused and led his 30,000-strong army deeper into Wallachia "without proper supplies or adequate reconnaissance". Basarab was unable to stand a battle in the open field against a large army, owing to the poor state of his troops, and he decided to retreat somewhere into the mountains of Transylvanian Alps.
Robert entered Curtea de Argeş, the main city of the Wallachian state. He realised that Basarab had fled into the mountains and decided to give chase. After many days of difficult marching in the Carpathian Mountains, with his troops beginning to starve, the king and Basarab agreed to an armistice, with the condition that the latter would provide guides who knew the way out of the mountains and would lead the army back to the Hungarian plain by the shortest route.
The guides, however, were ordered to lead the Hungarians into an ambush. When the army entered a ravine, the Wallachians started to attack them from all sides, shooting arrows and pelting them with trees and stones.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Posada
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