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The Battle of Manzikert, or The Battle of Malazgirt, occurred on August 26, 1071 between the Byzantine Empire and Seljuk Turkish forces led by Alp Arslan, resulting in the defeat of the Byzantine Empire and the capture of Emperor Romanus IV Diogenes.

Background

During the 1060s the Seljuk sultan Alp Arslan allowed his Turkish allies to migrate towards Armenia and Asia Minor, where they sacked cities and plundered farmland. In 1064 they destroyed the Armenian capital at Ani. In 1068 Romanus IV led an expedition against them, but his slow-moving infantry could not catch the speedy Turkish cavalry, although he was able to capture the city of Hierapolis in Syria. In 1070 Romanus led a second expedition towards Malazgirt (then known as Manzikert) in the eastern end of Anatolia (in today's Muş Province), where a Byzantine fortress had been captured by the Seljuks, and offered a treaty with Alp Arslan; Romanus would give back Hierapolis if Arslan gave up the siege of Edessa (Urfa). Romanus threatened war if Alp Arslan did not comply, and prepared his troops anyway, expecting the sultan to decline his offer, which he did.

Preparations

Accompanying Romanus was Andronicus Ducas, the co-regent and a direct rival. The army consisted of about 5000 Byzantine troops from the western provinces, and probably about the same number from the eastern provinces; 500 Franks and Normans mercenaries under Roussel de Bailleul; some Turkish, Bulgarian, and Pecheneg mercenaries; infantry under the duke of Antioch; a contingent of Armenian troops; and some (but not all) of the Varangian Guard.

The march across Asia Minor was long and difficult, and Romanus did not endear himself to his troops by bringing a luxurious baggage train along with him; the Byzantine population also suffered some plundering by Romanus' German mercenaries, whom he was forced to dismiss. The expedition first rested at Sebasteia on the Halys, and reached Theodosopolis in June of 1071. There, some of his generals suggested continuing the march into Seljuk territory and catching Arslan before he was ready. Some of the other generals, including Nicephorus Bryennius, suggested they wait there and fortify their position. Eventually it was decided to continue the march.

Thinking that Alp Arslan was either further away or not coming at all, Romanus marched towards Lake Van expecting to retake Manzikert rather quickly, as well as the nearby fortress of Khliat if possible. However, Arslan was actually in Armenia, with 30 000 cavalry from Aleppo, Mosul, and his other allies. Arslan's spies knew exactly where Romanus was, while Romanus was completely unaware of his opponent's movements.

Romanus ordered his general John Tarchaneiotes to take some of the Byzantine troops and Varangians and accompany the Pechenegs and French to Ahlat (Khliat, at that time), while Romanus and the rest of the army marched to Manzikert. This probably split the forces in half, about 20 000 men each. Although it is unknown precisely what happened to Tarchaneiotes and his half of the army after this, they apparently caught sight of the Seljuks and fled, as they later appeared at Melitene and did not take part in the battle.

The battle

Romanus was unaware of the loss of Tarchaneiotes and continued to Manzikert, which he easily captured on August 23. The next day some foraging parties under Bryennius discovered the Seljuk force and were forced to retreat back to Manzikert. The Armenian general Basilaces was sent out with some cavalry, as Romanus did not believe this was Arslan's full army; the cavalry was destroyed and Basilaces taken prisoner. Romanus drew up his troops into formation and sent the left wing out under Bryennius, who was almost surrounded by the quickly approaching Turks and was forced to retreat once more. The Turks hid among the nearby hills for the night, making it nearly impossible for Romanus to send a counterattack.

On August 25, some of Romanus' Turkish mercenaries came into contact with their Seljuk relatives and deserted. Romanus then rejected a Seljuk embassy and attempted to recall Tarchaneiotes, who was of course no longer in the area. There were no engagements that day, but on August 26 the Byzantine army gathered itself into a proper battle formation and began to march on the Turkish positions, with the left wing under Bryennius, the right wing under Theodore Alyates, and the centre under the emperor. Andronicus Ducas led the reserve forces in the rear. The Seljuks were organized into a crescent formation about four kilometres away, with Arslan observing events from a safe distance. Seljuk archers attacked the Byzantines as they drew closer; the centre of their crescent continually moved backwards while the wings moved to surround the Byzantine troops.

The Byzantines held off the arrow attacks and captured Arslan's camp by the end of the afternoon. However, the right and left wings, where the arrows did most of their damage, almost broke up when individual units tried to force the Seljuks into a pitched battle; the Seljuk cavalry simply fled when challenged. With the Seljuks avoiding battle, Romanus was forced to order a withdrawal by the time night fell. However, the right wing misunderstood the order, and Ducas, as an enemy of Romanus, deliberately ignored the emperor and marched back to the camp outside Manzikert, rather than covering the emperor's retreat. Now that the Byzantines were thoroughly confused, the Seljuks seized the opportunity and attacked. The Byzantine right wing was routed; the left under Bryennius held out a little longer but was soon routed as well. Romanus was injured, and taken prisoner when the Seljuks discovered him.

When the Emperor Romanus IV was conducted into the presence of Alp Arslan, he was treated him with considerable kindess, and offered him the terms of peace which he had offered previous to the battle. He was also loaded with presents and Alp Arslan had him respectfully escorted by a military guard to his own forces. But prior to that, when he first was brought to the Sultan, this famous conversation is recorded to have taken place:

Alp Arslan: "What would you do if I was brought before you as a prisoner?"
Romanus: "Perhaps I'd kill you, or exhibit you in the streets of Constantinople."
Alp Arslan: "My punishment is far heavier. I forgive you, and set you free."

Shortly after his return to his subjects, Romanus was deposed, and then blinded and exiled in the island of Prote; soon after he died as a result of an infectioned caused by an injury during his brutal blinding.

Outcome

In line with the still ongoing discussions on the actual numbers of combattants in the confronting armies and their respective casualties, numerous sources relativize the Byzantine losses on the basis of many of their units having survived the battle intact and fighting elsewhere within a few months. Certainly, all commanders in the Byzantine side (Ducas, Tarchaneites, Bryennius, du Bailleul, and, above all, the Emperor) had survived and were going to be take parts in later events. Since the battle had not occurred until after nightfall, the Turks did not pursue the fleeing Byzantines, which probably saved most of them. The Turks did not even recapture Manzikert itself at this point. The Byzantine army regrouped and marched to Dokeia, where they were joined by Romanus when he was released a week later. In this sense, the battle was not, by itself, an immediate disaster.

The disaster the battle caused for the Empire was, in simplest terms, the loss of its Anatolian heartland. John Julius Norwich says in his trilogy on Byzantium that the loss was "its death blow, though centuries remained before the remnant fell. The themes in Anatolia were literally the heart of the empire, and within decades after Manzikert, they were gone.". Or, as Anna Comnena puts it a few decades after the actual battle, "the fortunes of the Roman Empire had sunk to their lowest ebb. For the armies of the East were dispersed in all directions, because the Turks had over-spread, and gained command of, countries between the Euxine Sea and the Hellespont, and the Aegean and Syrian Seas , and the various bays, especially those which wash Pamphylia, Cilicia, and empty themselves into the Egyptian Sea ."

One reason for the loss that is attributable to the battle was that the defeat showed the Seljuks that the Byzantines were not invincible and unconquerable, millennium-old Roman Empire (as both the Byzantines and Seljuks still called it). Their kinsmen were very soon to flow into Anatolia in great numbers through the door opened in Malazgirt.

The other reason was a chain of events, of which the battle was the first ring, that were going to destabilize the Empire in the years after the battle. The intrigues for the throne, the horrific fate of Romanus, Roussel de Bailleul attempting to carve himself an independent kingdom in Galatia with his 3000 Frank/Norman/German mercenaries, defeating the Emperor's uncle John Dukas who had come to suppress him, advancing toward the capital to destroy Chrysopolis (Üsküdar) on the Asian coast of the Bosphorus, the Empire finally turning to the spreading Seljuks to conclude an agreement asking them to overcome de Bailleul (which they did, then delivering him over), all acted in interaction to create a vacuum which the Turks have filled. Their choice in establishing their capital in İznik (Nikaea) in 1077 could possibly be explained by a desire to see if the Empire's struggles could present new opportunities.

In hindsight, both Byzantine and contemporary historians are unanimous in dating the decline of Byzantine fortunes to this battle. It is interpreted as one of the root causes for the later Crusades, to the extent they could be qualified to possess purely religious motivations. In this perspective, the West saw Manzikert as a signal that Byzantium was no longer capable of being the protector of Eastern Christianity, or Christian prilgrims to the Holy Places in the Middle East.

References

• John Haldon, "The Byzantine Wars."
• Warren Treadgold, "A History of the Byzantine State and Society."
• Runciman, "History of the Crusades" (Volume One)
• John Julius Norwich "Byzantium: The Apogee" (Volume II of his triology on the Byzantine Empire)

• 1071
• Battles of the Byzantine Empire
• Battles of the Seljuk Turks