Sep 09, 2021 · The effect of the Arab Wars was a loss of land and power. Byzantine lost a huge amount of land to the Arabs, who gained strength and more land. The second cause of the decline of the Byzantine Empire was the military system. The empire had been divided into many regions, which contributed locally raised troops to the imperial armies.
Oct 09, 2014 · The Byzantine empire had an absolute monarchy with secular absolute ruler while the Islam empire was Caliphate which was an aristrocratic constitutional Republic. The Byzantin empire was different from the Islam empire due to the fact that it was larger and more advanced.
The Byzantines were greatly aided by a weapon called Greek Fire. This weapon spewed fire at attacking ships, causing them to burst into flames. By the 800s, fighting against the Byzantines had so weakened the Arab forces that they no longer posed a threat to the empire.
The barbarians tribes were often at war with each other over territory/ power- Byzantines wanted to take advantage of this Byzantines hoped the Slavs would be too busy fighting the Avars to raid the Balkans- plan backfired Slavs fled the attacking Avars and traveled south- deeper into Balkans- many settled in this region The Avars themselves ...
The army was now more concentrated, as it had more limited territory to defend. The reorganization of Byzantine Anatolia, which would develop into the theme system, created a native military system where soldiers were settled in the new districts in exchange for providing military service.
The Arabs, recently united under the religion of Islam , posed a serious threat to the weakened, militarily reduced Byzantium, which was still recovering from its recent war with Persia. Arab troops raided Jordan and Syria and in response Byzantine troops marched to combat the invaders. Unexpectedly, the decisive Battle ...
Byzantine recovery after the Battle of Yarmouk was possible through the gradual development of a new provincial and military organization system. The beginnings of the structure later dubbed the ‘theme system’ or 'themes’, occurred during the seventh century, although the Byzantines did not use the term thema itself until around 805 AD. This system involved the military and political reorganization of the old Roman provinces into new districts drawn upon military lines. Most scholars hypothesize that the retreating soldiers concentrated themselves in Anatolia to defend the remnants of the Byzantine Empire in the Middle East .
The new defensive system created by the Byzantine army focused on the organization and advantages of what would become the ‘theme system’, the usage of Anatolian topography, and a new defensive style of warfare, saving Byzantium by creating a new bulwark against the Muslim onslaught. The Byzantine army may have lost an unprecedented amount ...
This strategy was the creation of homegrown defensive units based in newly organized administrative and military provinces. The new defensive system created by the Byzantine army focused on the organization and advantages ...
The seventh century was a vital point in the history of the Byzantine army. Since the beginning of the century, territory in the Balkans had steadily been lost to Avars and Slavs. Byzantine forces had managed to avert the crisis of the Persian invasion in the East by finally achieving victory over the Sassanid Empire of Persia in 628 AD, but it was only a brief respite before the new danger, Islam, emerged from the Arabian Peninsula. Weakened by its recent costly war with Persia, the Byzantine army was defeated by Islamic forces and most of the empire fell to the Muslim conquerors. If Byzantium was to survive, it had to reevaluate its situation and devise a new strategy to combat the Muslims.
The tough terrain and long distances in Anatolia meant that it took armies some time to arrive on sight since they only moved about eight to ten miles per day. Byzantine armies used a variety of pack animals such as mules and dromedary camels to cart supplies.
Similarities between the Islamic empire and the Byzantine empire were that they both rose to power through military force. With this similarity comes the next in the fact that both empires had extremely strong military forces. They both flourished through their use of trade . This included their help in developing the Silk Road ...
The root causes of the Crusades were due to the Muslim attacks on the Eastern Roman Empire. The city of Jerusalem was significant to the Christian religion and was viewed as a Holy land. The Turks took control over Jerusalem and massacred 3,000 Christians. The remaining Christians were treated so badly that they took a stand and formed the Crusades.
Byzantine relations with the rest of Europe had soured over the last several centuries as well: the Schism of 1054 and the 13th-century Latin occupation of Constantinople entrenched a mutual hatred between the Orthodox Byzantines and Roman Catholic Europe.
An Ottoman attack on a Venetian ship in the Bosporus prompted the Venetian Senate to send 800 troops and 15 galleys to the Byzantine capital, and many Venetians presently in Constantinople also chose to support the war effort, but the bulk of the Venetian forces were delayed for too long to be of any help.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Now sultan for the second time, Mehmed II intended to complete his father’s mission and conquer Constantinople for the Ottomans. In 1452 he reached peace treaties with Hungary and Venice.
Mehmed II and his army were remarkably restrained in their handling of affairs after the fall of Constantinople. They largely refrained from slaughtering commoners and nobility, instead choosing to ransom them to their home states and primarily executing only those who fought after the surrender. Mehmed repopulated the city with people from a multitude of backgrounds and faiths and relocated his capital from Edirne to Constantinople, ensuring a multicultural seat of power for a multicultural empire. He also began to view himself as Kayser-i Rûm (“Caesar of Rome”), the inheritor of the Roman Empire and all its historical lands. He asserted this claim with a series of campaigns that thoroughly subjugated both the Balkans and Greece by the late 15th century.
In 1452 he reached peace treaties with Hungary and Venice. He also began the construction of the Boğazkesen (later called the Rumelihisarı ), a fortress at the narrowest point of the Bosporus, in order to restrict passage between the Black and Mediterranean seas.
The dwindling Byzantine Empire came to an end when the Ottomans breached Constantinople’s ancient land wall after besieging the city for 55 days. Mehmed surrounded Constantinople from land and sea while employing cannon to maintain a constant barrage of the city’s formidable walls. The fall of the city removed what was once a powerful defense ...
Sultan Murad II laid siege to Constantinople in 1422, but he was forced to lift it in order to suppress a rebellion elsewhere in the empire. In 1444 he lost an important battle to a Christian alliance in the Balkans and abdicated the throne to his son, Mehmed II.
Many say that Christianity is the greatest legacy that the Byzantine Empire has left us, while others think that it was their diplomacy. What’s certain is that the art of making friends with the neighbors was the one of the reasons why they managed to last for 1123 years. They made use of different techniques gathered from all across the empire. From Greece came rhetoric as a tool for public diplomacy. Rome contributed with divide and conquer tactics which were used to assist other states with civil engineering projects, and from Egypt the Empire adopted dynastic marriages and sophisticated ceremonies to impress foreign officials.
With the help of their new weapon, the Byzantines managed to repel two Arab sieges of the city . The fire was also used in a number of wars against the Bulgarians, the Rus and in some internal revolts, all ending in success. Another super-weapon was the counterweight trebuchet.
There was also a Logothete of the Treasury, another for the Military and the Logthete in charge of the Empire’s Flocks. Underneath them was an entire legion of public servants and advisors, all living in Constantinople and working at the Great Palace. The rest of the Empire was structured in Themes.
These walls stand to this day as a testament to Byzantine engineering and are known as the Theodosian Walls. Constantinople also had sea walls that completely surrounded the city.
Together with the marvelous and extremely wealthy Constantinople itself, and the exchange of excessively generous gifts, it made for a pleasurable and lucrative visit for foreign representatives. The Byzantine Empire was the first to create a “ Bureau of Barbarians ” and use it to great effect.
The Byzantine Empire was notably different from other Medieval states at the time, particularly in matters of administration. It was the first to implement a centralized form of government and remained the only state to have one up until the 13 th century.
The Valens Aqueduct, which was built by Emperor Valens in the late 4 th century and still stands today, was 1061 yards long and the main source of water for the capital. The entire system of aqueducts and canals spanned a total distance of over 155 miles, making it the longest ever built in Antiquity.