External affairs of the Macedonian emperors.

Byzantine relations with the Arabs and Armenia. — The main problem in the external policy of Basil I, the founder of the Macedonian dynasty, was the struggle with the Muslim world. Conditions were unusually favorable for great achievements in this struggle, because in his time the Empire maintained peaceful relations with Armenia in the east, with Russia and Bulgaria in the north, and in the west with Venice and the western emperor. Added to these advantages was the internal dissension within the eastern caliphate aroused by the increasing influence of the Turks at the Arabian court, the defection of Egypt, where the independent dynasty of the Tulunids arose in the year 868, the civil wars among the North African Arabs, and the difficult position of the Spanish Umayyads in the midst of the local Christian population. Basil’s position then was very advantageous for a successful struggle with the eastern and western Arabs. But although the Empire fought against the Arabs almost without interruption throughout the reign of Basil I, it did not take full advantage of the favorable external conditions.

            The successful military campaign which opened at the beginning of the seventies in the eastern part of Asia Minor against the followers of the sect of the Paulicans resulted in the Emperor’s occupation of their main city of Tephrice. This conquest not only widened the extent of Byzantine territory, but also placed Basil face to face with the eastern Arabs. After several vigorously contested battles, the clashes between the two sides assumed the form of regular annual collisions which were not of very great consequence. Victory was sometimes on the side of the Greeks and sometimes on the side of the Arabs, but in the end the Byzantine borderline in Asia Minor moved considerably to the east.

            Far more serious were Basil’s relations with the western Arabs, who at that time possessed the greater part of Sicily and occupied some important points in southern Italy. The troubled affairs of Italy caused the intervention of the western Emperor, Louis II, who occupied the important city of Bari. It was with this ruler that Basil I formed an alliance for a combined attempt to drive the western Arabs out of Italy and Sicily. But this alliance did not succeed and was soon dissolved. After the death of Louis the population of Bari handed over their city to Byzantine officials.

            Meanwhile the Arabs occupied the strategically important island of Malta, south of Sicily, and in the year 878 they took Syracuse by assault after a siege of nine months. An interesting description of the siege of Syracuse was written by an eyewitness, the monk Theodosius, who was living there at the time, and after the fall of the city was imprisoned by the Arabs in Palermo. He related that during the siege a famine raged in the city, and the inhabitants were forced to eat grass, skins of animals, ground bones mixed with water, and even corpses. This famine caused an epidemic which carried off an enormous part of the population.[6] After the loss of Syracuse, among important points in Sicily the Byzantine Empire retained only the city of Tauromemium or Taormina on the eastern coast of the island. This toss was a turning point in Basil’s external policy. His plans for a general attack on the Arabs were not to be realized. The occupation of Tarentum in southern Italy by Basil’s troops and their successful advance into the interior of this country under the leadership of their general, Nicephorus Phocas, during the last years of Basil’s reign might be considered as some consolation after the failure at Syracuse, however.

            Notwithstanding the negative outcome of the western alliance against the Arabs, Basil attempted another alliance wirh the Armenian King Ashot Bagratid (Bagratuni) for the purpose of defeating the eastern Arabs. But at the time of the formation of this union Basil died. In spite of the loss of Syracuse and the unsuccessful campaigns against the Arabs, Basil increased somewhat the extent of Byzantine possessions in Asia Minor, and restored the lost importance of Byzantine rule in southern Italy. “The aged Basil,” said a recent student of his period, “could die in peace. He had fulfilled, both in the east and in the west, a very great military task, which was at the same time a civilizing task. The Empire left by Basil was stronger and more imposing than the one he had received.”[7]

            The peaceful relations maintained by Basil with all his neighbors, excepting the Arabs, were broken under his successor, Leo VI the Wise (886-912). A war broke out with the Bulgarians, which ended with their victory. It was during this war that the Magyars (Hungarians) appeared in Byzantine history for the first time. Toward the end of Leo’s reign the Russians stood near Constantinople. Armenia, the ally of the Byzantine Empire, exposed to incessant Arabian invasions, did not receive the aid she expected from Byzantium. In addition to all this the question of the Emperor’s fourth marriage aroused strong internal disturbances. As a result of these external and internal complications the problem of the struggle with Islam became more complex and difficult for the Empire.

            The campaigns against the Arabs were generally ineffective in the time of Leo VI. In the military clashes on the eastern borders the Arabs were at times as victorious as the Greeks. Neither side gained much from these collisions. In the west the Muslims occupied the city of Rhegium (Reggio) on the Italian shore of the Strait of Messina and after this the Strait was completely in the hands of the Arabs. In 902 they conquered Tauromenium or Taormina, the last important fortified point of Byzantine Sicily. With the fall of this city Sicily was, so to say, entirely in the hands of the Arabs, for the smaller cities which still belonged to the Greeks were of no importance in the later history of the Empire. The eastern policy of Leo VI during the second half of his reign in no way depended upon his relations with the Sicilian Arabs.

            The beginning of the tenth century was marked by active operations of the Muslim fleet. Even at the end of the ninth century Cretan pirates had repeatedly raided the coasts of the Peloponnesus and the islands of the Aegean Sea. These sea raids of the Arabs became still more dangerous when their Syrian and Cretan fleets began to act together. The attack of Thessalonica by the Muslim fleet under the leadership of the Greek renegade, Leo of Tripolis, in 904 is the most famous deed of the Arabs in this period. The city was taken only after a long and difficult siege, but a few days after its fall the conquerors departed with a large number of prisoners and rich spoils, setting sail eastward to Syria. It was only after this disaster that the Byzantine government began the fortification of Thessalonica. A detailed account of the Arabian raid of the city came from the pen of John Cameniates, a priest who lived through all the hardships of the siege.[8]

            The successful naval operations of the Arabs forced the Byzantine rulers to devote more attention to the improvement of their own fleet. The result was that in 906 the Byzantine admiral Himerius gained a brilliant victory over the Arabs in the Aegean. But in 911 the great sea expedition of Leo VI against the allied eastern and Cretan Arabs, also headed by Himerius, ended in complete failure for the empire. In his exact account of the composition of this expedition Constantine Porphyrogenitus spoke of the presence of 700 Russians.[9]

            Thus the Byzantine struggle with the Arabs was highly unsuccessful in the time of Leo VI: in the west Sicily was definitely lost; in southern Italy Byzantine troops failed to accomplish anything after the recall of Nicephorus Phocas; on the eastern border the Arabs were slowly but persistently going forward; and on the sea the Byzantine fleet suffered several serious defeats.

            In spite of the religious animosity toward the Arabs and the military clashes with them official documents at times referred to them in very friendly terms. Thus the patriarch of Constantinople of this period, Nicholas Mysticus, wrote to “the most illustrious, most honorable and beloved” Emir of the island of Crete that “the two powers of the whole universe, the power of the Saracens and that of the Romans, are excelling and shining as the two great luminaries in the firmament. For this reason alone we must live in common as brothers although we differ in customs, manners, and religion.”[10]

            In the long reign of Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (913-59) and Romanus I Lecapenus (919-44) the Byzantine Empire could not struggle effectively with the Arabs until the end of the third decade of the tenth century, because all its forces were thrown into the Bulgarian war. Luckily for the Empire, the caliphate was at this time going through a period of disintegration and internal strife, and separate independent dynasties were being formed. However, one successful operation of the Byzantine fleet may be mentioned: in 917 the renegade pirate Leo of Tripoli, who in 904 had captured Thessalonica, was overwhelmingly defeated at Lemnos.”[11]

            After the Bulgarian campaign very capable generals appeared in the Greek and Arab armies. The Greek domesticus John Curcuas was, in the words of the chronicler, a “second Trajan or Belisarius” and a conquerer of “nearly thousands of cities.” A special work was even written about him, but it has not been preserved.[12] His genius brought in a new “dawn on the eastern border;” with him there seemed to come a “new spirit into the imperial eastern policy, a spirit of confident aggression.”[13] The Arabs, too, had an efficient chief in the person of Saif-ad-Daulah, a member of the independent dynasty of the Hamdanids, which ruled Aleppo. His court became a center of flourishing literary activity, and his period was called by contemporaries the “Golden Age.” Toward the middle of the tenth century Curcuas achieved numerous victories in Arabian Armenia and occupied many cities in upper Mesopotamia. In 933 Melitene was captured by Curcuas, and in 944 the city of Edessa was forced to give up its precious relic, the miraculous image of the Savior (mandilion, το μανδιλιον), which was transported to Constantinople with great pomp. This was the last triumph of Curcuas. These successes made him “the hero of the moment,”[14] but his popularity alarmed the government and he was removed from his post. At that time Romanus Lecapenus fell, and in the next month his sons also were dethroned. Constantine Porphyrogenitus became sole emperor. “It was the end of an era; new actors were strutting onto the stage.”[15]

            The epoch of Romanus Lecapenus was of very great importance for the Byzantine policy in the East. After three centuries of keeping to the defensive, the Empire under the guidance of Romanus and John Curcuas assumed the offensive and began to triumph. The frontier was in a very different condition from what it had been at the time of Romanus’ accession. The border provinces were comparatively free from Arab raids. During the last twelve years of Romanus’ reign Muhammedan raiders only twice crossed the frontier. Romanus appointed as commander-in-chief Curcuas, “the most brilliant soldier that the Empire had produced for generations. He infused a new spirit into the imperial armies, and led them victorious deep into the country of the infidels … John Curcuas was the first of a line of great conquerors and as the first is worthy of high praise. And in the praise, a part should be given to Romanus Lecapenus to whose judgment the Empire owed his services and under whose rule were passed those twenty glorious years.”[16]

            The last years of Constantine Porphyrogenitus were marked by desperate battles with Saif-ad-Daulah, and although the Greeks had been beaten in several of these collisions, the outcome of the struggle was the defeat of the Arabs in northern Mesopotamia and the crossing of the Euphrates by the Byzantine army. During these years of struggle John Tzimisces, the future emperor, distinguished himself by his capable leadership. But the large sea expedition organized against the Cretan Arabs in 949 resulted in complete failure and the loss of numerous vessels. Six hundred and twenty-nine Russians were among the Byzantine warriors who participated in this campaign.[17] The constant clashes between the Greeks and the Muslims in the west, in Italy, and Sicily were of no importance for the general course of events.

            The eastern conquests of John Curcuas and John Tzimisces, which extended the borders of the Empire beyond the Euphrates, inaugurated a brilliant period of Byzantine victories over the Muslims. In the words of the French historian, Rambaud, “All the failures of Basil I were revenged; the road was opened to Tarsus, Antioch, Cyprus, and Jerusalem … Before his death Constantine could rejoice because during his reign so many great acts had been performed for the cause of Christ. He opened the era of Crusades for the East as well as for the West, for the Hellenes as well as for the Franks [i.e., for the western European nations].”[18]

            During the brief reign of Romanus II (959-63), his capable and energetic general, Nicephorus Phocas, the future emperor, occupied the island of Crete, thus destroying the nest of Arabian pirates who had terrorized the population of the islands and coasts of the Aegean Sea. By reconquering Crete the Empire regained an important strategic and commercial point in the Mediterranean Sea.[19] Nicephorus Phocas was equally successful in the ensuing war with Saif-ad-Daulah in the east. After a difficult siege he succeeded in temporarily occupying Aleppo, the seat of the Hamdanids.

            The achievements of the next three emperors — Nicephorus Phocas, John Tzimisces, and Basil II Bulgaroctonus — form the most brilliant pages of the military history of the Empire in its struggle with Islam. During his six years’ reign (963-69) Nicephorus Phocas concentrated his attention on the East, although occasionally he diverted it to the hostile acts of the Bulgarians, which became more serious due to the intervention of the Russian prince, Sviatoslav. Some of the Emperor’s forces were also absorbed in the collisions with the German king, Otto the Great, in Italy. In the East the Byzantine troops followed the conquest of Tarsus by the occupation of Cilicia, while the fleet succeeded in taking from the Arabs the important island of Cyprus. In connection with the fall of Tarsus the Arab geographer of the thirteenth century, Yaqut, narrates an interesting story based on the accounts of refugees. Under the walls of Tarsus, he said, Nicephorus Phocas ordered that two banners be raised as emblems of “the land of the Romans” and “the land of Islam,” and commanded the heralds to announce that around the first banner should gather all who desired justice, impartiality, safety of property, family life, children, good roads, just laws, and kind treatment; and around the second, all those who upheld adultery, oppressive legislation, violence, extortion, the seizure of landed estates, and the confiscation of property.[20]

            The occupation of Cilicia and Cyprus opened for Nicephorus the road to Syria, and he began to work toward the realization of his cherished dream: the conquest of Antioch, the heart of Syria. After a preliminary irruption into Syria, Nicephorus besieged Antioch, and when it became evident that the siege would last a very long time, the Emperor left his army and returned to the capital. During his absence, in the last year of his reign (969), his soldiers took Antioch with enormous spoils, thus fulfilling his great ambition. “Thus did Christian arms reconquer the great city of Antioch, the glorious Theoupolis [the name applied to the city by Justinian the Great], that ancient rival of Byzantium in the east, the city of great patriarchs and great saints, councils and heresies.”[21] Soon after the fall of Antioch the Byzantine troops took one more important Syrian center, the city of Aleppo, the residence of the Hamdanids. There is in existence the interesting text of the agreement between the Byzantine general and the master of Aleppo.[22] This treaty defined very carefully the boundaries and names of the Syrian districts ceded to the Byzantine Emperor and of those over which he was to become suzerain. Chief among the conquered points was Antioch. The city of Aleppo (Haleb, in Arabic) became a vassal state of the Empire. The Muslim population was taxed in favor of Byzantium, while the Christians of the vassal districts were freed from all taxation. The ruler of Aleppo (the emir) agreed to aid the Emperor in case of war with the non-Muhammedans of those provinces. He also bound himself to protect Byzantine trade caravans which might enter his territory. The reconstruction of the destroyed churches was guaranteed to the Christians. Freedom to change from Christianity to Muhammedanism or vice versa was also guaranteed.

            The treaty was concluded after the death of Nicephorus Phocas, murdered at the end of the year 969. Never before had the Muslims been subjected to so much humiliation. Cilicia and a part of Syria with Antioch were taken from them, and a very large portion of their territory was placed under the suzerainty of the Empire.

            The Arabian historian of the eleventh century, Yahya of Antioch, writes that the Muslim population was certain that Nicephorus Phocas would conquer all of Syria and other provinces, too. “The incursions of Nicephorus,” wrote this chronicler, “became a pleasure for his soldiers, for nobody attacked them or opposed them; he marched wherever he pleased, and destroyed whatever he liked, without encountering any Muslim, or anyone else who would divert him and prevent him from doing that which he wished … Nobody could resist him.”[23] The Greek historian, of the time, Leo the Deacon, wrote that had Nicephorus not been assassinated, he would have been able “to fix the boundaries of their [i.e. Greek] Empire in the east as far as India, and in the west as far as the confines of the world,” in other words, the Atlantic Ocean.[24]

            In the West the policy of Nicephorus Phocas was a failure. In his time the last points in Sicily which still belonged to the Empire were conquered by the Muslims, so that Sicily was completely in their hands. The main problem of John Tzimisces (969-76), who succeeded Phocas, was to secure the conquests in Cilicia and Syria. During the first years of his reign he could not participate personally in the military activities on the eastern border, because the Russian and Bulgarian wars, and the insurrection of Bardas Phocas demanded his undivided attention. He was victorious in the northern wars, and he also succeeded in suppressing the rebellion of Bardas Phocas. The Italian complications were settled through the marriage of the Byzantine princess, Theophano, to the heir of the German throne, the future Emperor Otto II. Only then was it possible for John Tzimisces to turn to his eastern problems.

            His campaigns against the eastern Muslims were highly successful. Regarding his last campaign an interesting source is the letter from John Tzimisces to his ally, Ashot III, king of Armenia, preserved in the works of the Armenian historian, Matthew of Edessa.[25] This letter shows that the Emperor, in aiming to achieve his final goal of freeing Jerusalem from the hands of the Muslims, undertook a real crusade. He departed with his army from Antioch, entered Damascus, and in his southward movement advanced into Palestine, where the cities of Nazareth and Caesarea voluntarily delivered themselves to the Emperor; even Jerusalem began to plead for mercy. “If the pagan Africans who lived there,” wrote the Emperor in his letter to Ashot, “had not hidden out of fear of us in the seacoast castles, we would have entered, with God’s help, the sacred city of Jerusalem and prayed to God in the Holy Places.”[26] But before reaching Jerusalem John Tzimisces directed his forces northward along the seacoast, and conquered many cities on his way. In the same letter the Emperor said, “Today all Phoenicia, Palestine, and Syria are freed from the Muhammedan yoke and recognize the authority of the Byzantine Greeks.”[27] This letter, of course, contains many exaggerations. When it is compared with the testimony of the authentic information given by the Christian Arabian historian, Yahya of Antioch, it is evident that the results of the Palestinian campaign were much less notable. In all probability the Byzantine army did not go far beyond the boundaries of Syria.[28]

            When the Byzantine soldiers returned to Antioch, the Emperor left for Constantinople, where he died early in 976. One Byzantine chronicler wrote, “All nations were horror-stricken by the attacks of John Tzimisces; he enlarged the land of the Romans; the Saracens and Armenians fled, the Persians feared him; and people from all sides carried gifts to him, beseeching him to make peace with them; he marched as far as Edessa and the River Euphrates, and the earth became filled with Roman armies; Syria and Phoenicia were trampled by Roman horses, and he achieved great victories; the sword of the Christian cut down like a sickle.”[29] However this last brilliant expedition of John Tzimisces did not accomplish the annexation of the conquered provinces, for his army returned to Antioch, which became the main base of the Byzantine military forces in the east during the latter part of the tenth century.

            Under the successor of John Tzimisces, Basil II (976-1025), the general state of affairs was not favorable for an aggressive policy in the east. The menacing insurrections of Bardas Sclerus and Bardas Phocas in Asia Minor and the continuing Bulgarian war demanded Basil’s undivided attention. Yet when the rebellions had been suppressed, the Emperor frequently participated in the struggle with the Muslims, even though the Bulgarian war had not ceased. The Syrian possessions of the Empire were greatly menaced by the caliph of Egypt, and the vassal city of Aleppo was occupied many times by the enemy’s army. By his personal appearance in Syria, at times unexpected, Basil frequently succeeded in restoring Byzantine influence in this province, but failed to make any significant new conquests. At the very outset of the eleventh century a treaty of peace was reached by the Emperor and the Egyptian Caliph Hakim of the dynasty of the Fatimids. During the remaining part of Basil’s reign there were no more serious collisions with the eastern Arabs. Meanwhile, Aleppo freed itself of its vassal dependence on the Byzantine Empire.

            Although officially peaceful relations were established between Basil and the Caliph Hakim, the latter sometimes pursued a policy of cruel persecution of the Christians, which undoubtedly greatly chagrined Basil as a Christian emperor. In 1009 Hakim ordered the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and Golgotha at Jerusalem. Church relics and riches were seized, monks were exiled, and pilgrims persecuted. The contemporary Arabian historian, Yahya of Antioch, said that the executor of the severe will of Hakim “endeavored to destroy the Holy Sepulcher itself and raze it to the ground; he broke to pieces the greater portion of it and destroyed it.”[30] The terrified Christians and Jews thronged the Muslim offices, promising to deny their religion and accept Islam. Hakim’s decree ordering the destruction of the temple was signed by his Christian minister.

            Basil II did nothing, apparently, for the defense of the persecuted Christians and their sanctuaries. After Hakim’s death (1021) a period of tolerance toward Christians again set in, and in 1023 the patriarch of Jerusalem, Nicephorus, was sent to Constantinople to announce that the churches and their property had been restored to the Christians, that the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and all the destroyed churches in Egypt and Syria had been rebuilt, and that, in general, the Christians were safe in the dominions of the caliph.[31] Of course, these tales of the rapid restoration of temples in such a brief period of time were exaggerated.

            In the west the Sicilian Arabs continued their raids on southern Italy, and the Byzantine government, occupied in solving other problems, could do nothing against them. The intervention of the German Emperor Otto II (related to the Byzantine throne) in Italian affairs resulted after some successes in a severe defeat at the hands of the Arabs. By the end of his reign Basil II had begun to plan an extensive expedition for the reconquest of Sicily, but he died in the course of its preparation.

            The anarchy which set in after Basil’s death emboldened the Muslims to start a series of offensive movements, which were particularly successful in the districts of Aleppo. The situation was somewhat improved for the Empire by the young and gifted general, George Maniaces, who succeeded in occupying Edessa in the early thirties of the eleventh century, taking from it its second relic, the apocryphal letter of Jesus Christ to Abgar, king of Edessa.[32] After the fall of this city Emperor Romanus III proposed a treaty to the Muslims. Its first two conditions, concerning the city of Jerusalem, deserved special attention. First, the Christians should obtain the right to rebuild all the destroyed churches, and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher should be restored at the expense of the imperial treasury. Second, the Emperor should keep the right of appointing the patriarch of Jerusalem. As a result of disagreement regarding several conditions of the treaty, negotiations lasted for a long time. The caliph seems not to have opposed these two demands. When the final agreement was reached in 1036, the Emperor received the right of restoring the Church of the Holy Sepulcher at his expense,[33] and in 1046 the Persian traveler, Nasiri-Khusrau, who had visited the restored church, described it as a most spacious building with a capacity of eight thousand persons; the edifice, he said, was built with the utmost skill, of colored marbles, with ornamentation and sculptures; inside the church was adorned everywhere with pictures and Byzantine brocade worked in gold. The legend recorded by this Persian traveler noted that even the Emperor himself came to Jerusalem, but privily, so that no one should recognize him. The Persian related: “In the days when Hakim was ruler of Egypt, the Greek Caesar came in this manner to Jerusalem. When Hakim received news of this arrival, he sent for one of his cup-bearers and said to him, ‘There is a man of such and such a countenance and condition whom thou wilt find seated in the mosque of the Holy City; go thou, therefore, and approach him, and say that Hakim hath sent thee to him, lest he should think that I, Hakim, knew not of his coming; but tell him to be of good cheer, for I have no evil intention against him.’”[34]

            The Empire’s attempts to reconquer Sicily did not bring about any definite results, in spite of the fact that George Maniaces was victorious in several battles. It is interesting to know that the Sicilian expedition of this period included the Varangian-Russian Druzhina (company) which served the Empire. The famous hero of Scandinavian sagas, Harald Haardraade, also participated in this campaign. In the middle of the eleventh century the Byzantine Empire was confronted by a new enemy, the Seljuq Turks, who were prominent in the subsequent period of Byzantine history.

            Thus, in the time of the Macedonian dynasty, in spite of the troubled period which followed the death of Basil II, the efforts of John Curcuas, Nicephorus Phocas, John Tzimisces, and Basil II widened the eastern borders of the Empire as far as the Euphrates, and Syria, with Antioch, once more formed part of Byzantine territory. This was the most brilliant period in the history of Byzantine relations with the eastern Muslims.

            At the same time very important and animated relations developed between the Empire and Armenia. For many centuries Armenia was the apple of discord between Rome and Persia. Their ancient struggle for this buffer state had finally led to the division of Armenia between them at the end of the fourth century. The smaller western part with the city of Theodosiopolis (now Erzerum) had been taken by the Roman Empire; the larger eastern part had fallen to the Persian Sassanids, and was known in the east as Persarmenia. According to one historian, the political division of Armenia “into two parts, eastern and western, led to a cultural break in the life of the Armenian people due to the difference between the Byzantine and Iranian rule.”[35] Justinian the Great introduced important military and civil reforms in Armenia with the intention of destroying some of the surviving local customs and transforming Armenia into an ordinary imperial province.

            In the seventh century, after the conquest of Syria and the defeat of Persia, the Arabs occupied Armenia. Armenian, Greek, and Arabic sources give contradictory accounts of this event. The Armenians later tried to take advantage of the troubled affairs of the caliphate, which frequently turned the attention of the Arabs away from Armenian problems, and made several attempts to throw off the new yoke. These attempts at revolt were repaid by terrible devastations on the part of the Arabs. N. Marr said that at the beginning of the eighth century Armenia was completely ruined by the Arabs; “the feudal lords were exterminated with much cruelty and the glorious achievements of Christian architecture were destroyed. In short, the fruit of all the cultural efforts of the preceding centuries was reduced to nothing.”[36]

            When the Arabian caliph found himself greatly in need of Armenian aid for his struggle with the Byzantine Empire in the middle of the ninth century, he conferred the title of “Prince of Princes” upon the Armenian ruler Ashot, of the family of Bagratids. The wise administration of this ruler received general recognition, and at the end of the ninth century the caliph conferred upon him the title of king. By this act a new Armenian kingdom, ruled by the dynasty of Bagratids, was definitely established. When news of this reached Basil I, shortly before his death, he hastened to bestow a similar honor upon the new king of Armenia by sending him a royal crown and signing with him a treaty of friendship and union. Basil, in a letter, called Ashot his beloved son, and assured him that of all states Armenia would always remain the closest ally of the Empire.[37] This shows clearly that both the Emperor and the caliph attempted to secure Ashot the Bagratid as an ally in their struggle against each other.[38]

            The anarchy which set in after Ashot’s death forced the Muslims to intervene in the internal affairs of Armenia, and it was only in the reign of Ashot II “the Iron” in the first half of the tenth century[39] that the Armenian territory was cleared to some extent of the Arabs, with the help of the Byzantine army and the assistance of the King of Iberia (Georgia, Gruzia). Ashot himself visited the court of Romanus Lecapenus at Constantinople and was accorded a triumphant reception. He was the first ruler to assume the title of Shahin-shah, meaning “King of Kings,” of Armenia. His successor, Ashot III, transferred the official capital of his kingdom to the fortress of Ani in the second half of the tenth century, where in a subsequent period many magnificent edifices were erected. The city which grew up there became a rich center of civilization. Up to World War I the ruins of Ani were within the boundaries of Russia, and to them the Russian scholar N. Marr devoted much time. His excavations resulted in brilliant discoveries, highly significant not only for the history of Armenia and the civilization of the Caucasian peoples in general, but also for a clearer conception of Byzantine influence in the Christian East.

            The new disturbances in Armenia in connection with the invasions of the Seljuq Turks forced Basil II to assume personal leadership as soon as the Bulgarian war was over. As a result, one part of Armenia was annexed to the Empire and the other part placed in vassal dependence. This new expansion of the Empire in the East, for which the capital accorded Basil a triumphant reception, was the last military victory in the active and glorious reign of the aged basileus.[40] In the forties of the eleventh century, under Constantine IX Monomachus, the new capital of Armenia, Ani, was taken over by the Empire. This put an end to the rule of the Bagratids (Bagratuni). The last member of the dynasty was induced to come to Constantinople, where he received in place of his lost kingdom lands in Cappadocia, a money pension, and a palace on the Bosphorus. The Byzantine Empire, however, was unable to maintain its power in Armenia because the people were greatly dissatisfied with the administrative as well as the religious policy of the central government. Most of the Byzantine troops who occupied Armenia, moreover, were removed and recalled to Europe to defend Constantine Monomachus, first against the insurrection of Leo Tornikios, and then against the Patzinaks (Pechenegs). The Turks, taking advantage of the existing state of affairs, made frequent irruptions into Armenia and gradually conquered it.