The Byzantine empire

[Mathalamus]

You should listen to the podcast and then then post a review The impression I got was that their Empire could easily have survived to the modern era if it hadn't made certain suicidal mistakes at crucial points of its history. No, I won't be more concrete.

suicidal mistakes such as what? losing the battle of yaromuk?

 

[Lord Baal]

suicidal mistakes such as what? losing the battle of yaromuk?

I'd expect he's talking about the same sort of thing as Dachs was earlier: the stupidity of certain rulers in concentrating their military strategy on unimportant areas such as Cilicia, while leaving the Anatolian plateau to the Turks.

 

[say1988]

thank the Gods for that one, the thought of Arabs conquering the whole of Europe before 1000 A.D. is scary

I wouldn't necessarily say that. Plenty of good things could have resulted. Perhaps they could have held Europe more united. Preventing various wars. Perhaps without religious differences the Middle East and other Islamic states could have benefited more from colonization, and with closer links preventing them from falling behind Europe. Islam and Islamic States are not inherently inferior to Christianity and Christian States.

 

[Mathalamus]

well judging from modern standards they sure look inferior.

 

[say1988]

Different circumstances.

 

[Mathalamus]

if the Islamic empire expanded into europe ( beyond spain that is) it would most certainty fall apart.

 

[say1988]

Yes, there is no way all of Europe could be held together for long, but that doesn't mean we wont end up with a far superior (or far inferior) Europe. Who knows what portions will end up together or what ideas would arise following the conquest. Islam does not inherently mean that Europe would be worse. That's like saying if the West had adopted an Orthodox church they would have all become communists or been taken over by Muslims.

 

[Dachs]

You should listen to the podcast and then then post a review The impression I got was that their Empire could easily have survived to the modern era if it hadn't made certain suicidal mistakes at crucial points of its history. No, I won't be more concrete.

Ugh, that's a lot of time to listen. I'll listen to just the Konstantinos XI one...

Hmp. I can see why you're getting that impression. Brownworth described the Kantakouzenos-Palaiologos civil war in rather unsatisfactory terms. You know, the one when the Ottomans were "given" Gallipoli/Kallipolis/Gelibolu by a Byzantine contestant for the throne? That, ah, wasn't what happened. I wrote a history article about this, but in simplest terms, the civil war was started initially by one bureaucrat who managed to hijack control of the capital while the (competent) regent was off conquering stuff from the Latins in Greece, and that regent had to come back from a rather nasty deficit to win the civil war. Then, unexpectedly, the civil war was started up again by the losers, the Black Death hit (and did a number on the Byzantines while seemingly not really troubling the Turks), the Latins turned on them, and then an earthquake hit. The earthquake was what allowed the Ottomans to take Gallipoli (whose walls were destroyed) and a foothold in Europe, not any action of the Byzantine contestants in the civil war.

Other than that, I mean, the podcast is actually quite good, pretty excellent if you're into narrative history, and fairly evocative. Certain episodes are emphasized to the relative minimization of others, understandable since his audience isn't going to be made up of historians.

Most countries in Europe learned how to ignore religious difference when necessary. Which is (for example) why Catholic France allied with the Protestants against the Catholic Habsburgs, and even cooperated with Muslim Turks to harm their interests.

It seems to me that the Byzantines never realized that you can't be too picky about your prospective allies when your mortal enemies are knocking at the door. Though I agree with your point that the Western Christian countries were pretty difficult potential allies.

That wasn't the issue - the Byzantines weren't the picky ones. The Latins were the ones who made conversion the price of support. (Brownworth does make this point.) The Byzantines were more than willing to ally with Catholics who didn't tack on outrageous conditions, such as Pedro of Aragon (allied against Charles of Anjou, king of Sicily) or Marshal Jean Boucicault of France (led a contingent defending against the Turks during the siege of Bayezid I). Byzantines were also more than willing to ally with Muslim powers, such as the Emirate of Aydin, or even the Ottomans. (The reason the Ottomans were even anywhere near Gallipoli when the earthquake hit was because they were fighting as allies of the Byzantine Emperor. They then abandoned that treaty of alliance as soon as the opportunity presented itself.) I daresay that if the French had withheld Sweden her subsidies unless Gustav Adolf had led his state into Catholicism, they would have gotten a response far more colorful than the Byzantines had ever given to the West. They're not really comparable situations.

 

[Mathalamus]

did Byzantium's occasional alliance with the Muslims piss off the rest of Europe?

 

[Lord Baal]

did Byzantium's occasional alliance with the Muslims piss off the rest of Europe?

No. The rest of Europe, except for those directly in line to be attacked by the Byzantines and Muslims, such as the Crusader states and Bulgaria, tended to not care much about events in the East whatseover.

 

[Winner]

I wouldn't necessarily say that. Plenty of good things could have resulted. Perhaps they could have held Europe more united. Preventing various wars.

They didn't manage to keep their own turf (or more accurately, their own patch of desert) united. Islamic Spain also disintegrated into many smaller states (taifas?), even though there was a common enemy present.

So I doubt they could keep Europe - which is pretty resistant to unification as it is - united and peaceful.

Perhaps without religious differences the Middle East and other Islamic states could have benefited more from colonization, and with closer links preventing them from falling behind Europe. Islam and Islamic States are not inherently inferior to Christianity and Christian States.

I don't know about that. Judging from the parallel histories of Christian Europe and the Islamic lands around it, Christianity looks like the lesser evil, at least in the long term. If Europe had been conquered and Islamized, it could have just as well ended up looking like the contemporary Middle East/North Africa.

No, thank you

 

[Winner]

Ugh, that's a lot of time to listen. I'll listen to just the Konstantinos XI one...

Hmp. I can see why you're getting that impression. Brownworth described the Kantakouzenos-Palaiologos civil war in rather unsatisfactory terms. You know, the one when the Ottomans were "given" Gallipoli/Kallipolis/Gelibolu by a Byzantine contestant for the throne? That, ah, wasn't what happened. I wrote a history article about this, but in simplest terms, the civil war was started initially by one bureaucrat who managed to hijack control of the capital while the (competent) regent was off conquering stuff from the Latins in Greece, and that regent had to come back from a rather nasty deficit to win the civil war. Then, unexpectedly, the civil war was started up again by the losers, the Black Death hit (and did a number on the Byzantines while seemingly not really troubling the Turks), the Latins turned on them, and then an earthquake hit. The earthquake was what allowed the Ottomans to take Gallipoli (whose walls were destroyed) and a foothold in Europe, not any action of the Byzantine contestants in the civil war.

Other than that, I mean, the podcast is actually quite good, pretty excellent if you're into narrative history, and fairly evocative. Certain episodes are emphasized to the relative minimization of others, understandable since his audience isn't going to be made up of historians.

Now, in the previous parts, he talks about similar things. I've mostly forgotten the details by now, but I think he also said that during the campaigns in Italy, when complete victory was literally at hand, some plotting in Constantinople actually ensured the ultimate defeat (not enough money/men were sent to the field generals out of fear they could get too powerful or something like that). This is a pretty recurrent theme in the podcast's many chapters - usually when the Empire had a good chance to score a really important victory, one that could make it more powerful and help it to survive in the long term, it squandered it. When good men were in charge, ambitious idiots conspired against them. Competent officers/generals were viewed with suspicion and often "removed" from their positions. And so on and so forth.

This is what I meant when I said that my impression is that the Empire eventually died mostly as a result of its own faults. It had a bad luck, granted, but if it hadn't been already eaten away internally, it would never have ended up like it did.

That wasn't the issue - the Byzantines weren't the picky ones. The Latins were the ones who made conversion the price of support. (Brownworth does make this point.) The Byzantines were more than willing to ally with Catholics who didn't tack on outrageous conditions, such as Pedro of Aragon (allied against Charles of Anjou, king of Sicily) or Marshal Jean Boucicault of France (led a contingent defending against the Turks during the siege of Bayezid I). Byzantines were also more than willing to ally with Muslim powers, such as the Emirate of Aydin, or even the Ottomans. (The reason the Ottomans were even anywhere near Gallipoli when the earthquake hit was because they were fighting as allies of the Byzantine Emperor. They then abandoned that treaty of alliance as soon as the opportunity presented itself.) I daresay that if the French had withheld Sweden her subsidies unless Gustav Adolf had led his state into Catholicism, they would have gotten a response far more colorful than the Byzantines had ever given to the West. They're not really comparable situations.

Well, I do find it hard to see the significance in absurd theological divides, so I'll just concede you have a point. On the other hand, the attitude of some Orthodox peoples who preferred to live under (religiously) benevolent Muslim rule rather than to pretend to have converted to the Western form of Christianity seems insane to me.

It's like if the US democrats chose to live under Soviet occupation rather than to concede defeat to the Republicans.

 

[Plotinus]

You forget that religious (and indeed political) groups tend to hate those who are very similar to themselves far more than they hate those who are more obviously different. Familiarity breeds contempt. Of course (say) a Monophysite would rather live under Muslims than Chalcedonians; at least, in Monophysite eyes, Muslims weren't wicked heretics distorting the gospel of Christ, whereas Chalcedonians were.

 

[Dachs]

Now, in the previous parts, he talks about similar things. I've mostly forgotten the details by now, but I think he also said that during the campaigns in Italy, when complete victory was literally at hand, some plotting in Constantinople actually ensured the ultimate defeat (not enough money/men were sent to the field generals out of fear they could get too powerful or something like that). This is a pretty recurrent theme in the podcast's many chapters - usually when the Empire had a good chance to score a really important victory, one that could make it more powerful and help it to survive in the long term, it squandered it. When good men were in charge, ambitious idiots conspired against them. Competent officers/generals were viewed with suspicion and often "removed" from their positions. And so on and so forth.

That was certainly part of it, but you have to remember that the far bigger concern at the time was the plague. Justinian's campaigns to conquer Italy failed not because of backdoor maneuvering or failure to reinforce his generals as much as he ought to have; the campaign was essentially won in 540, and by Belisarios at that. (Though his methods had to be somewhat suspicious to Justinian. Pretending to accept the Ostrogoths' nomination as Roman Emperor, then using it as a pretext to have them all killed at the celebratory banquet after he and his troops were let into the city? Hell, I can understand why Justinian would've been stingy with reinforcements after that...only a few decades before, both eastern and western Empires, as you heard in the podcast on Zenon, were wracked with near-constant military intrigue. It was very well within the realm of possibility for Belisarios or whomever to just take his army and march off to try to become emperor. Trust issues were not entirely unrealistic, even if they were a factor, and I don't think that that was the main problem.) And then the plague, the famous 'Justinian's Flea', hit, and the empire suddenly saw its tax base slashed by as much as a third, its manpower disastrously depleted; to boot, the Monophysites, reenergized by Baradaios' mission, were making trouble again, and the Sasanians were attacking in the East. Under the circumstances, I think Justinian, or even the Byzantines in general (insofar as anyone should really place blame on an entire society for much of anything), can't be faulted for the long-term effects of the Gothic Wars. After 540, they had to be downgraded in priority no matter what. Belisarios got the gooey end of the stick there because he was the best general they had, so if you want to keep as much of Italy as you can with virtually no resources, you might as well assign one of the most transcendant military officers in history there - even if the whole thing will be an intensely frustrating experience for the officer in question, and prevent him from taking his place next to Alexander or whomever on masturbatory military historians' lists of Greatest Generals in History a millennium in the future.

This is what I meant when I said that my impression is that the Empire eventually died mostly as a result of its own faults. It had a bad luck, granted, but if it hadn't been already eaten away internally, it would never have ended up like it did.

Eh. It also had more than a millennium-long run. Not too shabby for a state that tends to go down in history as an internally divided wreck, full of intrigue and plotting and coups. I'm sure that for every crucial flaw in the Byzantine state and society (again, insofar as a society can have a 'flaw') there was a matching advantage that helped sustain its longevity further than most states of Antiquity.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

in Monophysite eyes, Muslims weren't wicked heretics distorting the gospel of Christ, whereas Chalcedonians were.

It was interesting to discover whilst reading the Divine Comedy that back then (or at least in 14th century Italy) they believed that Mohammad was a rebellious schismatic cardinal from Ethiopia, and thus that Islam was an enormous corruption of Christianity. That's why Dante put Mohammad in the Eighth Circle with the other Frauds (and, incidentally, Ali, too, blaming him for the Sunni/Shia split).

 

[Plotinus]

I don't think a seventh- or eighth-century Monophysite would have agreed with that assessment; they were too familiar with Islam to mistake it for a version of Christianity. However, some Christian theologians of that time did engage with Islam as if it were a sort of Christian theology - Anastasius of Sinai is a good example, who discusses Muslim theology in the context of Monophysite christology (he thinks that the reason why the Muslims reject orthodox Christian christology is that the nefarious Monophysites, above all Severus of Antioch, have misrepresented it to them).

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I find that absolutely hilarious, since the multiple natures ascribed to Christ are a big "look at what those morons believe!" point for Muslims against Christians, so I would think a Monophysite interpretation of Christianity would be more likely to be accepted by Muslims than a Chalcedonian one!

 

[Winner]

That was certainly part of it, but you have to remember that the far bigger concern at the time was the plague. Justinian's campaigns to conquer Italy failed not because of backdoor maneuvering or failure to reinforce his generals as much as he ought to have; the campaign was essentially won in 540, and by Belisarios at that. (Though his methods had to be somewhat suspicious to Justinian. Pretending to accept the Ostrogoths' nomination as Roman Emperor, then using it as a pretext to have them all killed at the celebratory banquet after he and his troops were let into the city? Hell, I can understand why Justinian would've been stingy with reinforcements after that...only a few decades before, both eastern and western Empires, as you heard in the podcast on Zenon, were wracked with near-constant military intrigue. It was very well within the realm of possibility for Belisarios or whomever to just take his army and march off to try to become emperor. Trust issues were not entirely unrealistic, even if they were a factor, and I don't think that that was the main problem.) And then the plague, the famous 'Justinian's Flea', hit, and the empire suddenly saw its tax base slashed by as much as a third, its manpower disastrously depleted; to boot, the Monophysites, reenergized by Baradaios' mission, were making trouble again, and the Sasanians were attacking in the East. Under the circumstances, I think Justinian, or even the Byzantines in general (insofar as anyone should really place blame on an entire society for much of anything), can't be faulted for the long-term effects of the Gothic Wars. After 540, they had to be downgraded in priority no matter what. Belisarios got the gooey end of the stick there because he was the best general they had, so if you want to keep as much of Italy as you can with virtually no resources, you might as well assign one of the most transcendant military officers in history there - even if the whole thing will be an intensely frustrating experience for the officer in question, and prevent him from taking his place next to Alexander or whomever on masturbatory military historians' lists of Greatest Generals in History a millennium in the future.

Eh. It also had more than a millennium-long run. Not too shabby for a state that tends to go down in history as an internally divided wreck, full of intrigue and plotting and coups. I'm sure that for every crucial flaw in the Byzantine state and society (again, insofar as a society can have a 'flaw') there was a matching advantage that helped sustain its longevity further than most states of Antiquity.

Sure, after all, it was a continuation of the Roman Empire and, if I get it right, it maintained high levels of literacy and in general it was far more "civilized" than most of Western Europe at the time.

That only makes its fate more poignant. One would expect an empire with such a long history and experience to correct its greatest 'flaw', the succession which, judging by a short look at the Wikipedia page, wasn't usually very orderly and peaceful.

In the youtube video of a lecture given by the author of the podcast (http://www.12byzantinerulers.com/ -- videos 2 and 3) he mentions that the emperors were too focused on Constantinople, on political manoeuvring, and tended to ignore what was happening elsewhere. This seems pretty insane to me - why should I care about petty squabbles with my local opponents when the enemy is occupying my richest provinces? Meh.

Anyway, in the following parts of the lectures he touches the subject of religion and how the Latin and Orthodox churches eventually came to hate each other. This must be one of the most prominent cases of shooting oneself in the foot, so to speak.

 

[shortguy]

In the youtube video of a lecture given by the author of the podcast (http://www.12byzantinerulers.com/ -- videos 2 and 3) he mentions that the emperors were too focused on Constantinople, on political manoeuvring, and tended to ignore what was happening elsewhere. This seems pretty insane to me - why should I care about petty squabbles with my local opponents when the enemy is occupying my richest provinces? Meh.

What's petty about palace intrigues? If I'm the Emperor, I'm in far, far more danger from my "local opponents" (who are very powerful and influential people in their own right, not just some impotent collection of two-bit petty tyrants) than from some barbarian 1000 miles away.

 

[ParkCungHee]

And if I'm a local opponent, clearly I am in greater danger of the Emperor, who has all these soldiers right here, then a smaller army very far away.