Byzantine Military: June 2018

Friday, June 15, 2018

The Grand Byzantine Fortress of Selçuk (Ayasuluk)

Ayasuluk Castle, locally known as Ayasuluk Kalesi or Selçuk Kalesi, lies on a hill in the town of Selçuk, in the province of Izmir in Turkey. It is situated just a mile from the site of the ancient Greek city of Ephesus.

Ephesus was initially a harbour city but the continually silting up of its harbour eventually made it an inland site situated 5 km from the sea at present. At the beginning of the Byzantine era, Ephesus was still predominantly at its harbour location. During the 6th century the city declined and was split up. The old city at the harbour was enclosed by a defensive wall, making it considerably smaller and thus better to defend. The Ayasuluk hill had been part of the outskirts of the city and was now a mile outside the city.

The Byzantines then built Ayasuluk Castle, using stones from disused Greek and Roman buildings, for its construction. On the slope of the hill they built the Basilica of St. John. Defensive walls coming down from the castle, encompassed the basilica. Effectively turning the site in a citadel with the castle as an upper castle and the area with the basilica as a lower castle.

The combination of the marble façades and the mortared rubble made the walls 4 meters thick. The citadel walls were 1.5 km around with 17 towers. Entry to the citadel from the south was through the Gate of Persecution, which first led into the Basilica. In the 8th century the square towers on either side of the gate were made pentagonal, aiding in their defensive capabilities.

Over the following centuries, however, people from the harbour site gradually migrated towards the citadel on the hill as the harbour continued to silt up and they battled malaria. By the end of the Byzantine period the harbour was abandoned, and Ephesus was centered around Ayasuluk Hill.

In 1090 Ephesus was conquered by Seljuk Turks under Tengribirmish, but by then it had declined to nothing more than a small village. In 1097 the Byzantines took back control and renamed the village Agios Theologus. They kept control until the early 14th century. Then it was finally taken by the Seljuks, who renamed the site Ayasuluk. They repaired the walls of the castle, dredged the harbour and put it to use again. This resulted in the town prospering again.

Around the beginning of the 15th century Ayasuluk came under Ottoman rule. By that time the harbour had silted up again and had become a swamp. The town declined again to a village. The Ottomans however did keep the castle garrisoned. In the mid-17th century it had a garrison of 40 soldiers. As the population kept declining, the castle was abandoned during the 18th century. In 1914 Ayasuluk was renamed Selçuk.

A nice castle. Inside there are a small ruined mosque, a part of a former church turned into a cistern, a couple of Ottoman cisterns and groundplans of a couple of houses. It can be visited as a visitor of the site of the basilica. For that you have to pay a fee.

Eastern Roman Empire about 1025.
Selçuk Fortress is located one mile from the ancient
Greek city of Ephesus on the Aegean coast.

The castle was built during the time of the Byzantine Empire and later remodeled by the Turks.

The combination of the marble façades and the mortared rubble made the walls 4 meters thick. The citadel walls were 1.5 km around with 17 towers.

(journey) (Ayasuluk) (ayasuluk castle)

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Justinian The Great and Theodora

Emperor 527 to 565. Justinian was the last Roman Emperor to speak Latin as a first language. Justinian's reign is marked by the ambitious but only partly realized renovatio imperii, or "restoration of the Empire". His general Belisarius conquered the Vandal Kingdom in North Africa, extending Roman control to the Atlantic Ocean. Subsequently Belisarius, Narses, and other generals conquered the Ostrogothic Kingdom, restoring Dalmatia, Sicily, Italy, and Rome to the Empire after more than half a century of barbarian control. The prefect Liberius reclaimed most of southern Iberia, establishing the province of Spania. Under his rule there was a uniform rewriting of Roman law, the Corpus Juris Civilis, which is still the basis of civil law in many modern states. His reign also marked a blossoming of Byzantine culture, and his building program yielded such masterpieces as the church of Hagia Sophia.

Maurice

Emperor from 582 to 602. A prominent general in his youth, Maurice fought with success against the Sassanid Persians. Once he became Emperor, he brought the war with Persia to a victorious conclusion: the Empire's eastern border in the Caucasus was vastly expanded and for the first time in nearly two centuries the Romans were no longer obliged to pay the Persians thousands of pounds of gold annually for peace. Maurice campaigned extensively in the Balkans against the Avars – pushing them back across the Danube by 599. He also conducted campaigns across the Danube, the first Emperor to do so in over two hundred years. In the West, he established two large semi-autonomous provinces called exarchates, ruled by exarchs, or viceroys, of the Emperor. Maurice established the Exarchate of Ravenna, Italy in 584, the first real effort by the Empire to halt the advance of the Lombards. With the creation of the Exarchate of Africa in 590, he further solidified the empire's hold on the western Mediterranean.

Heraclius

Emperor 610 to 641. Heraclius' reign was marked by several military campaigns. The year Heraclius came to power the Empire was threatened on multiple frontiers. Heraclius immediately took charge of the ongoing war against the Sassanid Persians. The first battles of the campaign ended in defeat for the Byzantines; the Persian army fought their way to the Bosphorus. However, because Constantinople was protected by impenetrable walls and a strong navy, Heraclius was able to avoid total defeat. Heraclius drove the Persians out of Asia Minor and pushed deep into their territory, defeating them decisively in 627 at the Battle of Nineveh. Soon after his victory he faced a new threat of the Muslim invasions. In 634 the Muslims invaded Roman Syria, defeating Heraclius' brother Theodore. Within a short period of time the Arabs would also conquer Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Egypt.

Irene of Athens

Irene of Athens Byzantine Empress Regnant from 797 to 802. Prior to becoming Empress regnant, Irene was empress consort from 775 to 780, and empress dowager and regent from 780 to 797. It is often claimed she called herself basileus 'emperor'. In fact, she normally referred to herself as basilissa, 'empress', although there are three instances of the title basileus being used by her. Irene was born to the noble Greek Sarantapechos family of Athens. She married Leo IV in 769. Upon Leo's death she became regent for the future Constantine VI. Irene was almost immediately confronted with a conspiracy against her close to home and in Sicily. Irene withstood an invasion by a large Arab army. She subdued the Slavs of the Balkans and laid the foundations of Byzantine expansion and re-Hellenization in the area. Irene's most notable act was the restoration of the Orthodox veneration of icons (images of Christ or the saints). Pope Leo III, who needed help against enemies in Rome and who saw the throne of the Byzantine Emperor as vacant (lacking a male occupant), crowned Charlemagne as Roman Emperor in 800.

Nikephoros II Phokas

Emperor from 963 to 969. His brilliant military exploits resulted in the conquest of Cilicia and the re-conquest of the island of Cyprus from the Muslims. He conducted raids into Upper Mesopotamia and Syria. In the West he lost Sicily completely to the Muslims and faced Magyar raids deep into the Balkans. He was assassinated in his apartment on December 11, 969. On the night of the assassination the Empress Theophano suspiciously left the Imperial bedchamber, leaving the doors unbolted. General John Tzimiskes entered, killed the Emperor, and then declared himself Emperor. It was thought the General and the Empress had been lovers.

Basil II - The Bulgar Slayer

Emperor 976 to 1025. Basil oversaw the stabilization and expansion of the Byzantine Empire's eastern frontier, and above all, the final and complete subjugation of Bulgaria, the Empire's foremost European foe, after a prolonged struggle. For this he was nicknamed by later authors as "the Bulgar-slayer" by which he is popularly known. At his death, the Empire stretched from Southern Italy to the Caucasus and from the Danube to the borders of Palestine, its greatest territorial extent since the Muslim conquests four centuries earlier.

John II Komnenos and Irene of Hungary

Emperor from 1118 to 1143. The greatest of the Komnenian emperors. In the course of his twenty-five year reign, John made alliances with the Holy Roman Empire in the west, decisively defeated the Pechenegs in the Balkans, and personally led numerous campaigns against the Turks in Asia Minor. John's campaigns fundamentally changed the balance of power in the east, forcing the Turks onto the defensive and restoring to the Byzantines many towns, fortresses and cities right across the peninsula. In the southeast, John extended Byzantine control from the Maeander in the west all the way to Cilicia and Tarsus in the east. In an effort to demonstrate the Byzantine emperor's role as the leader of the Christian world, John marched into Muslim Syria at the head of the combined forces of Byzantium and the Crusader states.

Constantine XI Palaiologos

The Last Emperor of the Romans 1449 to 1453. Constantine faced the siege of Constantinople defending his city of 60,000 people with an army only numbering 7,000 men against an Ottoman army of over 80,000. He personally led the defense of the city and took an active part in the fighting alongside his troops in the land walls. At the same time, he used his diplomatic skills to maintain the necessary unity between the Genovese, Venetian and the Greek troops. When the city fell to the Turks he tore off his imperial ornaments so there would be nothing to distinguish him from any other soldier and led his remaining soldiers into a last charge where he was killed.