Battle of Akroinon
Encyclopedia
The Battle of Akroinon was fought at Akroinon or Akroinos (near modern Afyon) in Phrygia
Phrygia
In antiquity, Phrygia was a kingdom in the west central part of Anatolia, in what is now modern-day Turkey. The Phrygians initially lived in the southern Balkans; according to Herodotus, under the name of Bryges , changing it to Phruges after their final migration to Anatolia, via the...

, on the western edge of the Anatolia
Anatolia
Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...

n plateau, in 740 between an Umayyad
Umayyad
The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...

 Arab army and the Byzantine
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

 forces. The Arabs had been conducting regular raids into Anatolia for the past century, and the 740 expedition was the largest in recent decades, consisting of three separate divisions. One division, 20,000 strong under Abdallah al-Battal and al-Malik ibn Shu'aib, was confronted at Akroinon by the Byzantines under the command of Emperor Leo III the Isaurian
Leo III the Isaurian
Leo III the Isaurian or the Syrian , was Byzantine emperor from 717 until his death in 741...

 and his son, the future Constantine V
Constantine V
Constantine V was Byzantine emperor from 741 to 775; ); .-Early life:...

. The battle resulted in a decisive Byzantine victory. Coupled with the Ummayad Caliphate's troubles on other fronts and the internal instability before and after the Abbasid Revolt, this put an end to major Arab incursions into Anatolia for three decades.

Background

Since the beginning of the Muslim conquests
Muslim conquests
Muslim conquests also referred to as the Islamic conquests or Arab conquests, began with the Islamic prophet Muhammad. He established a new unified polity in the Arabian Peninsula which under the subsequent Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates saw a century of rapid expansion of Muslim power.They...

, the Byzantine Empire
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

, as the largest, richest and militarily strongest state bordering the expanding Caliphate
Caliphate
The term caliphate, "dominion of a caliph " , refers to the first system of government established in Islam and represented the political unity of the Muslim Ummah...

, had been the Muslims' primary enemy. Following the disastrous Battle of Sebastopolis, the Byzantines had largely confined themselves to a defensive strategy, while the Muslim armies regularly launched raids into Byzantine-held Anatolia
Anatolia
Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...

. Following their failure to capture the Byzantine capital, Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

, in 717–718, the Umayyads for a time diverted their attention elsewhere. From 720/721, however, they resumed these expeditions in a regular pattern: each summer one or two campaigns would be launched, sometimes accompanied by a naval attack or followed by a winter expedition. These were no longer aimed at permanent conquest but rather large-scale raids, plundering and devastating the countryside and only occasionally attacking forts or major settlements. The raids of this period were also largely confined to the central Anatolian plateau (Cappadocia
Cappadocia
Cappadocia is a historical region in Central Anatolia, largely in Nevşehir Province.In the time of Herodotus, the Cappadocians were reported as occupying the whole region from Mount Taurus to the vicinity of the Euxine...

), and only rarely reached the peripheral coastlands.

Under the more aggressive Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik
Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik
Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik 10th Umayyad caliph who ruled from 723 until his death in 743. When he was born in 691 his mother named him after her father....

 (r. 723–743), these raids became more important and were led by some of the Caliphate's most capable generals, including princes of the Umayyad dynasty, like Maslamah ibn Abd al-Malik
Maslamah ibn Abd al-Malik
Maslamah ibn Abd al-Malik was an Umayyad prince and one of the most prominent Arab generals of the early decades of the 8th century, leading several campaigns against the Byzantine Empire and the Khazar Khaganate...

 or Hisham's own sons Mu'awiyah
Mu'awiyah ibn Hisham
Mu'awiyah ibn Hisham was an Arab general, the son of the Umayyad Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik .He is known chiefly for his role in the Byzantine-Arab Wars, where he led many invasions against Byzantine Asia Minor. The first campaign he led was recorded in summer 725, which was carried out in...

, Maslamah and Sulayman
Sulayman ibn Hisham
Sulayman ibn Hisham was an Arab general, the son of the Umayyad Caliph Hisham ibn Abd al-Malik . He is known for his participation in the expeditions against the Byzantine Empire as well as his prominent role in the civil wars that occurred during the last years of the Umayyad Caliphate. Defeated...

. Gradually, however, the Muslim successes became fewer, especially as their resources were drawn into the mounting conflict with the Khazars
Khazars
The Khazars were semi-nomadic Turkic people who established one of the largest polities of medieval Eurasia, with the capital of Atil and territory comprising much of modern-day European Russia, western Kazakhstan, eastern Ukraine, Azerbaijan, large portions of the northern Caucasus , parts of...

. The raids continued, but the Arab and Byzantine chroniclers mention fewer successful captures of forts or towns. Nevertheless, after a major victory over the Khazars in 737 relieved them of pressure in the Caucasus
Caucasus
The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

, the Arabs intensified their campaigns against Byzantium: in 738 and 739, Maslamah ibn Hisham achieved a number of successes including the capture of the town of Ancyra. For the year 740, Hisham assembled the largest expedition of his reign, placing it under his son Sulayman ibn Hisham.

The battle

According to the Chronicle of Theophanes the Confessor
Theophanes the Confessor
Saint Theophanes Confessor was a member of the Byzantine aristocracy, who became a monk and chronicler. He is venerated on March 12 in the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox Church .-Biography:Theophanes was born in Constantinople of wealthy and noble iconodule parents: Isaac,...

, the Umayyad force totalled 90,000 men. 10,000 lightly armed men under al-Ghamr ibn Yazid were sent to raid the western coast, followed by 20,000 under Abdallah al-Battal and al-Malik ibn Su'aib who marched towards Akroinon, while the main force of some 60,000 (this last number is certainly much inflated), under Sulayman ibn Hisham, raided Cappadocia.

The Emperor Leo confronted the second force at Akroinon. Details of the battle are not known, but the Emperor secured a crushing victory: both Arab commanders fell, as well as the larger part of their army. About 6,800, however, resisted and managed to conduct an orderly retreat to Synnada
Synnada
Synnada was an ancient town of Phrygia Salutaris in Asia Minor. Its site is now occupied by the modern Turkish town of Şuhut, in Afyonkarahisar Province...

, where they joined Sulayman. The other two forces devastated the countryside and returned safely back, but failed to take any towns or forts. The Arab invasion army suffered from severe hunger and lack of supplies before returning to Syria. The 10th-century Arab Christian historian Agapius
Agapius the historian
Agapius son of Constantine was a 10th century Arabic Christian writer, best known for his lengthy Kitab al-'Unwan . He was the Melkite bishop of Manbij .He was contemporary with the annalist Eutychius , also a Melchite...

 also records that the Byzantines took 20,000 prisoners from the invading forces.

Effect and aftermath

Akroinon was a major success for the Byzantines, as it was the first large-scale victory they had scored in a pitched battle
Pitched battle
A pitched battle is a battle where both sides choose to fight at a chosen location and time and where either side has the option to disengage either before the battle starts, or shortly after the first armed exchanges....

 against the Arabs. Seeing it as evidence of God's renewed favour, the victory also served to strengthen Leo's belief in the policy of iconoclasm that he had adopted some years before. In the immediate aftermath, this success opened up the way for a more aggressive stance by the Byzantines, who in 741 attacked the major Arab base of Melitene. In 742 and 743, the Umayyads were able to exploit a civil war between Constantine V and Artabasdos
Artabasdos
Artavasdos, Latinized as Artabasdos or Artabasdus , was Byzantine Emperor of Armenian descent from June 741 or 742 until November 743...

 and raid into Anatolia with relative impunity, but the Arab sources do not report any major achievements.

The Arab defeat at Akroinon has traditionally been seen as a "decisive" battle and a "turning point" in the Byzantine-Arab Wars
Byzantine-Arab Wars
The Byzantine–Arab Wars were a series of wars between the Arab Caliphates and the East Roman or Byzantine Empire between the 7th and 12th centuries AD. These started during the initial Muslim conquests under the expansionist Rashidun and Umayyad caliphs and continued in the form of an enduring...

, causing the slackening of Arab pressure on Byzantium. Other scholars however, from the early 20th-century Syriac scholar E.W. Brooks to more recent ones such as Walter Kaegi
Walter Kaegi
Walter Emil Kaegi is a historian and scholar of Byzantine History, and professor of history in the University of Chicago. He is also a Voting Member of The Oriental Institute. He received his PhD from Harvard University in 1965...

 and Ralph-Johannes Lilie, have challenged this view, citing the fact that Akroinon coincided with other heavy reversals on the most remote provinces of the Caliphate, which exhausted its overextended military resources, as well as with internal turmoil due to civil wars and the Abbasid Revolt. At any rate, the Arab attacks against the Byzantine Empire in the 740s were rather ineffectual and soon ceased completely. Constantine V was able to take advantage of the Umayyad Caliphate's collapse to launch a series of expeditions into Syria and secure Byzantine ascendancy on the eastern frontier, which lasted until the 770s.

In the Muslim world, the memory of the defeated Arab commander, Abdallah al-Battal, was preserved, and he became one of the greatest heroes of Arab and later Turkish epic poetry as Sayyid Battal Ghazi
Battal Gazi
Battal Gazi or Seyyid Battal Ghazi was an Arab Muslim, saintly figure and warrior based in Anatolia during the late Umayyad period whose attributed legends, which also form the bulk of the information available on the historic personality, later became an important part in Turkish...

.
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