As earlier chapters have shown, the empire’s military situation was alleviated
by political upheavals in the Muslim world and the abatement of hammer
blows directed by the Abbasid leadership. The caliphate itself had more
recourse to diplomacy, recognising Ashot I Bagratuni (‘theGreat’) (884–90)
as paramount prince among the Armenians and bestowing a crown on him.
Soon afterwards, Basil I (867–86) responded with d´emarches of his own
towards Ashot.1 The later ninth century probably saw the elaboration of the
basileus’ diplomatic web eastwards, drawing in political elites in central and
eastern Caucasia such as ‘the chiefs of Azia’, lords of the Caspian Gates.2 By
the reign of Leo VI (886–912) the court was maintaining well-to-do Turks
from the Fergana valley as well as Khazars, and these young men were
making substantial down payments of gold in order to receive annual rogai
as members of a unit of the imperial bodyguard.3 The chinks in Muslim
power were shown up in other forms, such as the prisoners-of-war kept
at court. The more prominent among them were enrobed in the white
garments of catechumens at the emperor’s Christmas and Easter banquets,
as if to affirm willingness to adopt the religion of the Christians.4 Triumphal
parades of Basil I, as of Theophilos (829–42), celebrated with spectacular
props the emperors’ occasional forays intoMuslim-held regions, and a poet
could write of Basil as a new David, who with God’s help will vanquish the
enemy hosts.5
A triumphalist note is likewise sounded by orators such as Arethas in
his praises for Basil’s son Leo VI at the turn of the ninth century. However,
there is little talk of outright reconquest of lands from the Muslims.
Arethas’ accent is, rather, on the benefits bestowed by Leo on the city of
Constantinople through translation there of the relics of St Lazaros, from
the border-zone island of Cyprus.6 The humbling of the barbarians was
refracted through Constantinopolitan lenses, presenting Basil and his son
as, respectively, generals and masters of strategy, gaining spoils and additional
supernatural protectors for the City. But in fact Leo was hard-pressed
to cope with the repercussions for the border regions of the Abbasids’ internal
political problems. In many ways the vigorous jihad waged by the ghazis
of the Tarsus region,7 like the burgeoning piratical fleets operating from
Syrian and Cretan ports, were signs of the increased wealth and military
capability available to freebooters and true believers of various stripes at the
interface between the imperial and Islamic dominions.
The dislocation of the resource-rich Abbasid caliphate was, in short, a
mixed blessing for Byzantium. Oft-quoted is the declaration of Patriarch
Nicholas I Mystikos (901–7, 912–25): ‘there are two lordships, that of the
Saracens and that of the Romans, which stand above all lordship on earth,
shining out like the two mighty beacons in the firmament.’8 This is a figure
of speech, but its context is suggestive. Nicholas was writing to Caliph
al-Muqtadir (908–32), urging him in effect to disown the measures taken
against the civilian population of Cyprus by Damian, an apostate Christian
who had gathered a large fleet and operated semi-autonomously, albeit
notionally on the caliph’s behalf. Byzantium’s state of co-existence with the
caliphate was neither peaceful nor wholly stable. But the emperor could
exchange embassies, gifts and courtesies with the caliph, thereby maintaining
dignity. The numerous humiliating if petty challenges to his authority
from pirate fleets could be as politically debilitating as any caliphal hammer
blow. From this perspective, there was Realpolitik in PatriarchNicholas’
rhetoric concerning ‘lordships’. The events of the mid-tenth century tend
to bear out the unarticulated grounds for imperial statesmen’s caution in
exploiting Abbasid disarray. The jihad waged by an ambitious amir intent
on legitimising his new regime in Aleppo would eventually overturn the
underlying equilibrium, and equilibrium was the best that palace-based
emperors could realistically hope for.
World History
