The Battle of Caltavuturo was fought in 881 or 882 between the Byzantine Empire and the Aghlabid emirate of Ifriqiya, during the Muslim conquest of Sicily. It was a major Byzantine victory, although it could not reverse the Muslim conquest of Sicily.
In 880, a succession of naval successes under the admiral Nasar allowed the Byzantine emperor Basil I the Macedonian to envisage a counter-offensive against the Aghlabids in southern Italy and Sicily. [1] In Sicily, however, the Aghlabids still held the upper hand: in spring 881, the Aghlabid governor al-Hasan ibn al-Abbas raided the remaining Byzantine territories and in the process defeated the local commander, Barsakios, near Taormina. [2]
In the next year, however, AH 268 (881/2 CE), according to the Ibn al-Athir ( The Complete History , VII.370.5–7), the Byzantines had their revanche, defeating an Aghlabid army under Abu Thawr so completely that reportedly only seven men survived. [3] [4] The victorious Byzantine commander is identified by modern historians with Mosilikes, who is known to have served in the area in the early 880s. [5] According to the hagiography of the Patriarch of Constantinople Ignatios, the general invoked the patriarch during the battle, and he appeared on a white horse in the air before him, advising him to launch his attack towards the right. Mosilikes followed the advice, and won. [3] [4] The battle gave its name to the locality: the 12th-century geographer Muhammad al-Idrisi records the Qalʿat Abī Thawr ("Castle of Abū Ṯhawr"), which is the origin of the modern name Caltavuturo. [6] [7]
Over the next years, the Muslims launched several raids against Catania, Taormina, and "the king's city" (possibly Polizzi) in 883, against Rometta and Catania in 884, and again against Catania and Taormina in 885. These expeditions were successful in so far as they yielded sufficient booty or tribute to pay the army, but failed to capture any Byzantine strongholds. [8]
Year 877 (DCCCLXXVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar.
Year 953 (CMLIII) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar.
Year 902 (CMII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar.
Abu Ishaq Ibrahim II ibn Ahmad was the Emir of Ifriqiya. He ruled from 875 until his abdication in 902. After the demise of his brother, Ibrahim was endorsed as emir where he took steps to improve safety in his domain and secured the development of commercial activities. He improved public works, such as building a vast reservoir, erecting walls as well as the development of mosques and his Raqqada palace.
Caltavuturo is a town and comune in the Metropolitan City of Palermo, Sicily, Italy. The neighboring comunes are Polizzi Generosa, Scillato and Sclafani Bagni.
Euphemius or Euphemios was a Byzantine commander in Sicily, who rebelled against the imperial governor in 826 AD, and invited the Aghlabids to aid him, thus beginning the Muslim conquest of Sicily.
Leo of Tripoli, known in Arabic as Rashīq al-Wardāmī, and Ghulām Zurāfa, was a Greek renegade and fleet commander for the Abbasid Caliphate in the early tenth century. He is most notable for his sack of Thessalonica, the Byzantine Empire's second city, in 904.
The Muslim conquest of Sicily began in June 827 and lasted until 902, when the last major Byzantine stronghold on the island, Taormina, fell. Isolated fortresses remained in Byzantine hands until 965, but the island was henceforth under Muslim rule until conquered in turn by the Normans in the 11th century.
The Battle of Mauropotamos was fought in 844, between the armies of the Byzantine Empire and the Abbasid Caliphate, at Mauropotamos. After a failed Byzantine attempt to recover the Emirate of Crete in the previous year, the Abbasids launched a raid into Asia Minor. The Byzantine regent, Theoktistos, headed the army that went to meet the invasion but was heavily defeated, and many of his officers defected to the Arabs. Internal unrest prevented the Abbasids from exploiting their victory, however. A truce and a prisoner exchange were consequently agreed in 845, followed by a six-year cessation of hostilities, as both powers focused their attention elsewhere.
The Sack of Thessalonica refers to the capture, and subsequent sack, of the Byzantine city of Thessalonica by the Abbasid Caliphate in the year 904, led by Leo of Tripoli, a privateer and Muslim convert.
The siege of Syracuse in 827–828 marks the first attempt by the Aghlabids to conquer the city of Syracuse in Sicily, then a Byzantine province. The Aghlabid army had only months before landed on Sicily, ostensibly in support of the rebel Byzantine general Euphemius. After defeating local forces and taking the fortress of Mazara, they marched on Syracuse, which was the capital of the island under Roman and Byzantine rule. The siege lasted through the winter of 827–828 and until summer, during which time the besieging forces suffered greatly from lack of food and an outbreak of an epidemic, which claimed the life of their commander, Asad ibn al-Furat. In the face of Byzantine reinforcements, the new Arab leader, Muhammad ibn Abi'l-Jawari, abandoned the siege and withdrew to the southwestern part of the island, which remained in their hands. From there they pursued the slow conquest of Sicily, which led to the fall of Syracuse after another long siege in 877–878, and culminated in the fall of Taormina in 902.
The siege of Syracuse from 877 to 878 led to the fall of the city of Syracuse, the Byzantine capital of Sicily, to the Aghlabids. The siege lasted from August 877 to 21 May 878 when the city, effectively left without assistance by the central Byzantine government, was taken by the Aghlabid forces.
Yazaman or Yazman, surnamed al-Khadim was governor of Tarsus for the Abbasids and chief military leader in the Muslim borderlands with the Byzantine Empire in Cilicia from 882 to his death in 891. He is celebrated for his raids against the Byzantines.
The Battle of Marash was fought in 953 near Marash between the forces of the Byzantine Empire under the Domestic of the Schools Bardas Phokas the Elder, and of the Hamdanid Emir of Aleppo, Sayf al-Dawla, the Byzantines' most intrepid enemy during the mid-10th century. Despite being outnumbered, the Arabs defeated the Byzantines who broke and fled. Bardas Phokas himself barely escaped through the intervention of his attendants, and suffered a serious wound on his face, while his youngest son and governor of Seleucia, Constantine Phokas, was captured and held a prisoner in Aleppo until his death of an illness some time later. This debacle, coupled with defeats in 954 and again in 955, led to Bardas Phokas' dismissal as Domestic of the Schools, and his replacement by his eldest son, Nikephoros Phokas.
Constantine Phokas was a Byzantine aristocrat and general.
The Battle of the Straits was fought in early 965 between the fleets of the Byzantine Empire and the Fatimid Caliphate in the Straits of Messina. It resulted in a major Fatimid victory, and the final collapse of the attempt of Emperor Nikephoros II Phokas to recover Sicily from the Fatimids.
The siege of Melite was the capture of the Byzantine city of Melite by an invading Aghlabid army in 870 AD. The siege was initially led by Halaf al-Hādim, a renowned engineer, but he was killed and replaced by Sawāda Ibn Muḥammad. The city withstood the siege for some weeks or months, but it ultimately fell to the invaders, and its inhabitants were massacred and the city was sacked.
Al-Ḥasan ibn al-ʿAbbās was an Aghlabid military commander who fought in Sicily against the Byzantine Empire.
The siege of Taormina in 902 ended the conquest of the Byzantine city of Taormina, in northeastern Sicily, by the Aghlabids. The campaign was led by the deposed Aghlabid emir, Ibrahim II, as a form of armed pilgrimage and holy war. Ibrahim's forces defeated the Byzantine garrison in a hard-fought battle in front of the city walls, and laid siege to the city. Left unsupported by the Byzantine government, Taormina capitulated on 1 August. The population was massacred or sold into slavery. The fall of this last major Byzantine stronghold signalled the completion of the Muslim conquest of Sicily, which had been ongoing since the 820s, although some minor Byzantine outposts survived until the 960s.
The siege of Enna or Castrogiovanni was launched by the Aghlabids against the important Byzantine city of Enna in 859. The Aghlabid forces managed to capture the city.
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