Battle of Hyelion and Leimocheir

Infobox Military Conflict
conflict=Byzantine-Seljuk wars

caption=

partof=|date=1177
place=Hyelion, Meander Valley, Asia Minor
result=Byzantine victory
combatant1=Byzantine Empire
commander1=John Vatatzes
commander2=Unknown
strength1=Unknown
strength2=20,000 menJ. Birkenmeier, "The Development of the Komnenian Army: 1081-1180", 54]
combatant2=Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm
casualties1=Unknown
casualties2=Unknown|The Battle of Hyelion and Leimocheir saw the destruction, in an ambush at a river crossing, of a raiding Seljuq Turk army by the Byzantines.

Background

Following Emperor Manuel Komnenos' defeat at the Battle of Myriokephalon (1176) the Byzantines failed to implement all the conditions, particularly the destruction of border fortresses, demanded by the Seljuq sultan Kilij Arslan II as a prerequisite for a cessation of hostilities. [Choniates, Historia p. 108 (folio 192), Soublaion was razed but not Dorylaion, also Magdalino p. 99.] A substantial Seljuq cavalry army, including Turcoman nomad auxiliaries, was despatched into Byzantine territory, in the Meander Valley in western Anatolia, on a retaliatory raid. A Byzantine army under the general John Vatatzes, the emperor's nephew, set out from Constantinople with with instructions to intercept the Seljuq raiders. [John Vatatzes was the son of Theodore Vatatzes and the princess Eudokia Komnene, a sister of the emperor Manuel I Komnenos.] Vatatzes was able to pick up reinforcements, under Constantine Doukas and Michael Aspietes, as his army moved through Byzantine territory. [Choniates, Historia p. 108-109 (f. 192-193), also Birkenmeier p. 196.]

Battle

The date of the battle is unknown, it has generally been ascribed to the year 1177 on the basis of its position within the narrative of Niketas Choniates.

The Turks, who had orders to ravage the Meander Valley as far as the sea-shore, had sacked the Byzantine settlements of Tralles, Antioch, Louma and Pantacheir. As a result they were loaded with plunder, including, rather poetically, water from the sea, an oar and shore sand. [Choniates p.108 (f 192). The stranger items of plunder were doubtless stipulated by the sultan in order to prove that his forces had reached as far as the sea.] These burdens would have drastically slowed their progress and lessened their tactical mobility. The Seljuq army was returning towards Turkish territory when it approached a 'choke point' in its journey where the great eastern highway crossed the Meander River by way of a bridge (possibly ruined or semi-derelict), near the villages, or forts, of Hyelion and Leimocheir. [Ramsay p. 346, the author argues that Hyelion and Leimocheir must have been in the general vicinity of Antioch-on-the-Meander, one of the settlements sacked by the raiding Seljuqs. Even a ruined bridge would mark a shallow crossing point of the river.] The Byzantines had concealed themselves and were divided into two corps, separated by the river. They caught the Seljuq army in an ambush when it had partially crossed over the river, destroying it as a fighting force. [Choniates, pp. 108-109. (f 192-195), also Birkenmeier pp. 134-135 and 196] Many of the Seljuq soldiers died in the river, Choniates stating that only a few out of many thousands were able to save themselves. [Choniates, pp. 110. (f 194)] The Seljuq commander, bearing the title Atabeg, tried to break out of the trap with his heavily armed retainers but was killed by an Alan soldier of the Byzantine force. [Birkenmeier p. 134] On the Byzantine side the general Michael Aspietes also fell, drowned in the Meander when he was thrown by his wounded horse. [Choniates, pp. 110. (f 194-195)]

Aftermath

The battle underlined how limited the immediate effects of the Byzantine defeat at Myriokephalon were on the empire's hold over its Anatolian possessions. The Byzantine victory was followed up by punitive expeditions against the Turcoman nomads settled around the upper Meander valley. [ Angold p. 193.]

It is interesting to note that the Byzantine strategy at this battle, ambushing a raiding army on its return journey when it would be slowed by plunder and captives, is exactly what is prescribed in much earlier Byzantine military treatises, such as the Tactica of Leo VI (886-912). This points to a retention by Byzantine commanders of knowledge of the successful military strategies of the past.

The emperor Manuel died in 1180; his son and successor Alexios II Komnenos was a minor, and the empire was governed by a divided regency. Without the strong presence of Manuel the military advantage in Anatolia reverted to the Seljuqs. Sultan Kilij Arslan invaded the empire in 1182, when Byzantium was distracted by the coup d'état of Alexios' cousin Andronikos Komnenos, and following the Siege of Cotyaeum captured the towns of Sozopolis and Cotyaeum.

Footnotes

References

Primary source

*Choniates, Niketas, "Historia." English translation: Magoulias, H. (O City of Byzantium: Annals of Niketas Choniates), Detroit (1984). ISBN 0-814-31764-2

econdary sources

*cite book|last=Angold|first=M.|title=The Byzantine Empire 1025-1204|publisher=Longman|location=Harlow|year=1984
*cite book|last=Birkenmeier|first=J.W.B.|title=The Development of the Komnenian Army: 1081-1180|series="History of Warfare", 5 |location=Leiden|publisher=Brill|year=2002|id=ISBN 90 04 117105
*cite book|last=Magdalino|first= P.|title=The Empire of Manuel I Komnenos, 1143-1180|publisher=CUP Cambridge|year=1993
*cite journal|last=Ramsay|first=W. M.|authorlink = William Mitchell Ramsay|title=Antiquities of Southern Phrygia and the Border Lands (I)|journal=The American Journal of Archaeology and of the History of the Fine Arts|volume=3|issue=3/4|date=December 1887|pages=p. 346

ee also

*Komnenian army