Battle of Kapetrou

Battle of Kapetrou

Infobox Military Conflict
conflict=Battle of Kapetrou


caption=
partof=the Byzantine-Seljuk wars|date=1048
place=Anatolia, in the thema of Iberia and Armenia
result=Pyrrhic Byzantine victory; Seljuks retreat with much booty.
combatant1=
combatant2= Great Seljuk Sultanate
commander1=Liparit IV
commander2=Ibrahim Yinal
strength1=50,000
strength2=Unknown
casualties1=Unknown
casualties2=Unknown

The Battle of Kapetrou (also Kapetru or Kaputru) was fought between the Byzantine-Georgian armies and the Seljuk Turks on September 10 or September 18, 1048. It was the culmination of an Anatolian expedition of İbrahim Yinal, a uterine brother of the sultan Toğrül.

The emperor Constantine IX sent to the Georgian warlord Liparit, whom the Byzantines had aided in his struggle against the Georgian king Bagrat IV, to unite against the advancing Seljuks; but ordered defensive strategy till the arrival of Georgian reinforcements.

The battle was preceded by the complete destruction of Arzen or Artze, a vibrant commercial center in the Byzantine-administered thema of Iberia and Armenia (near the modern-day Erzerum, Turkey), by the Seljuk forces. A combined Byzantine-Georgian army of 50,000, under the command of Aaron, Kekaumenos and Liparit, met the Seljuks head-on at Kapetrou (modern-day Hasan Kale). In a fierce nocturnal battle, the Christian allies failed to achieve any serious success, and Ibrahim Yinal was able to safely leave the Byzantine territory, laden with spoils and captives, including the Georgian commander Liparit. The emperor later sent ransoms to Toğrül who refused them, however, and released Liparit on condition that he would never again fight the Seljuks.

The devastation left behind by the Seljuk raid was so fearful that the Byzantine magnate Eustathios Boilas described, in 1051/52, those lands as "foul and unmanageable... inhabited by snakes, scorpions, and wild beasts." The Arab chronicler Ibn al-Athir reports that Ibrahim brought back 100,000 captives and a vast booty loaded on the backs of ten thousand camels. [Paul A. Blaum (2005). Diplomacy gone to seed: a history of Byzantine foreign relations, A.D. 1047-57. "International Journal of Kurdish Studies". [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SBL/is_18/ai_n13826854 (Online version)] ]

References


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