The tenth century Byzantine expansion in Crete, Cyprus, and Northern Syria : ideology and practice
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Date
2023
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Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2023.
Abstract
In modern scholarship, the Byzantine-Islamic frontier is usually perceived as a monolithic entity; the inner dynamics of each frontier region, which made them distinct from one another, as well as the different treatment of each region by the Byzantines are neglected. The overarching objective of this thesis is to adopt a comparative and micro-scale approach to examine the tenth-century Byzantine expansion into Crete, Cyprus, and Northern Syria in order to trace the differences in the Byzantine treatment of the conquered regions both in ideology and practice. The first two chapters of this thesis examine the geographical discourse and the discourse of war created by the Byzantines during the tenth century military expansion. The first chapter of this thesis focuses on how the historical memory of the long-term socio-religious and political dynamics of each region strongly shaped the geographical discourse created by the Constantinople-centered literati. The second chapter discusses the "defensive" nature of the Byzantine expansion in the tenth century and argues that the Byzantine discourse on war or war rhetoric was strongly based on the idea of the protection of the empire as well as the well-being of the state and its people. The third chapter focuses on demonstrating how the religious and civil administration, taxation system, and military organization implemented after the Byzantine reconquests were shaped by the internal structue of the frontier regions and the broader dynamics of the Eastern Mediterranean.