Talk:Arab–Byzantine wars/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

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This article has been put on hold for the following Manual of Style violations.

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Feel free to contact me when these problems have been addressed. Tarret 15:03, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

No months or days of the week were linked, but I have improved the article per the rest of the recommended changes: 24 years and decades were delinked for not providing relevant context; "The" was removed from the heading "The Wars in North Africa"; I also made three minor fixes to the article that I noticed in the process of delinking. You have been notified on your talk page as requested. --Grimhelm 23:31, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

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How to improve

I think theres great room for improvement to elevate this to a Featured article. First, we need to cut down on the Conclusionssection, its a little too big, but only a little. Break it up into smaller sections if someone can.

Then, Group the latter conflicts into time periods or into different sub-headings. For instance, generally speaking, there was a revival under Basil I, decline after his rule and then massive super surge under Basil II. Also, mention the deals done with Crusaders in trying to invade Egypt not just in the conclusion but also in the latter conflicts part. Also, talk about the deals done with Saladin to stop Mameluke attack (even though Saladin and the Byzantines were quite apart) during 3rd Crusade. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.6.239.36 (talk) 21:59, 28 January 2007 (UTC).

What about the fact that in the 11th century, the Byzantine's launched a semi-successful attack that took some land in sicily from the arabs?Tourskin 19:55, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I beleive you are referring to the Catapanate of Italy and the Italo-Normans mercenaries who formed the Kingdom of Sicily in it's place. I am not quite sure on the exact details of that and how they relate with Byzantine and the political interactoins so if you do have some info go ahead and add that in as a sub-section since all of it occured slowly in the century preceding the crusades.--Tigeroo 14:51, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Abbassid governance deep into Anatolia

Last I checked, there were no Abbasids in Anatolia. They stayed were they were, in Iraq until the Mongols destroyed them. The Seljuks went to Anatolia.Tourskin 01:08, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I take it that this is the last line in the lead? If so, I have fixed that. --Grimhelm 17:37, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

The Seljuks, were "officially" under the banner of the Abbassid caliph. That they were powerful enough that they were the de facto rulers is another story. They still needed to acknowledge him and infact came to power as the official powers of the caliphate after he invited them to come save him from Shia Buyids and Fatimids. It made them legit to operate under his banner, until that point they were busy carving out a separate empire based from Nishapur. "Technically" the Abassids ruled until being wiped out by the Mongols, practically they had ceased to be the central authority since the Samanids.--Tigeroo 14:57, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Abbassid governance, being for teh most part centered at Baghdad, was not driven anywhere until Kublai Khan destroyed Baghdad, at least I think it was Kublai Khan, I know for sure that Baghdad remained the capital and at the end, the last city of the Abbassid Caliphate.Tourskin 19:10, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Immensely exaggerated Roman casualties - This is plagued with Pro-Islamic propaganda

I have made a count of all the lost Roman troops in all the battles in the first thirty years of the Byzantine arab wars from early 620's to the late 650's. Ignoring the "Unknown" numbers and using only the MINIMUM casualty estimates given, the total loss of Roman troops amounts to over 160,000 (160,600). Counting using the Higher estimates for some brings this to about 350,000. Please, any one with greater knowledge find reliable sources, not from the Qu'ran (no disrespect intended). If the Byzantines lost that many men in such a small amount of time. Don't forget, I counted half the battles, not including the naval battles in which alledgedly, some 500 ships were lost. Unsigned for fear of Political Correctness. User:unsiged.

Unsigned doesn't work!! You still show up!! Anyway, I will gladly work with you and think we can address things here no problem. It's funny because I see this article as the opposite as a very Byzantine centric history article and have been trying to even it out. I am not quite sure where the casualties come-up but there have been issues with casualties (and no the Quran does not mention casualties at all!!!!) but that is a problem of a historic nature. I think for the general outline of this page they are not even necessary. Generally the Muslim kingdoms lost naval battles to the Byzantines only managing a victory in a handful, though I confess I cannot find the 500 ship reference in the book referenced as the source either but I suspect refers to the "Battle of the Masts". Would have to look it up a bit to address the issues there.--Tigeroo 08:45, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

I appreciate your support, But don't worry, my name isn't User:unsiged.

Images

I added the image of Antioch in the 12th century and the siezure of Edessa to the article. Hope that will give the article a little extra sparkle, if you know what I mean.Tourskin 19:27, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Decisive arab victory?

Hardly teh case considering Nikephorus' syrian invasion coming so close to Damascus and Jerusalem and the later Byzantine resurgence. I admit I am slightly Byzantine biased but hell if people debate the fall of constantinople as not being decisive then this surely is not a decisive arab victory. Consider the Byzantine-Bulgarian Wars. The Byzantines subjugated the Bulgarians twice but its still a draw. No I am not saying that this war was a draw, but it was by no means a decisive defeat, particularly considering the sieges of constantinople and the failed attempts at Anatolia. Then there is the conqest of Edessa, syria, crete, cyprus, temporary reconquest in sicily. Thats not decisive, its an incomplete victory.Tourskin 19:03, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Allow me to add another hole in this so called decisive victory:

Nikephoros II and his stepson Basil II. Under the Makedonoi, the Byzantine Empire became the strongest power in Europe, recovering territories lost in the war.

You are right there is no way anything can decisive in a protracted war. I don't beleive the eradication of the opponent is required for a victory condition either. I think a simple look at the net of territories lost and captured pre-war and end-war is a fair evaluation of victor. I beleive the result is also sufficiently skewed in the Arab corner to eliminate any question of a stalemate.--Tigeroo 17:42, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Shouldnt victory be decided by a number of factors besides land acquisition, for example the state of the competing economies, the navel power, military strength also political powress, and also who lasted the longest, when these important factors are thrown in the byzantines start to look a lot better (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.165.183.15 (talk)

Mmmm... I can't say no to that being an Arab victory. They made quite some decisive victories, but were met with decisive defeats. In the end though, the Arab states survived more or less, the Byzantines did not, unless you say that the Ayyubids were not an Arab power, or the Mamelukes. Tourskin 17:11, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

"the Arab states survived more or less, the Byzantines did not" Are you sure, i thought that the byzantines survied until 1450's and only fell to the turks whereas all the arab empires that the byzantines were enemies with ended before this, towards the end of arab-byzantine relations before they were succeeded by others the byzantines in the 10th century were the stronger of the two —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.1.100.110 (talk) 15:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Maps

I propose adding these two maps(Image:Byzantine Empire animated.gif and Image:Arabische Rijk.jpg) above the article to make it clearer. --Sa.vakilian(t-c) 11:49, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

mmmm...I don't approve. The first map of the Byzantines is very misleading - most of the disastrous territorial losses that led to the death of the Empire were lost to the Turks and to some extent, the Latins and Serbians in Epirus and the Peloponesse, neither of these are taken into account by the first animated map. Secondly, the arab conquests map in green is already up there in a different color (the same information, that is). What would be useful is for the animated map to show where the Arabs and the Byzantines are at the same time. Furthermoore, teh first map is linked to via Byzantine Empire. Tourskin 22:02, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't mean to sound rude or anything. By all means add what you think is correct, its part of being bold but thank you anyway for discussing. Anyways, its just my opinion that we need something a little more specific. Tourskin 22:30, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

• Well i agree with the person above. But have got my own points in it, most important of which is the lose of anatolian territory, it is mentioned in our history sources that muslims occupied the anatolia upto the tarsus mountains, and accodring to this map, the region was still in the byzantine occupasion in 700s !, more over the territory of central anatolia was also captured by rashidun caliphate upto the main byzantine fort of Marash, this is also not mentioned in the map and region was given in byzantine control.

Mohammad Adil 18:28, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Roman/Byzantine Casualties

I agree that the casualty figures shown on wikipedia for each individual battle in the Byzantine-Arab Wars are just ridiculous. It was very rare for there to be 50,000 casualties in a single pitched battle during the classical and medieval periods, yet many of the battles have casualty figures recorded in this region. Furthermore modern historians have agreed that the 7th-8th centuries was one of the weakest periods in the Byzantine Empire's history and that they probably didnt have more than 150,000 soldiers in the entire empire. They simply didnt have enough men to a)field 100,000+ men in regular battles b)lose 50,000+ men in several battles. At the Roman Empire's peak Gibbon states the Roman Army had around 350,000 troops (legions+auxillary), even they would have struggled to field 100,000+ men over and over again despite losing over 50% of their army in several battles. The Byzantine Empire covered half the territory of the old Roman Empire and also didnt have the logistical capabilities that the complete empire had enjoyed. So to conclude my rant- THESE ARTICLES NEED TO BE ALTERED! btw. I'm a British medieval history student, so yes im a westerner.

Hera52 19:44, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you. It was I who tried to raise the issue as an unsigned person. So let us ally! Tourskin 18:41, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

• well, well ... there were three major pitched battles between Rashidun Caliphate army and Byzantine army, Battle of fahl, battle of ajnadyn and finally battle of yarmouk. as byzantine power was destroyed in syria, therefore no such battle was fought in the conquest of egypt and only 12,000 muslim soldiers conquered it, what i mean to say is that yes there is some sort of exaggration in the primary muslim sources, like tibari and waqdi etc etc.... and they should be corrected with some suitable modern estimations. but its ridiculous to say that byzantine empire was weak in 7th century so do its army !!!!!!, army have nothing to do with the political situation and before the islamic conquest begun byzanitne have already got much time to recover from the bows of persian wars. An empire of 34 million[1] population have got enough logistic capabilities to concentrate an army of 200,000 men, surely not in one battle field but can have a total army of this size when needed, on different frontiers, and when empire is falling and its own capital is under threat then it will be a foolish act on behaf of its emperor not to concentrate its armies on the weak side to prevent further invasion, and hariculas did it, he concentrated armies first at ajnadyn, then fahal and finnaly at yarmouk. After yarmouk the last byzantine "large" garrison in anatolia was defeated in Battle of Iron bridge that followed by the surrender of antioch. no further resistance was given by byzantine army in conquest of anatolia. Caliph Umar ordered muslims to consolidate there position in the region avoiding further conquest untill next order !, how simple it was !, and byzantines were highly dependable on the christian arabs and armenians in there battles in levant.

Mohammad Adil 18:45, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

First of all:

• 6 years (628 AD - 634 AD) is not enough time to consolidate after a 25 year war. The Persian Roman wars were bloody, the last one the most bloody of them all.
• Phocas and Heraclius, Byzantine Emperors, had divided the populace with religious controversies. The number of men who actually fought for Byzantium was reduced by such disloyalty arising from this.
• The Empire may have been 34 million, but how many were widows? How many children or orhapns, thanks to the Byzantine-Sassanid Wars? The victory was not total for Byzantium, it was very costly. How many of these 34 million actually liked the Emperor is difficult to say because many saw hi marriage to his niece as wrong and they did not like his views on Christianity which is why many decided to accept Muslim rule which would have given them temporary protection from persecution.

It is true that the Arabs won some astounding victories. Even I am ashamed of these defeats, even though I am not Greek or Roman. But this source here:

Norwich, John Julius (1997). A Short History of Byzantium. New York: Vintage Books. pp. p. 95. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

confirms my statement that Heraclius did not have enough time after the Persian wars. Tourskin 04:41, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Actually what i belive after getting through the military history ... is that only those win who have superior tactics its not only about muslim victory during Rashidun Caliphate or arab victories in Umayyad and Abbasid era, its all about what they did and how they won, which method they used to win the battle, it happens... right its happens in history that one any nation rises it rises due to some brilliant leaders, its not only with muslim nation under Rashidun Caliphate, even it is with otomman's ( see there downfall and rise) its with mongols... see byzantines under Basil , see Persians under cyrus and Khros ..... do you think if Gengiz khan was alive at the time when mongols were decisively defeated at battle of ain al Jalut near jerushalem , so would mongols have been defeated or rather had won the battle ??? which greek dare to move towards Asia with the will to conquere it ????? untill Alexander III came ! similarly Muslim historians says about first major pitched battle between muslims and byzantines ( i.e battle of ayjnadyn ) if there was any one else except Khalid in the command of Muslim army, then muslim army may have not moved to ayjnadyn to face the romans.

Muslims had leader .. the real leaders during Rashidun era, the best of there military commander was Khalid, who was some time named as the hammer of Caliph Abu Bakr ( who used him effectively to win on both Persian and roman fronts ). See for example Battle of Yarmouk, check the article of it, see in background section that what was actualy the strategy of Heraculis, it was decisive strategy actually, but was nicely tackled by Khalid. and then check what was khalid's strategy and tactics at the battle field to over come the romans outnumbered army. It was all about the strategy and tactics, its a game. check each and every battle dureing Rashidun caliphate it was won not by mericul but by intelligence, and check the battle of tours of umayyad era, see the muslim dlunder in it and see the leadership of charles mentle .... see how abdulrehman failed to use the same light cavalry and lost the battle, with which Khalid some 96 years earlier won at yermouk.... so you may understand whats my point is.

• duroing the lost of Levant by byzantine it was actually the failure of byzantine strategies, they actually failed to understand the military prowess of muslims (perhaps they underestimated them), they failed to understand the militery strategies of generals of Islamic armies.... it was nothing about exauction stuff here, is it necessary to always have a large army in order to win the battle or to arrange some suitable strategies to over come the crisis ??? hope you will go to the first point of having a suitable strategy .... Caliph Abu Bakr won the ridda wars just by this method, do you know of ridda wars ???? it was a revolt of arab tribes of arabia after the death of prophet mohammad rejecting the central authority of madinah, Caliph Abu Bakr had only army of 15,000 men with support of only mecca, madinah and taif and due to his superior tactics and strategies his men over run the whole arabia with in a year and by next year his army was on its way to invade persian empire and later byzantine empire.... so for me the sudden muslim victories were actually the fruit of the brilliant tactics used by the early leader.

Mohammad Adil 15:04, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

• • also check this section http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashidun_Caliphate_army#Tactics —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mohammad adil (talk • contribs) 15:13, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

No one is denying the brilliance of the arab commanders. Their conquest was swift and permanent. Only the casuaties are disputed here. I think we may have gone a little of topic here. Tourskin 19:53, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

• • May beyou are refering to battle of ayjnadayn right ???? and yes indeed there is some misunderstanding there, as the casualties are quoted direct from primary sources that must have a doubt of exaggration... 50,000 casualties are too much i think, but one thing for sure that there were two battles of ayjnadyn ( if you read islamic history) one was a BIG one other was small fought after the conquest of jerushalem during reconquest of palistine. As it was first major pitched battle and it is obvious from the speech of Khalid at battle that roman army outnumbered muslims.... islamic sources mention it to be some 100,000-90,000 where as byzantine sources are blank about it, as a normal byzantine expedition force was 20,000 and the name Ayjnadayn was given to that place because of the concentration of corps at that place ( as Jund in arabic literary means military center or corps and AJ-jan-na-dyn is the prular of jund, from the sources we come to know that it was during the siege of Busra city that the byzantine forces started to concentrate there... they may be around 40,000-50,000 in number and there casualties after 2 days of battle and losting there general and champions may be about 10,000+... and Allah knows the best !

what you say ??? Mohammad Adil 15:58, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes God knows best. But I am afraid wikipedis does not generally speaking quote from God, nor would many see it as reliable.

These battles are completely out of hand here. Where did you get these plans for the Battle of Yarmouk? You cannot add this without references. And you cannot say "I think I remember Britannica said this". You have to be sure of this, you can't use your memory.

• The Battle of Yarmouk is chaotic, theres too much information from fairly dodgy sources that don't help the reader. Some sources added suggest 20,000 troops for Yarmouk (even I say thats too few) others say 400,000? Do you know how difficult it is to keep together 400,000 men, feed them, arm them, give them instructions, keep them in order and fight? How long it takes to train them, to build up weapons for them, to build up food and prepare the cities ahead of the army to make food and clothes and provisions?

• I counted about 500,000 men that were killed - using lower estimates (although I admit most of these battles didn't give more than one estimate) for the campaigns upto Conquest of Syria. This is too many dead. Haha, only widows and orphans survived the war?

Let me gather my sources here:

Grant, R.G. (2005). Battle a Visual Journey Through 5000 Years of Combat. London: Dorling Kindersley. pp. p. 74. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help) States 80,000 troops deployed at Yarmouk and 70,000 dead Byzantines, though it uses Al-baladhuri as a source but I don't know how he could have counted so many dead men.

States also 80,000 troops for Yarmouk and that they were "massacred". So perhaps 70,000 dead or wounded is not an exaggeration but I don't know so much about the casualties.

The above source also mentions that Heraclius went a little mad afterwards, due to his failures. He was facing religious problems at home (there was a debate amongst Christians at the time regarding Monophysite and Chalcedon Christianity).

In all likelyhood, the battles before and after Yarmouk involved smaller troop numbers. One battle before Yarmouk saw a good-sized Byzantien army defeated but its known how many were killed or how many participated. For now we are at the mercy of these sources and should use numbers most frequently states but keep in mind logistics.

Respectfully, Tourskin 19:38, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

• lolzzz bro first let me clear that i used that quote only because we are here discussing not writing article on wikipedia !!!

• Secondly let me clear that Battle of yarmouk is the decisive battle and was first "huge" battle that muslims fought, so it is discussed in great detail in the muslims sources not only in tabari but also in waqdi which discusses its day by day maneuvors.... so you cant say that i have just wrote these plans with out reference but i have given related reference with every move of muslim and byzantine army, so its not disputed here but the strength and casualties are disputed.

• and about my comments "i think britanica mention it to be that etc etc " so bro it was a taunt, actually some body wrote there that britanica mentioned 50,000 troops but actually britanica mentioned that 50,000 died ... so i gave these comments as a taunt. You may have got it wrong.

• And yes, even it is in our early sources that after yermouk muslims faced small forces except when they conquered Antioch, it says that after Ayjnadyn and yermouk the byzantine casualties were highest at the battle of iron bridge after which antioch surrendered.

waiting for your reply

Mohammad Adil 20:05, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok. Its just hard to believe that the Byzantine army simply stood as it was without any manaevoures thats all. Thats what the battle plan shows for Yarmouk.

I know that virtually all of the battles where the Byzantines sent lots of there men to their deaths were decisive.

Ok then I guess we seemed to have narrowed down our disagreements to just the numbers and what the article Yarmouk should have (if a new reader who knew nothing of war read the article they would be confused by so many numbers). In the future, I'll see if I can adjust the style (I will leave the content for now) to make the article look better. Tourskin 23:21, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

• well bro read the article again it also tells what maneuvor was done by byzantine army over the command of Mahan. As any of good commander would have done he (Mahan) never launched his entire army in battle field, as it was large army and it would be not an easy task to give them instructions and more over communication would have became very tough. so mahan did some thing else, it was wisely did but the counter maneuvors by khalid were more effective and successful, let me summarize what mahan's maneuvors were:
• day first

sent a screen of warriors along the entire front to engage with muslims entire front (center and left, right wings), this was to check the ability and strength of opposing army and for from where to start decisive action againt them.

• day 2

Mahan decided to launch offense on the left and right wing, accordingly his wings advanded againt the respective wings of muslim army, both the left anf right wings of muslims retreated againt the pressure of byzantine attack untill khalid with his mobile guard came to aid. at the evening both armies stood once again from where they begun.

• day 3

The serious penetration on day 2 was in right wing, and byzantine did much demage there, so mahan decided to take offense again the right half of muslims army, his corps accordingly advanced againt the right half of muslims center and right wing, both retreated and khalid again came to there aid.

• day 4

as muslims right wing suffered the most, so as like any of wise general mahan too decided to take decisive action against it, with the plan to drove the muslims right wing and then attack the right half of muslims center (under Sharjeel 's command) from flank and front thus droving it back will surely result in the whole scale retreart of muslims army. with this plan in mind mahan decided to attack just after dawn to take muslims in surprise, but failed as according to chronicles muslims had just finished there Fajar salat (morning prayers, which is offered before the dawn, too luck for muslims at that day lolzz)... the day 4 was goiung to decide who will win it was day of judgment ! mahan's corps attacked again the right half of muslims center and right wing. khalid again aided them and mahan's plan of penetration was failed.

• day 5

mahan did the mistake, as emperor heraculis ordered him to do every thing for resolving this matter with out war ( but he said before war !), due to high number of casualties mahan sent for resolving the matter by negociation, khalid got the point that it is done because mahan's troops are in weak condition, so he arranged his offensive strategy for next day.

• day 6

mahan's strategy for this day is unknown, because khalid never gave him time to do any thing after dawn the whole muslims army (center, left, right wings) moved forward and khaoid begun the offense with his cavalry that resulted in muslim victory, i am not praising him extra but yes he deserved to be praised as he had that much confidence over his plan that he even chosed the rout for byzantines to retreat and already at night sent his 500 cavalry to block that half km long ford. byzantine retreted at the same direction as the way to north east was blocked by khalid's cavalry.

• so this was mahan's plan, read the article it is present there, but when some one reads the article it shows only the plan of khalid ! it is not so, but actually the plan of khalid dominates the yermouk.

Mohammad Adil 12:36, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Lol I didnt read it!! Ok fair enough. Its just that the pictures makes it look like the Byzantines did not do much at all. But if you think it is well explained then I allow it.Tourskin 18:48, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Now check this .....
• Siege of Constantinople (674)
• Siege of Constantinople (718)

can you now imagin 200,000 army ???? specially for muslims ... with nescent empire, and in whose army only muslims can join !!! and how can this large army can be handled ???? isn't it funny ??? i will check te islamic sources related to this siege what they mention about the number of there army, then i am gonna edit it.

Mohammad Adil 19:07, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't forget that the Arabs had 40 years or so to increase their population and on top of this Non-muslism were used as well - many Christian slaves were used to row the galleys of the Arab fleet. Forget about 717 AD, 80,000 men is a very reasonable estimate since thats 70 years after the first invasion of Syria - by then the Arabs were in southern Spain and to have reached so far and so a large number of men was needed to hold and conquer these positions.

200,000 for 674 is probably an estimate for the non-combatants and soldiers on the Arab side that took part in the siege e.g. Slaves. In all likelihood, the Arabs used as many allies as possible to raise such a force - I don't think that they would have excluded non-Islamic military aid so to say that only Muslims can join is probably not what happened. Tourskin 20:29, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• • well bro according to the defination of jihad no non-muslims can took part in it. more over there is a hadith that talks about the importance of the conquest of constantinopole. and 200,000 including slaves !!!! man 200,000 was not the population of the umayyad's capital damascus in those days !!!! why didn't they simply made a fortress town there ??? they could live there with ease with there wives and childerns with them cooking food for them and giving them shelter in winter 4 years are more then enough for building a city with town planning lolzzz. and as it was juhad "holy war" so no body gonna get help from non-muslims for just raising numberes, itsa actualy the rear event i.e byzantine victory after a long series of defeat, therefore it probably exaggrated. and about slaves with them, so dear no man gonna have 10-15 slaves with him when there is little food to eat even for himself, and more over the slaves,wives and childerns they had with them were non-combatants, so its not fair enough to count them with the troops. and according to the laws of the army of those days they never use to bring there wives and childrens with them when on long and dangerous march, so i belives there were slaves, (not as many as they boost upthe numberes to 200,000) and few wives with there husbands and for care of wounded warriors. the numberes what i belive according to the ability of the arabs where must not be more then 100,000 ... i still haven't saw it in history sources, i am going to go on mondayto library to check it in Tarik al tibari, ibn aksir and also in ibn Khludun, what they mention about the size of army.... and then according to justice we gonna have to minimize it further to match the modern style of estimates of sizes of armies.

Mohammad Adil 16:18, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

GA Sweeps Review: On Hold

As part of the WikiProject Good Articles, we're doing sweeps to go over all of the current GAs and see if they still meet the GA criteria. I'm specifically going over all of the "Conflicts, battles and military exercises" articles. I believe the article currently meets the majority of the criteria and should remain listed as a Good article. In reviewing the article, I have found there are some issues that may need to be addressed. I have made minor corrections and have added three citation needed tags for several statements within the article. Please add sources for those within seven days and the article will maintain its GA status. Also, it would be beneficial if the large quotes were introduced in a prior sentence of who said them or from what excerpt it was from. Right now, they seem to just be entered into the text with a source afterwards, which may confuse some readers. If progress is being made and issues are addressed, the article will remain listed as a Good article. Otherwise, it may be delisted. If improved after it has been delisted, it may be nominated at WP:GAC. I don't see that being a problem since the article is so well-maintained. If you have any questions, let me know on my talk page. Regards, --Nehrams2020 23:49, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Good work so far, but there is still one more fact tag in the article that needs to be addressed. --Nehrams2020 23:30, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

The article at this point meets the GA criteria and will maintain its status. Keep improving the article, and ensure that all newly added information is properly sourced. I have updated the article history to reflect this review. Regards, --Nehrams2020 01:07, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Review of this article

Troop numbers for Byzatium. My previous discussions on this have been quite inconclusive, though not totally without success. Byzantium had 150,000 troops under Justinian I in 565 AD. In 773 AD, with the Byzantine Empire having lost North Africa, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, Italy and Bulgaria, the Empire had 80,000 Troops. This is according to the following source:

• Treadgold, Warren (2002). The Oxford History of Byzantium. New York: Oxford UP. pp. p. 144. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

Therefore, I ask that we have a thorough review over the battles and the Roman casualties involved. With all due respect, the opening stages of the Byzantine-Arab wars was not some heroic conquest by a few thousand against ten million. It was conquest of roughly 40,000 brilliant soldiers against an army between 150,000 - 80,000 men in strength - lets say 115,000, an average of the two. Now consider this. 115,000 troops go down to 80,000 in a little over 100 years. What does that say about Roman casualties? Think about it, troops don't last for 100 years but soldiers have families, whose sons will form the next generation of soldiers. Therefore, Roman casulties could not have been higher than 70,000 total. The Battle of Yarmouk is perhaps the only serious pitched battle.

Another point - Yarmouk was the only serious battle. How do I suppose so? Simple, the fact is the Byzantine Empire had almost no control over their territories. The Empire had been at war from 602 - 629. Thats 27 years of Persian armies destroying cities and occupying lands. When the Arabs attacked, the Byzantines had not recovered these provinces fully - more often than not they were in their hands only by name, not with significant troops present. Severakl outbreaks of plague destroyed Byzantium's population, the Capital went from over 300,000 to 80,000 people, for example. The following sources suggest this:

• Hoyland, Robert (2002). The Oxford History of Byzantium. New York: Oxford UP. pp. p. 126. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)
• Norwich, John Julius (1997). A Short History of Byzantium. New York: Vintage Books. pp. p. 298. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

Counting the troop numbers

Yes I have nothing better to do, but I have counted the total number of troops that the Byzantines are said to have had, here it is:

Minimum estimate of troops used --> 663,000 troops by Byzantium.
Minimum estimate of troops killed --> 273,900

You see how ridiculous the references are in the battles. How can Byzantium lose almost 300,000 soldiers but start off with 150,000. This is not a man factory empire. This empire was cursed with civil war, recovering from a Persian war, had rebellions by many other Christians who refused to accept the Ecumenical councils of the early churches. You see, Byzantium was not a war machine in 630 AD. But she was in 773 AD.Tourskin (talk) 05:41, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Numbers of troops and casualties are always the hard part of historic battles, at best what we have are estimates which vary from source to source based on what they have factored in or not. I suggest we follow the wikipolicy. We cannot on our behalf vouch for or do the evaluation of the "facts" for the readers. Lets simply attribute the numbers and state them. That should make it clear to the readers that those are not really concrete facts but at best guesstimates. Who we should cite and who not would be guided by verifiability, notability and RS naturally. P.S. I am not upto speed on the issue on debate, merely seeing a solution in the concept that wikipedia does not define truths rather it's collects human knowledge.--Tigeroo (talk) 08:57, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree with user:tigeroo. i suggest that we should give the primary sources estimates of troops and then the modern estimates as did in battle of yarmouk. there were two major pitched battles during muslim conquest of Syria. the 1st was Ayjnadayn after which palistine jordan and southern syria including the strongholds damascus, busra and north upto emessa were captured, the battle was result of muslims attack on levant and there capture of many small towns and victories against the local garrisons of ghassanid arabs. The 2nd decisive battle was battle of yarmouk, that was a final effort to retake the region by byzatines. it was not so as it looks, 100,000+ troops never came all together but it was the strategy adopted by muslim generals which make them to gather at yermuk, once they were defeated muslims faced only the small garrison forces untill they faced an other large force in 637 out side antioch which was a relatively large garrison force to defend the great city, no muslim source mention its number but it may be 15,000-30,000 which use to be a normal byzantine expedition force. And about battle of fahal then i personally dont think it was so large because the battle was against the forces that escaped from battle of ajnadayn and joined the garrison at the town of Fahal, but it was for sure a large battle as compair to other small battles going around against byzantines. If you have estimates of ajnadayn by roman sources and by some modern sources then do tell me we will discuss about them as well. And about the source of nicole's book so he seems to mix the two battles of aynadyn, the second battle was not a major one it was a small regular type battle against a garrison at ajnadyn region in which muslim troops outnumbered romans.

Mohammad Adil (talk) 20:49, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Now that you have both mentioned it, I think that is the best option. I still don't agree with the numbers but I have no sources for numbers. I will drop this for the time being. Thanks for the response. Tourskin (talk) 21:10, 24 December 2007 (UTC)