Battle of Myriokephalon, 1176

Battle of Myriokephalon

Marching on Konya, the capital of the Seljuk sultanate of Rum, Manuel I's army was ambushed by Sultan Kilij Arslan II in the narrow pass of Tzivritze near the fortress of Myriokephalon. The emperor obtained a safe retreat by promising to dismantle his frontier forts at Dorylaeum and Sublaeum and himself compared the defeat to Manzikert; the battle saved the sultanate, and afterwards Byzantium gradually lost the ability to contend for central Anatolia.

Date

17 September 1176exact dateDate in the Julian calendar

Place

Pass of Tzivritze near Myriokephalonapproximate locationtoday: between Isparta and Konya, Turkey (exact site disputed) · Balkans and Anatolia

Participants

Manuel I Komnenos, Kilij Arslan II, Byzantine Empire, Sultanate of Rum

Threads

Balkans and Anatolia (11th–12th c.)

Also known as

Battle of Myriocephalum; Battle of Tzivritze; Битва при Мириокефалоне; Битва в ущелье Цибрице; Baldwin of Antioch; Балдуин Антиохийский

Kilij Arslan II, sultan of Rum from 1156, had come to Constantinople in a show of submission in late 1160 or 1161. In 1176 Manuel gathered a large army against Konya — 25,000–30,000 men by John Haldon's estimate, about 35,000 by John Birkenmeier's. On 17 September, without properly scouting the route, the army entered the narrow pass of Tzivritze near the fortress of Myriokephalon, east of Isparta, whose site has not been identified. The Turks attacked from the heights; the blow fell hardest on the Byzantine right wing, whose commander, Baldwin of Antioch, was killed.

Manuel reportedly lost his nerve for a time, but he then took command again and fought his way through to the vanguard, and the army was not destroyed. Kilij Arslan agreed to let it withdraw unmolested on condition that the emperor dismantle his forts at Dorylaeum and Sublaeum and withdraw their garrisons; but Turkoman bands harassed the retreat, and Manuel razed only Sublaeum, leaving Dorylaeum intact. Manuel himself compared the defeat to Manzikert, sending word to Constantinople ahead of his army; yet the battle has often been exaggerated into a catastrophe in which the whole Byzantine army perished. The next year the Byzantines defeated the Turks at Hyelion and Leimocheir on the Meander.

Historians judge that Myriokephalon was decisive in that it saved the Seljuk sultanate and ended Manuel's hopes of taking Konya, but that it did not at once change the military balance: only gradually did the advantage in Anatolia shift, until Byzantium could no longer compete there for dominance. Some see it as a second turning point, a century after Manzikert.

Connections

Part of

Reign of Manuel I Komnenos8 April 1143 – 24 September 1180 · Balkans and Anatolia

Related events

Battle of Manzikert26 August 1071 · Balkans and AnatoliaManuel himself compared his defeat to Manzikert, a century earlier

Suleiman ibn Qutalmish founds the Sultanate of Rum at Nicaeabetween 1075 and 1081 · Balkans and Anatoliathe sultanate founded at Nicaea in the 1070s, now ruled from Konya, survived Manuel's attempt to destroy it

Battle of Legnano29 May 1176 · Western and Central Europein 1176, within four months of each other, both emperors were defeated — Frederick by the Lombard cities, Manuel I by the Seljuks of Rum

Frederick Barbarossa's crusade: from Regensburg to the Saleph11 May 1189 – 10 June 1190 · Balkans and Anatoliain 1190 the Germans stormed Konya, the Seljuk capital that Manuel I had failed to reach in 1176

Same participants

Second Crusade31 March 1146 – 1149 · Western and Central Europevia Sultanate of Rum

Stefan Nemanja unites Serbiabetween 1166 and 1168 – 1196 · Balkans and Anatoliavia Byzantine Empire

Battle of Myriokephalon

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