1.
Gothic architecture
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Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished in Europe during the high and late medieval period. It evolved from Romanesque architecture and was succeeded by Renaissance architecture and its characteristics include the pointed arch, the ribbed vault and the flying buttress. Gothic architecture is most familiar as the architecture of many of the cathedrals, abbeys. It is also the architecture of many castles, palaces, town halls, guild halls, universities and to a less prominent extent, private dwellings, for this reason a study of Gothic architecture is largely a study of cathedrals and churches. A series of Gothic revivals began in mid-18th-century England, spread through 19th-century Europe and continued, largely for ecclesiastical and university structures, the term Gothic architecture originated as a pejorative description. Hence, François Rabelais, also of the 16th century, imagines an inscription over the door of his utopian Abbey of Thélème, Here enter no hypocrites, slipping in a slighting reference to Gotz and Ostrogotz. Authorities such as Christopher Wren lent their aid in deprecating the old medieval style, the Company disapproved of several of these new manners, which are defective and which belong for the most part to the Gothic. Gothic architecture is the architecture of the medieval period, characterised by use of the pointed arch. As an architectural style, Gothic developed primarily in ecclesiastical architecture, the greatest number of surviving Gothic buildings are churches. The Gothic style is most particularly associated with the cathedrals of Northern France. At the end of the 12th century, Europe was divided into a multitude of city states, norway came under the influence of England, while the other Scandinavian countries and Poland were influenced by trading contacts with the Hanseatic League. Angevin kings brought the Gothic tradition from France to Southern Italy, throughout Europe at this time there was a rapid growth in trade and an associated growth in towns. Germany and the Lowlands had large flourishing towns that grew in comparative peace, in trade and competition with other, or united for mutual weal. Civic building was of importance to these towns as a sign of wealth. England and France remained largely feudal and produced grand domestic architecture for their kings, dukes and bishops, the Catholic Church prevailed across Europe at this time, influencing not only faith but also wealth and power. Bishops were appointed by the lords and they often ruled as virtual princes over large estates. The early Medieval periods had seen a growth in monasticism, with several different orders being prevalent. Foremost were the Benedictines whose great abbey churches vastly outnumbered any others in France, a part of their influence was that towns developed around them and they became centers of culture, learning and commerce
2.
Pope Urban II
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Pope Urban II, born Odo of Châtillon or Otho de Lagery, was Pope from 12 March 1088 to his death in 1099. He is best known for initiating the First Crusade and setting up the modern-day Roman Curia in the manner of an ecclesiastical court to help run the Church. Pope Urban II was a native of France and he was a descendant of a noble family in Châtillon-sur-Marne. Urban, baptized Eudes, was born to a family of Châtillon-sur-Marne and he was prior of the abbey of Cluny, later Pope Gregory VII named him cardinal-bishop of Ostia c. 1080. He was one of the most prominent and active supporters of the Gregorian reforms and he was among the four whom Gregory VII nominated as papabile. From the outset, Urban had to reckon with the presence of Guibert, Gregory had repeatedly clashed with the emperor Henry IV over papal authority. Despite the Walk to Canossa, Gregory had backed the rebel Duke of Swabia, Henry finally took Rome in 1084 and installed Clement III in his place. Urban took up the policies of Pope Gregory VII and, while pursuing them with determination, showed greater flexibility, usually kept away from Rome, Urban toured northern Italy and France. He facilitated the marriage of Matilda, countess of Tuscany, with Welf II and he supported the rebellion of Prince Conrad against his father and receiving the office of the groom from him at Cremona in 1095. The Empress Adelaide was encouraged in her charges of coercion against her husband. Urban maintained vigorous support for his predecessors reforms, however, Urban IIs problems included war with Germany, conflict in France, a rival pope and Christians in the East under siege. Perhaps a massive pilgrimage may solve these problems, a great council met, attended by numerous Italian, Burgundian, and French bishops in such vast numbers it had to be held in the open air outside the city of Clermont. Though the Council of Clermont held in November of the year was primarily focused on reforms within the church hierarchy. Urban IIs sermon proved highly effective, as he summoned the nobility and the people to wrest the Holy Land. There exists no exact transcription of the speech that Urban delivered at the Council of Clermont on 27 November 1095, the five extant versions of the speech were written down some time later, and they differ widely from one another. All versions of the speech except that by Fulcher of Chartres were probably influenced by the account of the First Crusade called the Gesta Francorum. Fulcher of Chartres was present at the Council, though he did not start writing his history of the crusade, Robert the Monk may have been present, but his version dates from about 1106. The five versions of Urbans speech reflect much more clearly what later authors thought Urban II should have said to launch the First Crusade than what Urban II himself actually did say
3.
Clermont-Ferrand
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Clermont-Ferrand is a city and commune of France, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, with a population of 141,569. Its metropolitan area had 467,178 inhabitants at the 2011 census and it is the prefecture of the Puy-de-Dôme department. Olivier Bianchi is its current mayor, Clermont-Ferrand sits on the plain of Limagne in the Massif Central and is surrounded by a major industrial area. The city is famous for the chain of volcanoes, the Chaîne des Puys surrounding it, the famous dormant volcano Puy de Dôme is one of the highest of these and well known for the telecommunication antennas that sit on its top and are visible from far away. Clermont-Ferrands most famous square is Place de Jaude, on which stands a grand statue of Vercingetorix sitting imperiously on a horse. The inscription reads, Jai pris les armes pour la liberté de tous and this statue was sculpted by Frédéric Bartholdi, who also created the Statue of Liberty. Clermont-Ferrands first name was Augusta Nemetum and it was born on the central knoll where the cathedral is situated today, known then as Nemossos. It overlooked the capital of Gaulish Avernie, the fortified castle of Clarus Mons gave its name to the whole town in 848, to which the small episcopal town of Montferrand was attached in 1731, together taking the name of Clermont-Ferrand. The old part of Clermont is delimited by the route of the ramparts, the town of Clermont-Ferrand came about with the joining together of two separate towns, Clermont and Montferrand, which was decreed by Louis XIII and confirmed by Louis XV. Clermont ranks among the oldest cities of France, the first known mention was by the Greek geographer Strabo, who called it the metropolis of the Arverni. The city was at that time called Nemessos – a Gaulish word for a sacred forest and it was somewhere in the area around Nemossos that the Arverni chieftain Vercingetorix was born in around 72 BC. Also, Nemossos was situated not far from the plateau of Gergovia, after the Roman conquest, the city became known as Augustonemetum sometime in the 1st century, a name which combined its original Gallic name with that of the Emperor Augustus. Its population was estimated at 15, 000–30,000 in the 2nd century and it then became Arvernis in the 3rd century, and expanded until the mid 3rd century. The city became the seat of a bishop in the 5th century, at the time of the bishop Namatius or Saint Namace, who built a cathedral here described by Gregory of Tours. Clermont went through a period after the disappearance of the Roman Empire and during the whole High Middle Ages. Between 471 and 475, Auvergne was often the target of Visigothic expansion, a generation later, it became part of the Kingdom of the Franks. On 8 November 535 the first Council of Clermont opened at Arvernis, with fifteen bishops participating, including Caesarius of Arles, Nizier of Lyons and Saint Hilarius, bishop of Mende. Sixteen decrees were made there, notably the second canon that recalls that the granting of episcopal dignity must be according to the merits, in 570, Bishop Avitus offered the Jews of his town the alternatives of baptism or expulsion
4.
First Crusade
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The First Crusade was the first of a number of crusades that attempted to capture the Holy Land, called by Pope Urban II in 1095. An additional goal became the principal objective—the Christian reconquest of the sacred city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land. During the crusades, nobility, knights, peasants and serfs from many regions of Western Europe travelled over land and by sea, first to Constantinople and then on towards Jerusalem. The Crusaders arrived at Jerusalem, launched an assault on the city and they also established the crusader states of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, and the County of Edessa. The First Crusade was followed by the Second to the Ninth Crusades and it was also the first major step towards reopening international trade in the West since the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The majority view is that it had elements of both in its nature, the origin of the Crusades in general, and particularly that of the First Crusade, is widely debated among historians. The confusion is due to the numerous armies in the first crusade. The similar ideologies held the armies to similar goals, but the connections were rarely strong, the Umayyad Caliphate had conquered Syria, Egypt, and North Africa from the predominantly Christian Byzantine Empire, and Hispania from the Visigothic Kingdom. In North Africa, the Umayyad empire eventually collapsed and a number of smaller Muslim kingdoms emerged, such as the Aghlabids, who attacked Italy in the 9th century. Pisa, Genoa, and the Principality of Catalonia began to battle various Muslim kingdoms for control of the Mediterranean Basin, exemplified by the Mahdia campaign and battles at Majorca and Sardinia. Essentially, between the years 1096 and 1101 the Byzantine Greeks experienced the crusade as it arrived at Constantinople in three separate waves, in the early summer of 1096, the first large unruly group arrived on the outskirts of Constantinople. This wave was reported to be undisciplined and ill-equipped as an army and this first group is often called the Peasants’ or People’s Crusade. It was led by Peter the Hermit and Walter Sans Avoir and had no knowledge of or respect for the wishes of Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. The second wave was not under the command of the Emperor and was made up of a number of armies with their own commanders. Together, this group and the first wave numbered an estimated 60,000, the second wave was led by Hugh I, Count of Vermandois, the brother of King Philip I of France. Also among the wave were Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse. It was this wave of crusaders which later passed through Asia Minor, captured Antioch in 1098 and finally took Jerusalem 15 July 1099. ”The third wave, composed of contingents from Lombardy, France. At the western edge of Europe and of Islamic expansion, the Reconquista in the Iberian Peninsula was well underway by the 11th century and it was intermittently ideological, as evidenced by the Codex Vigilanus compiled in 881
5.
Alexios I Komnenos
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Alexios I Komnenos, was Byzantine emperor from 1081 to 1118. Although he was not the founder of the Komnenian dynasty, it was during his reign that the Komnenos family came to full power, the basis for this recovery were various reforms initiated by Alexios. His appeals to Western Europe for help against the Turks were also the catalyst that contributed to the convoking of the Crusades. Alexios was the son of the Domestic of the Schools John Komnenos and Anna Dalassena, Alexios father declined the throne on the abdication of Isaac, who was thus succeeded by four emperors of other families between 1059 and 1081. Under one of these emperors, Romanos IV Diogenes, Alexios served with distinction against the Seljuq Turks. Under Michael VII Doukas Parapinakes and Nikephoros III Botaneiates, he was employed, along with his elder brother Isaac, against rebels in Asia Minor, Thrace. In 1074, western mercenaries led by Roussel de Bailleul rebelled in Asia Minor, in 1078, he was appointed commander of the field army in the West by Nikephoros III. Alexios was ordered to march against his brother-in-law Nikephoros Melissenos in Asia Minor and this did not, however, lead to a demotion, as Alexios was needed to counter the expected invasion of the Normans of Southern Italy, led by Robert Guiscard. While Byzantine troops were assembling for the expedition, the Doukas faction at court approached Alexios, the mother of Alexios, Anna Dalassena, was to play a prominent role in this coup détat of 1081, along with the current empress, Maria of Alania. First married to Michael VII Doukas and secondly to Nikephoros III Botaneiates, she was preoccupied with the future of her son by Michael VII, furthermore, to aid the conspiracy Maria had adopted Alexios as her son, though she was only five years older than he. Maria was persuaded to do so on the advice of her own Alans and her eunuchs, given Annas tight hold on her family, Alexios must have been adopted with her implicit approval. As a result, Alexios and Constantine, Marias son, were now adoptive brothers, by secretly giving inside information to the Komnenoi, Maria was an invaluable ally. As stated in the Alexiad, Isaac and Alexios left Constantinople in mid-February 1081 to raise an army against Botaneiates, however, when the time came, Anna quickly and surreptitiously mobilized the remainder of the family and took refuge in the Hagia Sophia. From there she negotiated with the emperor for the safety of family members left in the capital, the tutor discovered they were missing and eventually found them on the palace grounds, but Anna was able to convince him that they would return to the palace shortly. However, before they were to gain entry into the sanctuary, Straboromanos and she refused to go with them and demanded that they allow her to pray to the Mother of God for protection. This request was granted and Anna then manifested her true theatrical and manipulative capabilities, Nikephoros III Botaneiates was forced into a public vow that he would grant protection to the family. Straboromanos tried to give Anna his cross, but for her it was not sufficiently enough for all bystanders to witness the oath. She also demanded that the cross be personally sent by Botaneiates as a vow of his good faith and he obliged, sending a complete assurance for the family with his own cross
6.
Seljuq dynasty
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The Seljuqs established both the Seljuk Empire and Sultanate of Rum, which at their heights stretched from Anatolia through Iran and were targets of the First Crusade. During the 10th century, due to events, the Oghuz had come into close contact with Muslim cities. Around 985, Seljuq converted to Islam, in the 11th century the Seljuqs migrated from their ancestral homelands into mainland Persia, in the province of Khurasan, where they encountered the Ghaznavid empire. In 1025,40,000 families of Oghuz Turks migrated to the area of Caucasian Albania, the Seljuqs defeated the Ghaznavids at the battle of Nasa plains in 1035. Tughril, Chaghri, and Yabghu received the insignias of governor, grants of land, at the battle of Dandanaqan they defeated a Ghaznavid army, and after a successful siege of Isfahan by Tughril in 1050/51, they established an empire later called the Great Seljuk Empire. The Seljuqs mixed with the population and adopted the Persian culture. The Great Seljuqs were heads of the family, in theory their authority extended over all the other Seljuq lines, turkish custom called for the senior member of the family to be the Great Seljuq, although usually the position was associated with the ruler of western Persia. Muhammads son Mahmud II succeeded him in western Persia, but Ahmad Sanjar, the rulers of western Persia, who maintained a very loose grip on the Abbasids of Baghdad. Several Turkic emirs gained a level of influence in the region. Kerman was a province in southern Persia, between 1053 and 1154, the territory also included Umman. Kerman was eventually annexed by the Khwarezmid Empire in 1196, the Empire of the Steppes, a History of Central Asia. Early Seljuq History, A New Interpretation, New York, NY, Routledge,2010 Previté-Orton, C. W
7.
Excommunication
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The word excommunication means putting a specific individual or group out of communion. In some religions, excommunication includes spiritual condemnation of the member or group, Excommunication may involve banishment, shunning, and shaming, depending on the religion, the offense that caused excommunication, or the rules or norms of the religious community. 1 Corinthians 5, 1-8 directs the church at Corinth to excommunicate a man for sexual immorality, in 2 Corinthians 2, 5-11, the man, having repented and suffered the punishment by the majority is restored to the church. In Romans 16,17, Paul writes to mark those who cause divisions contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned and avoid them. Also, in 2 John 1, 10-11, the writer advises believers that whosoever transgresseth and he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed, within the Catholic Church, there are differences between the discipline of the majority Latin Church regarding excommunication and that of the Eastern Catholic Churches. Excommunication can be either latae sententiae or ferendae sententiae, according to Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki, excommunication does not expel the person from the Catholic Church, but simply forbids the excommunicated person from engaging in certain activities. g. A thus excommunicated bishop cannot validly invest a priest as pastor of a vacant parish and they are urged to retain a relationship with the Church, as the goal is to encourage them to repent and return to active participation in its life. These are the effects for those who have incurred a latae sententiae excommunication. Since excommunication excludes from reception of the sacraments, absolution from excommunication is required before absolution can be given from the sin that led to the censure, in many cases, the whole process takes place on a single occasion in the privacy of the confessional. For some more serious wrongdoings, absolution from excommunication is reserved to a bishop, another ordinary and these can delegate a priest to act on their behalf. Such ceremonies are not held today, and instead are simply announced by the bishop, interdict is a censure similar to excommunication. It too excludes from ministerial functions in public worship and from reception of the sacraments, in the Eastern Catholic Churches, excommunications is imposed only by decree, never incurred automatically by latae sententiae excommunication. A distinction is made between minor and major excommunication and those on whom minor excommunication has been imposed are excluded from receiving the Eucharist and can also be excluded from participating in the Divine Liturgy. They can even be excluded from entering a church when divine worship is being celebrated there, the decree of excommunication must indicate the precise effect of the excommunication and, if required, its duration. They are to be removed from participation in the Divine Liturgy, and they are deprived of the right to vote or to be elected. Minor excommunication is roughly equivalent to the interdict in Western law, under current law, an excommunicate is never vitandus. Persons belonging to an Eastern Catholic Church are never subject to a latae sententiae punishment, according to the Code of Canon Law of 1917, the excommunications reserved to the Apostolic See were grouped in three categories, those reserved 1
8.
Feud
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Feuds begin because one party perceives itself to have been attacked, insulted or wronged by another. Intense feelings of resentment trigger the initial retribution, which causes the party to feel equally aggrieved. The dispute is subsequently fuelled by a cycle of retaliatory violence. This continual cycle of provocation and retaliation makes it difficult to end the feud peacefully. Feuds frequently involve the original family members and/or associates, can last for generations. They can be interpreted as an outgrowth of social relations based in family honor. Until the early period, feuds were considered legitimate legal instruments and were regulated to some degree. For example, Serb culture calls this krvna osveta, meaning blood revenge, in the English-speaking world, vendetta is sometimes extended to mean any other long-standing feud, not necessarily involving bloodshed. Sometimes, it is not mutual, but rather refers to a series of hostile acts waged by one person against another without reciprocation. Blood feuds were common in societies with a rule of law. An entire family is considered responsible for any one of them has done. Sometimes two separate branches of the family have even come to blows, or worse, over some dispute. The practice has mostly disappeared with more centralized societies where law enforcement, in Homeric ancient Greece, the practice of personal vengeance against wrongdoers was considered natural and customary, Embedded in the Greek morality of retaliation is the right of vengeance. Feud is a war, just as war is a series of revenges. In the ancient Hebraic context, it was considered the duty of the individual, the executor of the law of blood-revenge who personally put the initial killer to death was given a special designation, goel haddam, the blood-avenger or blood-redeemer. Six Cities of Refuge were established to provide protection and due process for any unintentional manslayers, the avenger was forbidden from harming the unintentional killer if the killer took refuge in one of these cities. According to historian Marc Bloch, The Middle Ages, from beginning to end, the onus, of course, lay above all on the wronged individual, vengeance was imposed on him as the most sacred of duties. The solitary individual, however, could do but little, moreover, it was most commonly a death that had to be avenged
9.
Flanders
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Flanders is the Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium, although there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, language, politics and history. It is one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium, the demonym associated with Flanders is Fleming, while the corresponding adjective is Flemish. The official capital of Flanders is Brussels, although Brussels itself has an independent regional government, in historical contexts, Flanders originally refers to the County of Flanders, which around AD1000 stretched from the Strait of Dover to the Scheldt estuary. In accordance with late 20th century Belgian state reforms the area was made two political entities, the Flemish Community and the Flemish Region. These entities were merged, although geographically the Flemish Community, which has a cultural mandate, covers Brussels. Flanders has figured prominently in European history, as a consequence, a very sophisticated culture developed, with impressive achievements in the arts and architecture, rivaling those of northern Italy. Belgium was one of the centres of the 19th century industrial revolution, geographically, Flanders is generally flat, and has a small section of coast on the North Sea. Much of Flanders is agriculturally fertile and densely populated, with a density of almost 500 people per square kilometer. It touches France to the west near the coast, and borders the Netherlands to the north and east, the Brussels Capital Region is an enclave within the Flemish Region. Flanders has exclaves of its own, Voeren in the east is between Wallonia and the Netherlands and Baarle-Hertog in the consists of 22 exclaves surrounded by the Netherlands. It comprises 6.5 million Belgians who consider Dutch to be their mother tongue, the political subdivisions of Belgium, the Flemish Region and the Flemish Community. The first does not comprise Brussels, whereas the latter does comprise the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of Brussels, the political institutions that govern both subdivisions, the operative body Flemish Government and the legislative organ Flemish Parliament. The two westernmost provinces of the Flemish Region, West Flanders and East Flanders, forming the central portion of the historic County of Flanders, a feudal territory that existed from the 8th century until its absorption by the French First Republic. Until the 1600s, this county also extended over parts of France, one of the regions conquered by the French in Flanders, namely French Flanders in the Nord department. French Flanders can be divided into two regions, Walloon Flanders and Maritime Flanders. The first region was predominantly French-speaking already in the 1600s, the latter became so in the 20th century, the city of Lille identifies itself as Flemish, and this is reflected, for instance, in the name of its local railway station TGV Lille Flandres. The region conquered by the Dutch Republic in Flanders, now part of the Dutch province of Zeeland, the significance of the County of Flanders and its counts eroded through time, but the designation remained in a very broad sense. In the Early modern period, the term Flanders was associated with the part of the Low Countries
10.
Assumption of Mary
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The Catholic Church teaches as dogma that the Virgin Mary having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory. This doctrine was defined by Pope Pius XII on 1 November 1950. In the churches that observe it, the Assumption is a major feast day, in many countries, the feast is also marked as a Holy Day of Obligation in the Roman Catholic Church and as a festival in the Anglican Communion. The Catholic Church itself interprets chapter 12 of the Book of Revelation as referring to it, the earliest known narrative is the so-called Liber Requiei Mariae, which survives intact only in an Ethiopic translation. Probably composed by the 4th century, this Christian apocryphal narrative may be as early as the 3rd century, also quite early are the very different traditions of the Six Books Dormition narratives. The earliest versions of this apocryphon are preserved by several Syriac manuscripts of the 5th and 6th centuries, although the text itself probably belongs to the 4th century. The story also appears in De Transitu Virginis, a late 5th century work ascribed to St. Melito of Sardis that presents a theologically redacted summary of the traditions in the Liber Requiei Mariae. The Transitus Mariae tells the story of the apostles being transported by white clouds to the deathbed of Mary, the Decretum Gelasianum in the 490s declared some transitus Mariae literature apocryphal. An Armenian letter attributed to Dionysus the Areopagite also mentioned the supposed event, john of Damascus, from this period, is the first church authority to advocate the doctrine under his own name. His contemporaries, Gregory of Tours and Modestus of Jerusalem, helped promote the concept to the wider church. In some versions of the story, the event is said to have taken place in Ephesus, in the House of the Virgin Mary, although this is a more recent. The earliest traditions locate the end of Marys life in Jerusalem, in a later tradition, Mary drops her girdle down to the apostle from heaven as testament to the event. This incident is depicted in later paintings of the Assumption. It was celebrated in the West under Pope Sergius I in the 8th century, theological debate about the Assumption continued, following the Reformation, climaxing in 1950 when Pope Pius XII defined it as dogma for the Catholic Church. Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott stated, The idea of the assumption of Mary is first expressed in certain transitus-narratives of the fifth and sixth centuries. The first Church author to speak of the assumption of Mary. The Catholic writer Eamon Duffy states that there is, clearly, however, the Catholic Church has never asserted nor denied that its teaching is based on the apocryphal accounts. The Church documents are silent on this matter and instead rely upon other sources, Pope Pius XII deliberately left open the question of whether Mary died before her Assumption
11.
Sultanate of Rum
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The name Rûm reflects the Arabic name of Anatolia, الرُّومُ ar-Rūm, a loan from Greek Ρωμιοί Romans. The Sultanate of Rum seceded from the Great Seljuk Empire under Suleiman ibn Qutulmish in 1077, following the Battle of Manzikert, with capitals first at İznik and then at Konya. It reached the height of its power during the late 12th and early 13th century, in the east, the sultanate absorbed other Turkish states and reached Lake Van. Trade from Iran and Central Asia across Anatolia was developed by a system of caravanserai, especially strong trade ties with the Genoese formed during this period. The increased wealth allowed the sultanate to absorb other Turkish states that had established in eastern Anatolia. The Seljuq sultans bore the brunt of the Crusades, and eventually succumbed to the Mongol invasion in 1243, for the remainder of the 13th century, the Seljuqs acted as vassals of the Ilkhanate. Their power disintegrated during the half of the 13th century. The last of the Seljuq vassals of the Ilkhanate, Mesud II, was murdered in 1308, the dissolution of the Seljuq state left behind a number of Anatolian beyliks, among them that of the Ottoman dynasty, which eventually became the Ottoman Empire. In 1075, he captured the Byzantine cities of Nicaea and Nicomedia, two years later, he declared himself sultan of an independent Seljuq state and established his capital at İznik. Suleyman was killed in Antioch in 1086 by Tutush I, the Seljuk ruler of Syria, when Malik Shah died in 1092, Kilij Arslan was released and immediately established himself in his fathers territories. Kilij Arslan was defeated by soldiers of the First Crusade and driven back into south-central Anatolia, in 1107, he ventured east and captured Mosul but died the same year fighting Malik Shahs son, Mehmed Tapar. Meanwhile, another Rum Seljuq, Malik Shah, captured Konya, in 1116 Kilij Arslans son, Mesud I, took the city with the help of the Danishmends. Upon Mesuds death in 1156, the sultanate controlled nearly all of central Anatolia, Mesuds son, Kilij Arslan II, captured the remaining territories around Sivas and Malatya from the last of the Danishmends. At the Battle of Myriokephalon in 1176, Kilij Arslan II also defeated a Byzantine army led by Manuel I Komnenos, despite a temporary occupation of Konya in 1190 by the Holy Roman Empires forces of the Third Crusade, the sultanate was quick to recover and consolidate its power. During the last years of Kilij Arslan IIs reign, the experienced a civil war with Kaykhusraw I fighting to retain control. Suleiman II was routed by Kingdom of Georgia in Battle of Basian and he was succeeded by his son Kilij Arslan III, whose reign was unpopular. Kaykhusraw I seized Konya in 1205 reestablishing his reign, under his rule and those of his two successors, Kaykaus I and Kayqubad I, Seljuq power in Anatolia reached its apogee. Kaykhusraws most important achievement was the capture of the harbour of Attalia on the Mediterranean coast in 1207 and his son Kaykaus captured Sinop and made the Empire of Trebizond his vassal in 1214
12.
Byzantine Anatolia
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In the middle of the 3rd century the empire briefly split into three, but there followed repeated cycles of division and reunification. Diocletian established a centre at Nicomedia in Bithynia. Initially designated Nova Roma, but then Constantinopolis in Constantines honour, byzantium had long been considered of strategic importance, guarding the access from the Black Sea to the Aegean. Various emperors had either fortified or dismantled its fortifications depending on power was using it. Byzantium featured in Constantines last war against Licinius in which Constantine had besieged the city and he set about renewing the city almost immediately, inaugurating it in 330. This is a year sometimes picked as the beginning of the Byzantine Empire, the new capital was to be distinguished from the old by being simultaneously Christian and Greek and a centre of culture. However the empire split again on his death, only to be reunited again by Theodosius I, Theodosius died in Milan in 395, and was buried in Constantinople. His sons Honorius and Arcadius divided the empire between them and it was never again to be united. Thus the Eastern Empire was finally established by the beginning of the 5th century, as it entered the Middle Ages, while the west was to decay and Rome to be sacked under Honorius. The west limped on under a series of short lived emperors and progressively shrinking empire, in which the east frequently intervened, effectively ending with Julius Nepos. In 395 Arcadius inherited an empire that for the first time was independent, the peace engineered by his father with the Persian Sassanid Empire proved to be long lasting, taking the pressure off the eastern frontier. Although the barbarians to the north and west pose a constant threat and he had two years previous experience of ruling as a junior Augustus under his father. Under Arcadius religious controversy continued to be a concern of the state. He predeceased his brother in the west, being succeeded by his son Theodosius II, like his father his reign was very much influenced by powerful women. In his fathers reign, Theodosius mother Aelia Eudoxia was an influence on policy, and in his reign, his sister Pulcheria. His domestic accomplishments included founding the University of Constantinople in 425 and he also carried out considerable strengthening of Constantinoples walls against the threat of the Huns, following an earthquake in 448, that would serve the city well for hundreds of years. Religious controversies continued amongst the conflicting Christian theologies, and often reflected theological geopolitics within the Empire as much as doctrine, on Theodosius death, Pulcheria married Marcian who became at least nominally emperor, and is considered a Theodosian if only by marriage. During Marcians reign the empire pursued an isolationist policy, leaving the western empire increasingly helpless under Barbarian attacks, like many of his predecessors he presided over a doctrinal conference, the Council of Chalcedon, and is recognized as a saint
