Free Republic

The two forces eventually met near the city of Manzikert, just north of Lake Van. Sultan Muhammad bin Dawud sent a delegation to parley with Romanus on "the pretext of peace," though in reality, he was "stalling for time," explained Michael Attaleiates, who was present. This only "roused the emperor to war." Romanus spurned the emissaries, forced them to prostrate themselves before him, and commanded them to tell their sultan that "there will be no treaty ... and no going home except after I have done in the lands of Islam the like of what has been done in the...

Today, on August 26, 1071, one of history’s most decisive battles took place at Manzikert, initiating the creation of the modern state of Turkey atop formerly Christian Asia Minor. The story, which follows, is instructive.In 1019, “the first appearance of the bloodthirsty beasts… the savage nation of infidels called Turks entered Armenia,” in eastern Anatolia, “and mercilessly slaughtered the Christian faithful with the sword,” writes a chronicler. In the ensuing years and decades, virtually the whole of Armenia was decimated: hundreds of thousands were slaughtered or enslaved, and thousands of churches torched or desecrated, including by being turned into mosques:...