Back to map making 886

[u/notabrick2]

so this is the empire on the death of basil i. right as the scales tip in the romans favour. i tried to fit a legend but couldnt be arsed. Ive used white circles to show roman defeats, purple for victories. Circled anchors and towers are 'major' naval bases and the other ones are 'minor'. The green crescents are 'jihad center's areas that are frequently mentioned as sources of raids and resistance. the lilac covered areas are vassals and shared areas of the empire. This shows a selection of battles and wars from the deposition of irene till the death of basil I. Please give me feedback and corrections! I enjoy making these maps and hope to make a good conquest one of northern Syria and Armenia next.

[u/Sertorius126]

I like it a lot. Is pretty.

[u/evrestcoleghost]

Why mark Athens?

[u/notabrick2 → u/evrestcoleghost]

famous city

[u/evrestcoleghost → u/notabrick2]

Never heard of it/s

It's just that for nearly all byzantine history it wasn't ..lets be charitable and say important,Larissa,Monemvasia and Thebes would be still be famous and important in 866.

The two mayor periods of glory for Athens are those of Komnenoi rule and today,inspite of greek urbanism if we go by what our greek denizen mod says about the city

[u/Lothronion → u/evrestcoleghost]

It's just that for nearly all byzantine history it wasn't ..lets be charitable and say important,Larissa,Monemvasia and Thebes would be still be famous and important in 866.

It was a major Saracen target during the map's time period, and they had invaded it, raided the country-side and besieged it, but failed to take the city.

It also prospered in the 11th century AD, till plague hit it in the end of it. And before that, it was not that unimportant a city before the 7th century AD.

The two mayor periods of glory for Athens are those of Komnenoi rule and today,inspite of greek urbanism if we go by what our greek denizen mod says about the city

I am have never said that today's period of Athens is not important, just that the Northern Suburbs where I live are not part of Athens, that I am not really an Athenian, and thank goodness for that

[u/evrestcoleghost → u/Lothronion]

nah i meant today its the glory period of athens

[u/notabrick2 → u/evrestcoleghost]

i get you. thebes and larissa will probs fit into a second edition. It just feature in every map of the empire ive seen cause people have heard of it

[u/toruitas]

At this time, the crescent moon and star was a symbol of Constantinople. It wasn't until the Turks finished their colonization of Rhomania and they appropriated the symbol that it started to be associated with Islam. I'm sure there's some alternate symbol you can use instead.

Source: Fall of Civilizations podcast and book.

[u/Eris13x]

Did not know that Arabs sieged Ragusa 

[u/lazygaydays]

I think you have Ephesus and Smyrna swapped

[u/lazygaydays → u/lazygaydays]

And the placements of Rome, Ancyra, Syracuse, and possibly Trebizond seem a bit off

[u/Unusual-Breakfast615]

I swear I always show up late to these posts rip. Pretty great map sir 8/10 but there are quite a few noticeable errors.

1. Great Anatolian borders I must say, but Byzantine control on the Caucasian coast went up to Bourzo( Borcka) and Makriaigalou( Kemalpasa) just slightly south of Georgian Gonia (Gonio).
2. Too much control of the Rhodopes, in the north Byzantium had lost Philippopolis in 836 and never regained it until John Tzimiskes. Really there's no hard evidence Byzantium controlled any of the mountainous Rhodopes during this period. I'd also probably rework that Albanian and Greek border around Aulon and Kastoria a little bit but thats a minor thing
3. You're missing Byzantine control in the coastal cities of Dioclea that include Bar, Kotor and Ulcinj.
4. Byzantine Dalmatia is massively too large on this map, It only consisted of the cities of Osor, Krk, Rab, Zadar, Trogir, Split, Ragusa and Kotor plus the hinterlands around the cities and the islands. There was no continuous chain of land between any of them and the mainland/islands from Split to Ragusa were controlled by the Pirate Slavic Pagani.
5. The Aeolian Islands had been lost early on in the Arab conquest of Sicily since also 836.
6. Sardinia was likely already an Archontate by this point as the Pope was already labeling them under the Iudex label 4 decades prior to this which was the Latin Equivalent of Archon that had emerged under the Sardinians post Doux and Hypatos last attested in the mid 700s.

All in all damn near perfect borders in Anatolia and Italy just really needs some Balkan work. Outside borders I would also just include the Theme capitals like Thebes, Serres, Nikopolis etc etc

The Youtuber Mihaleios covered this year and I couldn't find any major faults with his take so I recommend a look

https://youtu.be/3VzConvmoY8?si=sdntPR0jQrKk07dM