Changes

By 1050 the Byzantine Empire was a very strong state, with a highly professional army, sophisticated bureaucracy and extensive territories from northern Iraq to the Danube. The Empire had enjoyed a renaissance under the Macedonian Dynasty and especially under the capable Basil II. A common Greek Christian Orthodox Culture unified the diverse peoples’ of the realm, and this was exported to the Slavs of Eastern Europe. However, after the death of Basil II, the Macedonian dynasty came to an end and the Empire was led by a series of ineffectual Emperors and was devasted by several civil wars. In 1071 the Emperor was Romanus IV Diogenes (1068–1071), a member of the Cappadocian military aristocracy. He was an experienced general, but he had alienated many in the Byzantine aristocracy who saw him as a usurper and resented his authoritarianism. The strategic situation facing the Byzantine Empire was very dangerous. By 1050 the The Empire had appeared secure especially after its destruction of the Bulgar Empire. However, the Pencheng Turks, from the Eurasian Steppes threatened the Empire’s Balkan and Black Sea possessions. In Italy, the Normans were seizing the last remaining Byzantine possessions in Italy. The biggest threat to the Empire was posed by the Seljuk Turks. These had been nomads in Central Asia and had been converted to Islam about 1000 AD. The Turks were led by the Seljuk family and they invaded southwestern Asia in the 11th century<ref> A.C.S. Peacock and Sara Nur Yildiz, The Seljuks of Anatolia: Court and Society in the Medieval Middle East, (I.B. Tauris, 2015), p. 29 </ref>. They were able to defeat the various Muslim dynasties that had seized power after the decline of the Abbasid Caliphate. They founded an empire that included Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and the majority of Iran. Their conquests were at the start of Turkish domination in the Middle East that was to last for centuries. The Seljuks attacked the Christian allies of the Byzantines in the Caucasus ' and conquered Armenia. They also began to raid deep into Byzantine territory which they regarded as a Jihad and they even managed to seize key fortresses on the Christian Empire’s territory.