Download The War of the Three Gods: Romans, Persians and the Rise of by Peter Crawford PDF

By Peter Crawford

Battle of the 3 Gods is an army historical past of the 1st half 7th century, with heavy specialize in the reign of the jap Roman Emperor Heraclius (AD 610-641). This was once a pivotal time in global historical past in addition to a dramatic one. The japanese Roman Empire used to be dropped at the very breaking point of extinction via the Sassanid Persians, earlier than Heraclius controlled to inflict a crushing defeat at the Sassanids with a determined, ultimate gambit. His conquests have been short-lived, even though, for the newly switched over adherents of Islam burst upon the zone, administering the coup de grace to Sassanid strength and laying siege to Constantinople itself to bring in a brand new era.

Peter Crawford skillfully narrates the three-way fight among the Christian Byzantine, Sassanid Persian and Islamic empires, a interval peopled with attention-grabbing characters, together with Heraclius, Khusro II and the Prophet Muhammad himself. a number of the epic battles and sieges are defined in as a lot element as attainable together with Nineveh, Yarmouk, Qadisiyyah and Nihawand, Jerusalem and Constantinople. The recommendations and strategies of those very various armies are mentioned and analyzed, whereas maps enable the reader to put the occasions and persist with the various fortunes of the contending empires. this is often an exhilarating and significant learn of a clash that reshaped the map of the realm.

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Extra resources for The War of the Three Gods: Romans, Persians and the Rise of Islam

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This allowed the Romans to shift to a more pre-emptive rather than reactionary strategy, with armies deployed all along the length of the Danube. The barbarians still proved capable of driving deep into Roman territory – the Slavs attacked Macedonia in 593 while the war of the three gods – Press 26 The War of the Three Gods the Avars approached the walls of Constantinople in 598 – but by the turn of the seventh century Mauricius could look upon the Danube as a job well done. The frequency of raids dropped as the barbarians became less and less eager to confront the reinforced Thracian and Illyrian armies and as a result Roman forces began to cross the Danube and defeat the Avars and Slavs in their homelands.

Learning siege craft techniques from Roman prisoners of war, the Sassanids became the war of the three gods – Press 20 The War of the Three Gods increasingly adept at taking even the largest of settlements, perhaps even more so than the Romans themselves. 57 Even with this organisation, the lack of reliable testimony makes the size of the Sassanid military difficult to gauge. Their long-term stalemate with the Romans suggests that they could raise significant forces. 59 The Persians may have had an even larger military establishment than these field armies suggest with it likely that, like the Romans, some forces had to be deployed along the frontiers against not just the Romans but the Caucasians, Arabs, Turks and Indians.

This should have allowed Phocas to focus solely on the increasingly alarming situation on the eastern frontier. However, there was to be another distraction for the embattled emperor; one that was to prove his undoing – the revolt of the Heraclii. The Revolt of the Heraclii Unlike Phocas himself, the revolt against him that began in 608 came from a far loftier position than a mere soldier. 5 Whilst he will have served elsewhere, the first historical mention of Heraclius the Elder was under the command of Philippicus, magister militum per Orientem between 586 and 588.

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