User talk:Cplakidas/Archive 14

Hi Constantine, I hope you'll consider running again in the coord elections. - Dank (push to talk) 02:07, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Hello Dank, sorry it took me so long to reply, but I've been rather busy in real life and I wanted to thing my reply a bit over. Despite my best intentions, I was not able to help out much during my tenure the previous year, and from what it looks like, I fear I will be even less able to do so this year. What time and energy I have I much prefer to spend in article-writing, and besides, I really don't feel I am up to the job of being a coordinator. The project needs people with ideas and experience on structure, collaborations, outreach etc, and I don't see myself too able to contribute there. I wish you all the best, and any support I can give, I will give, but there's definitely other users who will do a better job at it than I did. Constantine ✍ 16:32, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your service, and I'll be happy to ping you when things come up that I think you'd like to know about. - Dank (push to talk) 17:01, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

Hello. There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you.--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 12:55, 15 September 2013 (UTC)

Greetings from WikiProject Military history! As a member of the project, you are invited to take part in our annual project coordinator election, which will determine our coordinators for the next twelve months. If you wish to cast a vote, please do so on the election page by 23:59 (UTC) on 28 September! Kirill ^[talk] 18:21, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

Your Military History Newsletter Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results Articles: Last month's new Featured and A-Class content Book reviews: Nick-D looks at the American Civil War

Wow, thanks! -- llywrch (talk) 04:31, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

And thanks for deleting that external link to the Order of Eugene. When I first saw the link, I thought the Order was simply some Greek Orthodox religious group (monastic or lay), but upon following the link I found it did not pass the smell test & left a post on

WP:FTN for lack of a better place to ask. I know of one more external link to this group which I will handle. -- llywrch (talk

) 16:47, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Good. When I first came across this group, I was by turns laughing and aghast at their presumption... By themselves, they are a tragicomic curiosity, but it appears there are enough gullible people out there who will pay for anything, so if you come across any other reference to them, nuke it with extreme prejudice. And once again thanks for your contributions on the Empire of Trebizond. Cheers, Constantine ✍ 17:55, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Hi. Do you have any information about these alleged members of the crispo family, Fiorenza II Crispo, Co-Lady of Milos and Maria Crispo, Co-Lady of Milos? I don't find anything in the sources except the mention of 2 unnamed daughters in Hopf's genealogical tables here, and the mention of this information in subsequent books by later historians (incl Miller). The problem is (apart from the absence of a name) that Hopf contradicts himself in some of his other books (he writes somewhere that Giacomo died without children, and somewhere else that Giovanni Michiel married another woman of the Crispo family) ; (in his genealogical tables he provides no source, and they are well known for beeing full of errors). Plus, the brides would have been very very young (their parents married only in 1414 of 1415 according to Peter Schreiner) (the first one is supposed to have married in 1419!). There is neither any mention of children in the contemporary Venetian documents about Giacomo's succession (in Thiriet's Régestes du Sénat de Venise. I think that these articles should be deleted, and stay only as a note in Giacomo's article.--Phso2 (talk) 09:29, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, I didn't know anything about these two ladies, and seeing as you have access to more and better sources than I do, I trust your judgement. There's nothing I could find on them in Greek, and the website used in their articles fails WP:RS since the sources used appear to be other genealogists of unverifiable reliability rather than scholarly sources. So go ahead and

WP:AFD them. Constantine ✍

10:51, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I think that greater degre of uncertainty should be introduced into descriptions involving the ownership of the city at this time. I even found a statement that Tsar Peter retained Philippopolis supported by a reference to Fine which flatly contradicted this assertion. Urselius (talk) 14:23, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Hmm, you raise an interesting point, but for this particular period, I think the city was Bulgarian (or at least, under Bulgarian government. The citizens themselves may well have continued to be Greek-speaking and felt themselves "Roman", at least in part). I wouldn't trust Porphyrogennetos too much, as he mixes antiquarian terminology with his own contemporary situation (the quote you gave refers quite clearly to the late antique situation by the very use of the term "eparchia"), and the city was certainly well within the borders of the Bulgarian realm for a long time by Sviatoslav's invasion, borders extant IIRC long before they were recognized by the Byzantines since their 920s peace treaty. I don't know why Fine makes this claim, perhaps the city declared itself free from Bulgarian authority after Sviatoslav's invasion, but I'll have to check this. Give me a few days to re-check the primary sources. Constantine ✍ 14:34, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Fine's assertion is on p. 186. He contrasts the leniency of Sviatoslav to those Bulgarian towns which surrendered to him, saying that Sviatoslav was trying to prevent his troops antagonising the Bulgarians, with his treatment of Philippopolis. His cruelty to the people of Philippopolis, impaling 20,000 of them - allegedly, is hardly in keeping with this policy. However, as an opening attempt to horrify Byzantine public opinion and cow Byzantium's leaders, the Byzantines still being in open arms against him, it is more understandable. Urselius (talk) 19:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Incidentally I recently bought a book - The Byzantine Art of War by Michael J. Decker (2013) Westholme Publishing with several campaign maps inscribed "after Cplakidas" - fame at last? Urselius (talk) 20:09, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Hah, that's nice, and ego-boosting ;). I think I remember some email some time ago requesting permission about such a use, I'll have to re-check it. Good to see that the author attributes the maps, I've seen many maps and other images in Greek newspapers and you'd never know they were taken off Wikipedia and not laboriously made by their graphics department... How is the book, BTW? Is it worth buying? Constantine ✍ 21:21, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

It's not too bad, but the time period - Justinian to 1453 - is too long for much meaningful detail, one section of "illustrative campaigns" jumps from Belisarius in Africa to Nikephoros Phokas in Cilicia-Syria! The arms and armour section is fairly appalling. Urselius (talk) 21:53, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I see. Perhaps one day you should take a shot at writing a more fleshed-out work, I for one would read it (and make more maps for it). BTW, I don't remember if I've asked you before, have you read this book? It should be right up your alley. Constantine ✍ 22:03, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

I have sometimes thought that I could do a better job than some authors; no doubt you have thought the same in regard to your own compositional skills. I would have some difficulty with the book you recommend as I have zero understanding of German. I can read French and make sense out of most of the Latin phrases I come across; I also did a bit of Anglo-Saxon but even that has little in common with Modern German. I’m a typical product of the English educational system, early specialisation. I knew I was going down the science route, so foreign languages were of little or no practical use to me. It did regret it many years later when I had to translate a number of very relevant papers from French. I was once told by a Bavarian friend that my few bits of spoken German had a distinct Sächsische accent. Urselius (talk) 07:39, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

Right, I finally got around to checking Leo the Deacon in the original, and this is what he says: "Ὁ δὲ Σφενδοσλάβος, [...] περιδεεῖς καὶ καταπλῆγας Μυσοὺς τῇ ἐμφύτῳ ἀπηνείᾳ κατεργασάμενος (φασὶ γὰρ τὴν Φιλίππου πόλιν τῷ πολεμεῖν ἐξελὼν, δισμυρίους τῶν ἐν τῷ ἄστει ληφθέντων ὠμῶς καὶ ἀπανθρώπως ἀνασκολοπίσαι, καὶ ταύτῃ τὸ ἀντίξουν ἅπαν ἐκδειματῶσαι καὶ θεῖναι ὑπόσπονδον)", i.e. "Sviatoslav, [...]. had cowed and subdued the Mysians [Bulgarians] with his innate cruelty (for they say that when he took Philip's city by force, he cruelly and inhumanly put to the stake 20,000 of the inhabitants, and in this way all his enemies were terrified and sumbitted seeking terms)". This seems to imply that the city was in Bulgarian hands, and indeed all modern retellings of the Rus' invasion I have read (Obolensky, Stephenson, Whittow, et al.) seem to include the episode within the context of the fall of eastern Bulgaria, and Whittow explicitly calls it a "key Bulgar fortress". Given that Philippopolis along with Serdica and much of Macedonia fell into Bulgarian hands in the mid-9th century, and no (successful) Byzantine attempt at recovery is recorded or even hinted at after, plus the fact that for until Sviatoslav's invasion the Byzantine-Bulgarian border ran approximately along the lines of the modern southern Bulgarian border, Philippopolis must be regarded as a Bulgarian city. Constantine ✍ 10:25, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

The wording of Leo suggests that Philippopolis was Bulgarian, but does not state it beyond dispute. There are some pieces of evidence which might suggest the reverse. I found two Bulgarian publications in English which state that Philippopolis was recaptured by Michael III and Bardas in the 850s (Gjuzelev, V., (1988) Medieval Bulgaria, Byzantine Empire, Black Sea, Venice, Genoa (Centre Culturel du Monde Byzantin). Published by Verlag Baier, p. 130 and Bulgarian Historical Review (2005), United Center for Research and Training in History, Published by Pub. House of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, v.33:no.1-4, p. 9). In Leo VI's Notitia Episcopatuum Philippopolis is described as a metropolis with a number of dependent bishoprics, including: Leuke, Joannitza and Bukuba. The last bishopric was represented in a church council of 869, whilst all three of these bishops subject to Philippopolis were represented at a council of 879. There was one bishop from a see outside of the Empire at the council of 979 - Ochrida in Bulgaria - but this see is not listed in Leo's Notitia. This tends to suggest that the Notitia represents cities within the Empire at the time, rather than being an excercise in antiquariansim; this is supported by the fact that the names of the sees dependent on Philippopolis at the time of Leo VI are entirely different to those described as such in the time of Heraclius. Fine states that the peace treaty with Tsar Peter returned the Thracian frontier to the position it occupied at the time of previous treaties in the 890s and 904. These treaties are not described in detail, or on surviving record, but they date from before the conquests of Symeon. Bulgaria may have had difficulty in retaining Philippopolis long-term because the area, like the rest of Byzantine Thrace, had a monetary economy and Bulgarian beaurocracy, based on renders in kind, was unable to function effectively. Also the actions of the local governor in relation to the threat of Sviatoslav makes no sense if it was a Bulgarian city - all the "other" Bulgarian cities opened their gates to Sviatoslav's army, which at the time included Bulgarian troops, and the Bulgarian Tsar himself was Sviatoslav's prisoner and enforced ally, confined to his own capital. I think that the available evidence is not strong enough to make any certain assertion as to the political status of Philippopolis at this time in its history. Urselius (talk) 11:13, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

The points you raise are interesting but there are two objections. First, the most direct reading of Leo, to me at least and apparently the major modern historians as well, indicates Philippopolis to be in Bulgarian hands; indeed, the argument that the other cities surrendered as opposed to P. is moot if we suppose that Sviatoslav assaulted P. first, after which the other Bulgarian strongholds were cowed and submitted, a reading entirely in the spirit of Leo's passage. Second, your theory contains much hypothesis and little solid evidence, esp. since the Bulgarian Church in its early years is known to have been under Constantinopolitan authority; I don't dispute that your suggestion is a plausible, but I am not qualified for passing judgement on it. As regards the article, I am forced to follow the bibliography I have used, and that is pretty clear. Barring a direct statement to the contrary from a RS, I cannot alter it. Constantine ✍ 21:17, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

There is a considerable difference between reversing a thesis supported by some evidence, and introducing an element of uncertainty, which in turn is supported by other evidence. The Byzantine historians and chroniclers note the loss of cities in battle, but often do not note their later restitution by treaty. This is something that modern historians, such as Steven Runciman, have often repeated. It is generally assumed that Adrianople returned to Byzantine control after being taken by Symeon, but I have never seen a reference to this as a chronicled event. Fine and Ostrogorsky (in Early Medieval Byzantine Cities) place Philippopolis in Byzantine hands in the reigns of Leo VI and Constantine Porphyrogenitus, presumably on the strength of the ecclesiastical records. Fine states that many Bulgarian towns opened their gates to Svyatoslav before the storming of Philippopolis, and makes a pointed contrast between their treatment and the fate of the latter city. BTW, Fine does make a bald statement that "Philippopolis was a Byzantine city" at the time of Svyatoslav's storming of it. Urselius (talk) 15:49, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

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