Do you have any sources, books or information about what actually happened after the Battle of Manzikert? The myth is that the Battle was a catastrophe, which shattered the Byzantine Empire. But apparently it wasn't the battle that defeated the Romans, but the civil war, backstabbing, treacherous officials selling out the Empire. Local officials even seemed to have invited the Turks in to spite their political opponents or made excessive use of Turkish mercenaries, who betrayed them. WHAT actually happened after Manzikert? Is there a timeline, which explains the WHERE, WHAT and WHEN?
>>17986099There probably isn't, the best source is The Alexiad which is obviously biased and written by a woman who lived on the court, far away from the provinces. But the level of incompetence of upper and middle management had to be staggering if they lost territory which held against arabs for 3 centuries in the matter of a decade.
>>17986099Same thing that always happens and ruins every society: elites withdraw from society and see their existence no longer tied to serving the state but hoarding wealth and power for themselves.
>>17986099I just finished reading this last week. It goes into great detail about the events leading up to and after Manzikert.
>>17986168>It's all the fault of Roussel de Bailleul!
>>17986099Why you gotta be so fucking stupid as to get mad about this? The "disaster of Manzikert" also includes all the circumstances preceding and following the battle, and yes it did destroy the empire.
>>17986136note that Manzikert itself is in eastern Anatolia, near the Armenian border (and mostly Armenian until the 20th century)and yet the Byzantine collapse reached the point where a Turkish warlord took over a bunch of Aegean islands
>Causes a civil war to be Emperor when he is nearly 80 fucking years oldWTF was his problem
>>17986228nta but he was a major cause of the collapse in Anatolia
>>17986228Not really his argument at all. Having 3 new fronts opened during Monomachos reign which included Normans, as well as Seljuks and Pechenegs was definitely a contributing factor.
>>17986256Nigga really wanted to be remember in the history books
