History in Pictures

[Vetus Ordo]

A thread dedicated to share interesting pictures about historical events.

It's a fun way to learn more things about History and hopefully it will spark more interest among the people here than the common discussions.

Museum of Military History Vienna:

The state-tent of the Grand Vizier Damad Ali Pasha, which served as tent for audiences, was captured by the Austrians in the Battle of Petrovaradin. In the Battle of Petrovaradin on August 5 1716, 80,000 Austrian soldiers, under the leadership of Prince Eugene of Savoy, defeated a 150,000 men strong Ottoman army. The losses on the side of the Ottomans were between 10,000 - 30,000 men, including the Grand Vizier himself, on side of the Austrians ca. 3,000 men. Only 50,000 Ottomans could escape from the Austrians to Belgrade.

The Battle of Petrovaradin or Peterwardein was a decisive victory for the Imperial Army of the Holy Roman Emperor in the war between the Archduchy of Austria of the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire (1716–1718), at Petrovaradin (then part of Military Frontier, Archduchy of Austria; today part of Novi Sad, Vojvodina, Serbia).

History

In 1716, Grand Vizier Damat Ali gathered a 150,000 strong Ottoman army at Belgrade, at the core of which were 40,000 Janissaries, 20,000 Sipahi, and 10,000 Tatars, together with some renegade Kuruc cavalry. They crossed the Sava at Zemun at the end of July, and moved on the right bank of the Danube towards Sremski Karlovci (in the Habsburg territory). The Tatars, with Moldavians and Kurucs drove into Transylvania, but the Transylvanian forces were no match for the Tatars.

The commander of the Austrian forces, Prince Eugene of Savoy, decided to engage the Ottomans at Petrovaradin. He had arranged for the construction of a fortified encampment within the Petrovaradin fortress there, and set the 83,300 strong Imperial army on the march from their quarters in Futog. There was an 8,000 man garrison in the fortress consisting primarily of Serbs. In the Austrian army served Croatian and Hungarian infantry and cavalry regiments (approx. 42,000 men), Serbian border soldiers in the Vojvodina and the auxiliaries from Württemberg.

On August 2, the first skirmish between the Imperial vanguard and Ottoman horsemen occurred. By the next day, the Grand Vizier had already reached Petrovaradin and immediately dispatched 30,000 Janissaries against the imperial positions. They dug saps and began to bombard the fortress.

The core of the Imperial army only crossed the Danube on the night of August 5 by two pontoon bridges after which they encamped.

The Battle and its Effects

At 7 o'clock on the morning of August 5, Prince Eugene began the Austrian offensive. While the right flank under Prince Alexander von Württemberg stormed an Ottoman artillery battery, the Imperials rode into trouble in the center: deployment through the small gate of the Petrovaradin fortress proceeded slowly. The Janissaries went on the counter-attack immediately and forced the imperial army back into the fortress. Prince Eugene sealed off the central incursion with additional troops and sent his cavalry into the Ottoman flanks, by which means they were encircled. The Grand Vizier could not manage to break the encirclement with his sipahis nor could he regroup his troops. The Tatars even pulled back without engaging in combat.

After the defeated Ottomans were wiped out, Prince Eugene personally led his troops against the Grand Vizier's encampment. Supported by the guns of six frigates of the Danube fleet, the battle had been won by two o'clock, with the Grand Vizier himself among the slain. Barely 50,000 Ottomans returned to Belgrade. Soon, from Constantinople came a messenger from the Sultan with order of execution of Damat Ali. He is buried at the Belgrade Fortress, Kalemegdan, in the tomb known as Damad Ali Pašino Turbe.

After the war, a church commemorating this event was built on Tekije, on the hill over battlefield, and is dedicated to Our Lady of Tekije, also known as Our Lady of the Snows. The church is special, because it has both Catholic and Orthodox altars and both Christian denominations use it. The site is a place of pilgrimage on every August 5.

After Petrovaradin, Prince Eugene turned against Timişoara (in Ottoman territory) and captured it despite great resistance and desperate attempts by the Ottomans to relieve the town. Eventually, they admitted defeat and signed a treaty with Austria and her ally Venice.

Church of St. Mary of the Snows:



Petrovaradin fortress, substantially rebuilt in the mid-18th century:

[Vetus Ordo]

Image: "Suitable Answer" by Lado Gudiashvili, 1945. The artist depicted Rûm's knocked out envoy before Queen Tamar.



In July of 1203* the envoy of the Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm arrived in Tbilisi, the Kingdom of Georgia. His mission was to deliver his Sultan’s ultimatum to the Georgian Queen Tamar. It marked yet another attempt by the Seljuks to stem the Georgian southward advances. The story of this conflict is narrated in the contemporary Georgian, Armenian and Islamic sources. The Sultan of Rûm Ruknüddin Süleymanshah II (c. 1196–1204), son of Kilij Arslan II, who overthrew his brother, Sultan Kaykhusraw I and became sultan in 1196, fought hard, with considerable success, to reassemble a once vast state fragmented under his late father. Initially, his relations with the neighboring kingdom of Georgia were ostensibly peaceful, including the exchange of embassies and precious gifts. Through expansionism, the two regional superpowers eventually came into open confrontation in eastern Anatolia and the ruler of Rûm eventually felt strong enough to solve the Georgian problem once and for all by military means.

According to the Georgian chronicles the letter contained the following text:

"I, Ruknüddin, the Sultan of the entire world under heaven, the highest one, likened to the angels sitting beside God, sent (here) by the Great Mohammed, notify you of this, Tamar, the Queen of Georgia. You ordered the Georgians to take up arms and destroy God’s beloved Islamic people; then not satisfied with this, you imposed a vassal’s tribute on a free tribe. Now I am coming to restore justice for the house of the Persians, and to reform you and your people so that you will never dare to take the sword up again, which God has granted us. I will preserve life only to those who will come to my tent before I enter your country and humbly ask for mercy and assume the faith of the Prophet Mohammed and reject your faith, and break with their own hands the cross, on which they vainly set their hopes. And now wait for reprisals from me for the troubles you have inflicted upon all Muslims."

When the letter was read aloud the envoy added: "In reward for her obedience, the sultan promised to marry the Queen on the condition that she embraces Islam; if Tamar doesn’t want to denounce Christianity, he would number her among the other unfortunate concubines in his harem."

When the messenger relayed the sultan’s demand, Zechariah Mkhargrdzeli, a Georgian General of Kurdish-Armenian origin, was so outraged that he slapped him on the face. According to medieval chronicler, who was watching these negotiations, Süleymanshah’s emissary was knocked out "lying down as if dead". When consciousness came back to the unfortunate diplomat, he heard the following words from Zechariah: "If you weren’t an envoy, cutting your tongue out and then cutting your head off would be your punishment." **

The entire Georgian court was infuriated. It was evident that the war was inevitable and the Sultan’s military preparation entered its decisive phase. In order to win more time, the Georgians withheld their answer along with the beaten envoy. As there was no time to waste, the Queen immediately ordered to assemble the Kingdom’s army. Within ten days (that shows quite good mobilization capabilities of the Kingdom) considerable Georgian forces concentrated in Javakheti near the rock-cut Monastery of Vardzia. There Tamar addressed her soldiers inspiring them for decisive battle. Led by the Queen’s consort David Soslan and Generals Ivane Mkhargrdzeli and Shalva Toreli, the army immediately marched to the southwest accompanied by "David’s and Gorgasal’s banner" (flag of Georgia held by Tamar’s great grandfather David IV and attributed to the extremely popular early medieval warrior king of Iberia and call Constantinople's ally Vakhtang I the Wolf Head).

Meanwhile Süleymanshah, joined by his vassal beys and allies, crossed into the Georgian marshlands with a huge army and encamped in the Basiani valley, 60 km northeast of the city of Erzurum in what is now northeastern part of the Republic of Turkey (modern Turkish historians identify the vicinity of Micingerd (Mazankert) as the location).

When the Georgian army approached the town of Kars (called Kari (the Door) by Georgians) at a distance of 1 day’s march, they send off the envoys of the Sultan and the Tamar’s messenger with them, with her answer:

"I, who entrusted myself to the Omnipotent and Almighty God, and ever praying to the Virgin Mary, and with faith and hope on the Holy Cross, read your message which enrages God. Oh, Ruknüddin, don’t you know that every man who falsely swears by the name of the Lord will be wiped off the earth? While you write me such things, I am sending you an army of Christ lovers, not to ask humbly for mercy, but to crush your arrogance and presumption…And the soldiers I have sent are already waiting at your gates."

Georgians made a rapid night time advance into Basiani and assailed the enemy’s camp in the early morning of July 27. In a pitched battle the Seljuk forces managed to roll back several attacks of the Georgians led by David Soslan and commenced counter-attacking, exposing their flanks to the Georgian forces in the rear. Their Commanders Ivane Mkhargrdzeli and Shalva Toreli used this opportunity and stormed a relatively disintegrated enemy formation, finally overwhelming them by pincer movement. The fierce Georgian attack finally broke the Seljuk ranks, the Sultan's banner was lost and the Sultan himself was wounded. That eventually resulted in panic within the Sultanate's forces and in their disorganized retreat. Süleymanshah had to withdraw from the battlefield seeking shelter behind the walls of Erzurum. Probably the defeat and wound accelerated his end that followed in 1204.

The Georgians captured an enormous booty and took many high-ranking prisoners. One of them later was recovered in exchange of one horseshoe. The victory at Basian showed that Tamar’s kingdom was dominant power in the region. It allowed Georgia to consolidate its position in the eastern Anatolia and keep the Seljuk resurgence in check, at the same time creating favorable conditions for further expansion of the Georgian sphere of influence. Next year, the Kingdom of Georgia invaded the eastern Roman province of Chaldia. This military expedition, that coincided with the 4th Crusade, resulted in creation of a new friendly state – the Empire of Trebizond, headed by Tamar’s relative Alexios I Komnenos.

Some time later, on the eve of the fifth Crusade, Amadeus, archbishop of Besançon, received a letter written by a crusader knight who called himself Gerbert de Boyz. The letter told about the news the author had heard in the East:

"Hear, too, other news worthy of your consideration and amazement. We have been able to confirm for certain, through messengers, the truth of the news we had heard, that with divine help the Christians from Iberia called Georgians, together with countless captive soldiers, heavily armed, raised up against the pagan infidels and have already conquered 300 castles and 9 great cities, the stronger ones they have manned, while the weaker ones have been burnt down… they’re coming to Jerusalem to win back the Holy Land subjugating all the territory of the pagans. Their noble king (Tamar's son George IV) is only sixteen years old, but he is equal to Alexander in strength and prowess…"

The above mentioned letter, despite containing a highly exaggerated description, is one of the few documents showing that in Crusader States d'Outremer there were people who were informed about the military strength of the kingdom of Georgia and saw it as a possible ally.

* The battle is variously dated between 1202 and 1205, but 1203 or 1204 has lately been given preference.

** As a lawyer I want to underline two legal aspects of these words:

1. It seems like the punishment required by the law for insulting his/her majesty was as described in the above mentioned phrase.
2. Nevertheless Georgian government respected “diplomatic immunity” to a certain extent. Not commonly accepted practice in the middle ages.

[Vetus Ordo]

The 'God Jesus Christ' mosaic stands as one of the earliest-known testaments to early Christian belief in the divinity of Christ. It was found in 2005 through excavations completed by the Israel Antiquities Authority and the University of Tel Aviv, exploring the ancient grounds beneath the British-built Megiddo Prison in northern Israel. The writing, dated to the year 230 AD, bears three Greek inscriptions, one reading: 'The god-loving Akeptous has offered the table to God Jesus Christ as a memorial'.

Akeptous is reckoned to be a woman who had contributed her table to the local Eucharist celebrations, according to Haaretz.

The survey uncovered the mosaic among one of the earliest-known Christian houses of worship, part of what was the Jewish and Samaritan village of Othnay. Dr Yotam Tepper of the University of Haifa, who led the original excavation, said the mosaic was probably part of a prayer hall in the Christian home. Such homes were the centre of Christian community before established Church buildings were introduced in the fourth century, following the conversion of Roman emperor Constantine.

Images of fish – common early Christian symbols – are also present on the mosaic. The 'Ichthys' (the Greek name for 'fish') was a 'visual pun' imbued with early Christian doctrine. As an acronym it formed the initial letters for the Greek phrase: 'Jesus Christ, Son of God, the Saviour'. The findings are also believed to shed new light on the nature of Roman attitudes to the early church. Traditionally imagined as flatly hostile to the Christian cult, nearby Roman military encampments suggest more tolerance to the new religion.

'Here the Romans had Christian officers,' Tepper said. 'The persecution may have been exaggerated later in the telling. But certainly the tales do not reflect the complexity of the reality, which is that there were Christians in the Roman army.' The donator of the Christian mosaic appears to be that of a Roman centurion named Gaianus, also called 'Porophrius, our brother'.

The Megiddo Prison is currently being cleared of inmates to make space for the establishment of the archaeological tourist attraction, which will host the remains of the Christian home, the Roman encampments and seven flour mills from the Ottoman era.

[Vetus Ordo]

The Iberian (Georgian) Monastery, Greek: Μονή Ιβήρων, Monḗ Ibḗrōn - is an Eastern Orthodox Christian monastery at the monastic state of Mount Athos in northern Greece and ranks third in the hierarchy of the Athonite monasteries. It was built under the supervision of two Georgian monks, John the Iberian and Tornike Eristavi in the 10th century. The monastery served as a major Georgian spiritual and intellectual center in the medieval Roman Empire. It's library contains 2,000 manuscripts, 15 liturgical scrolls, and 20,000 books in Georgian, Greek, Hebrew, and Latin.

[Vetus Ordo]

Jacob Baradaeus (c. AD 500- 578) was an eastern Roman citizen and the Miaphysite bishop of Edessa. His work for the Miaphysites, under the protection of empress Theodora, did contribute in creating the independent hierarchy of the Syriac Church. Jacob was born in Constantia (Tella), near Edessa, in a priestly and well-to-do family of local notables. Since his early childhood Jacob was attracted to monastic life, and in the monastery of Fsilta he learned about the Greek and Syriac Fathers and became very well-read. Later he was ordained a priest and became well-known among the non-Chalcedonian party.

After the accession of Justinian and Theodora to the Imperial dignity in AD 527, the Empress invited Jacob to Constantinople. There, Jacob was not drawn to the court life but preferred to retreat to a monastery instead.



(Empress Theodora, as depicted by Jean-Joseph Benjamin Constant, c. 1887)

Following the outbreak of a new confrontation between the official Imperial Church and the Miaphysites, Theodora asked the patriarch Theodosius of Alexandria, a defender of the Miaphysite cause and visiting the Queen City that time, to ordain Jacob a bishop in order to keep a Miaphysite hierarchy. Thus it was: Jacob was consecrated bishop of Edessa (a great centre of culture and of Christianity that time). Jacob travelled to Egypt, then to Syria, Palestine, Anatolia and Mesopotamia, consecrating Miaphysite bishops and priests, and even a patriarch of Antioch (Sergius of Tella). Jacob had Theodora backing him and Al-Harith (Flavius Arethas), phylarch of the Ghassanid Arabs of the south of the Levant, also backed his mission and received him in his court. During his peregrinations Jacob travelled in disguise, wearing a sackcloth and moving around like a beggar or an anchorite, thus his epithet Baradaeus (Βαραδαῖος) from Syriac Burada'a, sackcloth or hessian.



(A depiction of the court of Flavius Arethas, the Ghassanid Arab Christian phylarch)

Towards the end of his life, Jacob was in favour of a rapprochement between the official Church of the Empire and the non-Chalcedonians: after all, their differences, theologically speaking, were a product of mere verbal misunderstandings, as they professed the very same faith expressed in slightly different words. While on the road to Egypt, Jacob passed away on the 30th or 31st of July 578 in Maiuma, near Gaza of Palestine. His actions in favour of the Syriac hierarchy were so important that the Church itself was known as the Jacobite Church.

Today, he is a saint of the Oriental Orthodox Churches (Copts, Syriacs, and Ethiopians), and many Syriac Catholic parishes also honour him as a such.



(Some of the dioceses of the Syriac Orthodox Church. Many owe their existence to the work of Jacob Baradaeus)

[Vetus Ordo]

Archduke Charles of Austria with his general staff after the battle of Znaim on July 12th 1809 (Franco-Austrian war).

A painting of Felician Myrbach Freiherr von Rheinfeld, ca.1900.



More on the battle of Znaim here.

[Vetus Ordo]

BATTLE OF THE FRIGIDUS

The Battle of the Frigidus, also called the Battle of the Frigid River, was fought between 5–6 September 394, between the army of the Eastern Emperor Theodosius I and the army of Western Roman ruler Eugenius.

Because the Western Emperor Eugenius (though nominally Christian) had pagan sympathies, the war assumed religious overtones, with Christianity pitted against the last attempt at a pagan revival. The battle was the last serious attempt to contest the Christianization of the empire; its outcome decided the outcome of Christianity in the western Empire, and the final decline of Greco-Roman polytheism in favour of Christianity over the following century.

The defeat of Eugenius and his commander, the Frankish magister militum Arbogast, put the whole empire back in the hands of a single emperor for the last time until the final collapse of the Western Roman Empire (not considering the purely nominal claim of Zeno in 480). Theodosius passed the rule of the Western Empire to his younger son Honorius in the following year (with general Stilicho as regent while Honorius was underage).

[Vetus Ordo]

12th century Byzantine shoes.

Byzantine and Christian Museum, Athens.

[drummerboy]

Do they say "Made in China" on the sole? 

[Vetus Ordo]

Saint Maximus the Confessor, (born c. 580, Constantinople), was one of the most important philosophers and theologians of the Roman Empire and Europe, who, through his approximately 90 works, considerably influenced the theology and mysticism of the Middle Ages.

The Life of the Virgin, the only extant copy of which is in a Georgian translation, is also commonly, albeit mistakenly, attributed to him, and is considered to be one of the earliest complete biographies of Mary, the mother of Jesus.

In his early life Maximus was a high-ranking civil servant, and an aide to the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius. However, he gave up this life in the political sphere to enter into the monastic life. Maximus received brilliant education. He studied diverse schools of philosophy, and certainly what was common for his time, the Platonic dialogues, the works of Aristotle, and numerous later Platonic commentators on Aristotle and Plato, like Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, and Proclus. When the Imperial authorities began espousing the Christological position known as Monothelitism, Maximus was drawn into the controversy, in which he supported an interpretation of the Chalcedonian formula on the basis of which it was asserted that Jesus had both a human and a divine will.

He was consequently persecuted for his theological positions; following a trial, his tongue and right hand were mutilated.

Maximus was exiled to Lazica/Colchis. He died on August 13, 662 in the western Georgian province Lechkhumi.

Eventually the Sixth Ecumenical Council (680–681) declared that Christ possessed both a human and a divine will. With this declaration Monothelitism was formally recognized as heresy, and Maximus was posthumously cleared from all charges against him.

Maximus is venerated in both the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches. One of the last great theologians, if not the last, recognized by both East and West.

A few years ago archaeological excavations in one of the medieval churches in Lechkhumi revealed skeletal remains, which are believed to belong to Maximus.

Photo: mural depicting Maximus the Confessor (left) and John of Damascus and the greatest medieval Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli kneeling between them. Medieval Georgian Monastery of the Cross, Jerusalem.

[Vetus Ordo]

The uniform of Emperor Franz II / I († 1835)

(Franz II as Holy Roman Emperor & Franz I as Emperor of Austria)

[Jacob]

I came across this guy posting his parents' wedding album.  These two pictures are the most apropos for the forum.  History on a small scale to be sure.

Wedding, Clara and Angelo, 1950 by Robert Barone, on Flickr

Royal Bronx Wedding, 1950 by Robert Barone, on Flickr

[Vetus Ordo]

French Illustrator Revives the Byzantine Empire with Magnificently Detailed Drawings of Its Monuments & Buildings: Hagia Sophia, Great Palace & More

http://www.openculture.com/2018/08/french-illustrator-revives-the-byzantine-empire.html



The Byzantine Empire fell in the mid-15th century, but something of its spirit still lives on. A great deal of it lives on in the work of the French illustrator Antoine Helbert. "This passion was kindled by a birthday gift from his mother," writes a blogger named Herve Risson in a post about it. "This gift was a book about Byzantium. Helbert was 7 years old." Like many an interest instilled early and deeply enough in childhood, Helbert's fascination turned into an obsession — or anyway, what looks like it must be an obsession, since it has motivated him to create such magnificently detailed recreations of Byzantium in its heyday.



"Attracted by the architecture," Risson writes of Helbert, "he has also a strong passion for the history of the Byzantine Empire, much maligned and despised, in comparison with the history of the 'real' Roman Empire."

That's not to say that the Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, has received no attention, but undoubtedly it has received less than the Western Roman Empire it survived in the fifth century. Still, few historical empires of any kind receive such an exquisite degree of attention from any single living artist.



You can see some of Helbert's work on his site, which is divided into two sections: one for scenes of Byzantium, and one for the architecture of Byzantium. The latter category, images from which you see here, includes such world-famous landmarks as Hagia Sophia, Boukoleon Palace, and the Great Palace of Constantinople — the city now known as Istanbul, Turkey. The intact Hagia Sophia continues to attract tourists in huge numbers, but those who visit the Great Palace, or what remains of it, have to use their imagination to get a sense of what it must have looked like in the Byzantine Empire's heyday.



Helbert, who only made his first visit to Istanbul at the age of 35, has put in that amount of imaginative work and much more besides. "Since then," writes Risson, Helbert "has taken great care to resurrect the city of the emperors, with great attention to details and to the sources available. What he can’t find, he invents, but always with a great care for the historical accuracy." Indeed, many of Helbert's illustrations don't, at first glance, look like illustrations at all, but more like what you'd come up with if you traveled back to the Constantinople of fifteen or so centuries ago with a camera. "The project has no lucrative goal," Risson notes. "It’s a passion. A byzantine passion!"

[Kaesekopf]

I came across this guy posting his parents' wedding album.  These two pictures are the most apropos for the forum.  History on a small scale to be sure.

Wedding, Clara and Angelo, 1950 by Robert Barone, on Flickr

Royal Bronx Wedding, 1950 by Robert Barone, on Flickr

Sanctuary is way cluttered in that second pic!  :O

Sent from my STV100-1 using Tapatalk

[Jacob]

Sanctuary is way cluttered in that second pic!  :O

V2 council fathers would freak out at that pic.