On this day, we commemorate the Byzantine victory at the Battle of Andrassos.
On November 8th, 960 A.D., in an unidentified mountain pass on the Taurus Mountains, the Romioi (Byzantines) under Leo Phokas the Younger crushed the forces of the Hamdanid Emirate of Aleppo under the Emir Sayf al-Dawla.
The Battle is considered by many scholars to have finally broken the power of the Hamdanid Emirate.
Having lost much of his strength, and increasingly beset by illness, Sayf al-Dawla would never be able to renew his annual Jihad and raid into Romaic territory again.
Led by Leo's brother Nikephoros Phokas, the Romioi now launched a sustained offensive that by 969 had liberated Cilicia and northern Syria around Antioch, and resulted in the vassalisation of Aleppo itself.
Today, we honor the memory of those brave Romioi that dealt this crushing defeated upon the Arab hordes of the Hamdanid Emirate.
May their memory be eternal!
READ MORE: READ MORE: November 8, 1912 – The Liberation of Florina.
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