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The rise of Paphlagonia in importance may be connected with the active Pontic policy of Theophilus. It is not without significance that Paphlagonian ships played a part in the expedition which he sent to Cherson, and we may conjecture with probability that the creation of the Theme of the Klimata on the north of the Euxine and that of Paphlagonia on the south were not isolated acts, but were part of the same general plan. The institution of the Theme of Chaldia, which was cut off from the Armeniac Theme (probably A.D. 837), may also be considered as part of the general policy of strengthening Imperial control over the Black Sea and its coastlands, here threatened by the imminence of the Moslem power in Armenia. To the south of Chaldia was the duchy of Koloneia, also part of the Armeniac circumscription. In the following reign (before A.D. 863) both' Koloneia and Cappadocia were elevated to the rank of Themes.

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The Themes of Europe, which formed a class apart from those of Asia, seem at the end of the eighth century to have been four in number-Thrace, Macedonia, Hellas, and Sicily. There were also a number of provinces of inferior rankCalabria, under its Dux; Dalmatia and Crete, under governors who had the title of archon; while Thessalonica with the adjacent region was still subject to the ancient Praetorian

is that Paphlagonia was a katepanate before it acquired the rank of a straté gia. Michael, Vita Theod. Stud. 309, referring to the reign of Michael II., speaks οἱ τὸ θέμα τῶν Παφλαγόνων, but the use of dépa in such a passage cannot be urged as evidence for the date.

1 See below, p. 416.

The circumstances are discussed

below, p. 281. Chaldia may have also existed already as a separate command of less dignity under a Duke. For Takt. Usp., which mentions the strategos, names also in another place (119) ὁ δοὺξ Χαλδίας. Ι explain this as a survival from an older official list, which the compiler neglected to eliminate. In the same document aрxovтes of Chaldia are also mentioned. These were probably local authorities in some of the towns, like the archons of Cherson.

The evidence for a Dux of Koloncia under Theophilus is in an account of the Amorian martyrs dating from

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A.D. 845-847 (Acta 27, 29). The Emperor before his death directed that Kallistos Melissenos should be sent to Koloneia καὶ τὴν τοῦ δουκὸς διέπειν ἀρχήν. Kallistos is called a turmarch in Simeon, Add. Georg, 805; Koloneia was doubtless a turmarchy in the Armeniac Theme. Koloncia is not mentioned by the Arabic writers who depend on Al-Garmi or in the Takt. Usp. I conclude that till after the death of Theophilus it had not been separated from the Armeniac Theme, or, in other words, that Kallistos was the first Dux. Another inference may be that the Taktikon represents the official world immediately after the accession of Michael III.

Cont. Th. 181. Cp. Brooks, op. cit. 70, for Masudi's evidence.

Calabria: Gay, L'Italie mér. 7 ; Takt. Usp. 124. Dalmatia: 6 pxwv A., ib. Crete: ib. 119 o apxwv K. (which I interpret as a case, like that of Chaldia, where an older office is retained in the list).

Prefect of Illyricum, an anomalous survival from the old system of Constantine.' It was doubtless the Slavonic revolt in the reign of Nicephorus I. that led to the reorganization of the Helladic province, and the constitution of the Peloponnesus as a distinct Theme, so that Hellas henceforward meant Northern Greece. The Mohammadan descent upon Crete doubtless led to the appointment of a stratêgos instead of an archon of Crete, and the Bulgarian wars to the suppression of the Praetorian prefect by a stratêgos of Thessalonica.* The Theme of Kephalonia (with the Ionian Islands) seems to have existed at the beginning of the ninth century; but the Saracen menace to the Hadriatic and the western coasts of Greece may account for the foundation of the Theme of Dyrrhachium, a city which probably enjoyed, like the communities of the Dalmatian coast, a certain degree of local independence. If so, we may compare the policy of Theophilus in instituting the stratêgos of the Klimata with control over the magistrates of Cherson."

It is to be noted that the Theme of Thrace did not include the region in the immediate neighbourhood of Constantinople, cut off by the Long Wall of Anastasius, who had made special provisions for the government of this region. In the ninth century it was still a separate circumscription, probably under the military command of the Count of the Walls, and Arabic writers designate it by the curious name Talaya or Tafla."

A table will exhibit the general result of all these changes:

Stratégias

ASIATIC THEMES

1. Anatolic. 2. Armeniac. 3. Thrakesian.
4. Opsikian. 5. Bukellarian.

6. Cappadocia. 7. Paphlagonia. 8. Chaldia.
9. Koloneia.

Kleisurarchiai-10. Charsianon,

Theodore Stud. Epp. i. 3, p. 917 (TOû úπáрxov). This evidence is overlooked by Gelzer, Themenrerfussung, 38 sqq.

2 First mentioned in Scr. Incert. 336 (A.D. 813).

See below, p. 289.
Takt. Usp. 115.

See below, p. 324. Takt. Usp. 113.

11. Seleucia.

• Ib. 115 ; ep. 124 οἱ ἄρχοντες τοῦ Δυρραχίου.

7 See below, p. 417.

See Bury, op. cit. 67-68.

9 Talaya seems to be the best attested form (Brooks, op. cit. 69, 72). Gelzer, 86 sqq., operates with Tafla and thinks the district was called ή τάφρος. The solution has not yet been discovered.

Stratégiai

Ducate

NAVAL THEMES

1. Kibyrrhaiot. 2. Aigaion Pelagos,

EUROPEAN (AND OTHER) THEMES

1. Macedonia. 2. Thrace.

3. Hellas. 4. Peloponnesus.

6. Dyrrhachium.

5. Thessalonica.

7. Kephalonia. 8. Sicily. 9. Klimata. 10. Calabria.

Archontates . 11. Dalmatia. 12. Cyprus.

II. There were considerable differences in the ranks and salaries of the stratêgoi. In the first place, it is to be noticed that the governors of the Asiatic provinces, the admirals of the naval Themes, and the stratêgoi of Thrace and Macedonia were paid by the treasury, while the governors of the European Themes paid themselves a fixed amount from the custom dues levied in their own provinces. Hence for administrative purposes Thrace and Macedonia are generally included among the Asiatic Themes. The rank of patrician was bestowed as a rule upon the Anatolic, Armeniac, and Thrakesian stratêgoi, and these three received a salary of 40 lbs. of gold (£1728). The pay of the other stratêgoi and kleisurarchs ranged from 36 to 12 lbs, but their stipends were somewhat reduced in the course of the ninth century. We can easily calculate that the total cost of paying the governors of the eastern provinces (including Macedonia and Thrace) did not fall short of £15,000.

1 Constantine, Cer. 697, referring to the reign of Leo VI. There is every reason to suppose that the system was older.

Ibn Khurdadhbah, 85. "The pay of the officers is at the maximum 40 lbs; it descends to 36, 24, 12, 6 and even to 1 lb." The salaries which obtained under Leo VI. (Cer., ib.) enable us to apply this information. There we have 5 classes :-(1) 40 lbs. : Anatol., Arm., Thrakes. (2) 30 lbs. : Opsik., Bukell., Maced. (3) 20 lbs.: Capp., Chars., Paphl., Thrace, Kol. (4) 10 lbs. Kib., Samos, Aig. Pel. (5) 5 lbs.: 4 kleisurarchies. It is clear that in the interval between Theophilus and Leo VI. the salaries, with the exception of the highest, had

been lowered (Cer., ib.). If we apply the figures given by Ibn Khurdadhbah to the corresponding categories in the table of Themes under Michael III. (36 lbs. = £1555: 4s. ; 24 lbs. = £1036 16s. ; 12 lbs. £518: 8s. ; 6 lbs. = £259: 4s.), we get for the total amount paid to the military commanders £16,558 : 16s. But it must be remembered that the reduction of salaries may have been made under Michael III., or even before the death of Theophilus, and may have been connected with the increase in the number of the Themes. It seems, for instance, probable that when Koloneia became a strategia the salary may have been fixed at 20 lbs. But the data are sufficient for a rough estimate.

Q

In these provinces there is reason to suppose that the number of troops, who were chiefly cavalry, was about 80,000.1 They were largely settled on military lands, and their pay was small. The recruit, who began service at a very early age, received one nomisma (128.) in his first year, two in his second, and so on, till the maximum of twelve (£7: 4s.), or in some cases of eighteen (£10: 16s.), was reached.2

The army of the Theme was divided generally into two, sometimes three, turms or brigades; the turm into drungoi or battalions; and the battalion into banda or companies. The corresponding commanders were entitled turmarchs, drungaries, and counts. The number of men in the company, the sizes of the battalion and the brigade, varied widely in the different Themes. The original norm seems to have been a bandon of 200 men and a drungos of 5 banda. It is very doubtful whether this uniform scheme still prevailed in the reign of Theophilus. It is certain that at a somewhat later period the bandon varied in size up to the maximum of 400, and the drungos oscillated between the limits of 1000 and 3000 men. Originally the turm was composed of 5 drungoi (5000 men), but this rule was also changed. The number of drungoi in

1 Ibn Kudama, 197 sqq., gives the total for the Asiatic provinces as 70,000, but the sum of his items does not correspond. The number of troops in Paphlagonia is omitted, and Gelzer is probably right in supplying 4000 (op. cit. 98). He is also right in observing that the figure 4000 assigned to the Armeniacs must be wrong, but I cannot agree with his emendation, 10,000. For the number of the Thrakesians 6000 must also be incorrect; they cannot have been less numerous than the Bukellarians, who were 8000. I would therefore write 8000 for the Thrakesians, and 8000 for the Armeniacs (not too few for this Theme reduced by the separation of Chaldia and Charsianon). With these corrections we get the required sum 70,000. The same author gives 5000 for Thrace, to which we must add another 5000 for Macedonia (but these numbers may be under the mark). Ibn Khurdadhbah (84) asserts that the whole army numbered 120,000 men, and a patrician (i.e. a stratégos) commanded 10,000. The actual organ.

ization never corresponded to this scheme, and it has no historical value. The figures 120,000 may indeed roughly correspond to the actual total, if we include the Tagmata and all the forces in Hellas and the Western provinces.

2 Ibn Khurdadhbah makes two contradictory statements about the pay (1) it varies between 18 and 12 dinars a year (84), and (2) beardless youths are recruited, they receive 1 dinar the first year, 2 the second, and so on till their twelfth year of service, when they earn the full pay of 12 dinars. Perhaps the explanation is that the first passage only takes account of the "full pay.' This may

have varied in different Themes; or higher pay than 12 dinars may have been that of the Tagmatic troops, or of the dekarchs (corporals). In any case Gelzer is wrong in his estimate of the pay (120). He commits the error of taking the dinar to be equivalent to a franc (or rather 91 pfennige). But the dinar represents the Greek nomisma. The dirham (drachma) corresponds to a franc.

the turm was reduced to three, so that the brigade which the turmarch commanded ranged from 3000 upwards.

The pay of the officers, according to one account, ranged from 3 lbs. to 1 lb., and perhaps the subalterns in the company (the kentarchs and pentekontarchs) are included; but the turmarchs in the larger themes probably received a higher salary than 3 lbs. If we assume that the average bandon was composed of 300 men and the average drungos of 1500, and further that the pay of the drungary was 3 lbs., that of the count 2 lbs. and that of the kentarch 1 lb., the total sum expended on these officers would have amounted to about £64,000. But these assumptions are highly uncertain. Our data for the pay of the common soldiers form a still vaguer basis for calculation; but we may conjecture, with every reserve, that the salaries of the armies of the Eastern Themes, including generals and officers, amounted to not less than £500,000.1

The armies of the Themes formed only one branch of the military establishment. There were four other privileged and differently organized cavalry regiments known as the Tagmata : 2 (1) the Schools, (2) the Excubitors, (3) the Arithmos or Vigla, and (4) the Hikanatoi. The first three were of ancient foundation; the fourth was a new institution of Nicephorus I., who created a child, his grandson Nicetas (afterwards the Patriarch Ignatius), its first commander.3 The commanders of these troops were entitled Domestics, except that of the Arithmos, who was known as the Drungary of the Vigla or Watch. Some companies of these Tagmatic troops may have been stationed at Constantinople, where the Domestics usually resided, but the greater part of them were quartered in Thrace,

We cannot, I think, use the evidence in the documents concerning the Cretan expeditions of A.D. 902 and 949 (in Constantine, Cer. ii. chaps. 44 and 45) for controlling the Arabic statements as to the pay of soldiers and officers. For instance, we find the detachment of 3000 Thrakesians receiving 2 nomismata each (p. 655) in A.D. 902; and men of the Sebastean Theme receiving 4 n. each (p. 656), while the officers of the same Theme are paid-turmarchs 12 n., drungaries 10 n., counts 5 n. It seems probable

that these sums represent extra pay given for special expeditions oversea, and are outside the regular military budget. See below. We cannot draw conclusions from the sum of 1100 pounds = £475,222 which was sent in A.D. 809 to pay the army on the Strymon, as we do not know the number of the troops or whether the sum included arrears.

2 See Bury, Imp. Admin. System, 47 sqq.

3 Nicet. Vila Ign. 213.

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