Open AccessLEO VI ARABUS? An Unknown Fragment from the Arabic Translation of Leo VI’s Taktika
Author(s) -
Nikolaj Serikoff
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
acta orientalia vilnensia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2424-6026
pISSN - 1648-2662
DOI - 10.15388/aov.2003.18271
Subject(s) - byzantine architecture , arabic , emperor , classics , officer , fragment (logic) , literature , history , ancient history , philosophy , art , linguistics , computer science , archaeology , algorithm
The aim of this article is to introduce a hitherto unknown Arabic quotation from the military manual written originally in Greek under the name of the Byzantine Emperor Leo VI (886-912). This quotation is found in the fourteenth century Arabic military treatise At-tadbīrāt as-sulṭānīyya fī siyāsat aṣ-ṣanā’i’ al-ḥtarbīyya written by a Mamlūk high ranking officer, a “colonel” Ibn Mankalī. Greek quotations and longer passages found in military manuals of the Arabs are of great importance. They allow a modern historian to evaluate Byzantine influence on Arab military thought and, moreover, occasionally give some ideas on medieval Arab military intelligence.