Siege of Bosporos, 576

The siege of Bosporos was an attack by the Göktürks and their Utigur subjects on the Roman city of Bosporos in the Crimea in 576.^[1] Bosporos was the ancient Panticapaeum, near modern Kerch, and a Roman possession.^[2] Turxanthos sent the commander Bochan against it. Anagai, the ruler of the Utigurs, already lay before it.^[1] The city fell while the Roman envoy Valentinos was still among the Göktürks.^[1] With it the Göktürk realm reached the Crimea, its western limit.^[3]

Background

By 576 the Utigurs east of the Sea of Azov and the neighbouring Alans stood under Göktürk rule.^[4] In that year Valentinos came to Turxanthos. He announced the new Caesar Tiberius and came to renew the alliance against Persia.^[1] He found Turxanthos angry and in mourning for his father Istemi.^[1] Turxanthos charged the Romans with making a treaty with the Avars, the Göktürks’ runaway slaves.^[1] He asked why the Romans led his envoys through the Caucasus. He told them there was no other road, and he answered himself that they did it to keep him from their empire.^[1] He said that he knew very well where the Dnieper, the Danube and the Hebros flowed, and where the Avars had crossed into Roman land.^[1]

The occupation of the Crimea may have been a punishment for the Romans’ conduct. It may also have been a move to forestall an expansion of the Avars.^[3] In that case neighbouring tribes in Europe, probably Turkic, took parts of the Crimea on the Göktürks’ behalf. They acted as allies of lower rank, after the Romans had refused to hand over the Avars who had fled from the Göktürks.^[5]

The attack

After the burial of his father, Turxanthos sent Valentinos on to Tardush on the mountain Ektel.^[1] As the envoy left, Turxanthos threatened to besiege and take Bosporos at once.^[1] The words that gave the reason for the threat are lost in a gap in the text.^[6] Turxanthos sent Bochan with a very large force of Göktürks to destroy the city. Anagai was already encamped there with another Göktürk force.^[1]

Turxanthos may have incited Anagai and Bochan to invade Roman land. Their united forces then besieged Bosporos in a surprise attack in the same year.^[3] In a different account the attack was already under way. Bochan was sent to reinforce the forces under Anagai that were conducting the siege.^[7]

Menander’s next fragment says that the Roman envoys happened to be among the Göktürks when the city of Bosporos was taken.^[1] From this, he writes, it became clear that the Göktürks had gone to war with the Romans.^[1] Turxanthos therefore held Valentinos and his companions. He insulted and mocked them and only then let them go.^[1]

Date

Menander places the embassy about the second year of Tiberius as Caesar, which ran from December 575 to December 576.^[8] One dating puts the siege and the fall of the city in 576, the year of the embassy.^[3] Menander’s fragment agrees, since the city fell while the envoys were still with the Göktürks.^[1] Another dates the attack to 576 and the fall of the city to about 579.^[9]

Aftermath

In another version of events the Göktürks went on to besiege the old Greek fortress city of Cherson.^[3] In that case there was no war with Byzantium. Tardush and Valentinos agreed that the alliance stood, and the Göktürks kept the Crimea occupied.^[3] The siege and occupation of the Crimea would then have lasted until 598.^[10] Menander’s account ends differently. The envoys are held, and open war follows between the Göktürks and Rome.^[1]

A few years later, about 579 or 580, the emperor told the Avar envoys that the Göktürks were already encamped around Cherson and would learn at once if the Avars crossed the Danube.^[1] The Avar envoy saw that the emperor had invented this on purpose, to hold the Avars back by the fear of the Göktürks.^[1] Menander neither affirms nor denies that the Göktürks were in fact there.^[1]

Bosporos is the one Roman city that the Göktürks are recorded to have taken.

References

^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Menander Protector
^ Chavannes 1903, p. 241
^ a b c d e f Yavuz 2025, p. 321
^ Marquart 1903, p. 504-505
^ Yavuz 2025, p. 428
^ Menander Protector; Dindorf 1871, p. 89
^ Golden 1992, p. 130-131
^ Chavannes 1903, p. 240
^ Golden 1992, p. 100,131
^ Yavuz 2025, p. 388

Sources

Menander Protector

Literature

Peter B. Golden, An Introduction to the History of the Turkic Peoples (1992)
Emre-E. Yavuz, The Gokturk Empire: 2nd Edition (2025)
Édouard Chavannes, Documents sur les Tou-Kiue (Turcs) occidentaux (1903)
Josef Marquart, Osteuropäische und ostasiatische Streifzüge (1903)
Ludwig Dindorf (ed.), Historici Graeci minores, Bd. II: Menander Protector et Agathias (1871)