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Byzantine Empire: Asia Minor
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Throughout centuries, Byzantine Empire transformed into a totally different civilization. The Greek influence was the main actor of this change in terms of religion, culture and the most important of all; the language. First they adopted the orthodox faith of Christianity, and begun to use the Greek language together with Latin. However, the Byzantines through the course of the first millennium AD had to struggle with cultural influences and political threats from European cultures, Asian cultures and, especially, Islam after the seventh century.
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By the early fourteenth century, the Byzantine Empire had retained Asia Minor, the Balkans, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and North Africa. In addition, it had recovered Spain from the Visigoths, Italy from the Lombards and most of the southern coast of France from the Franks. Clashes continued to occur at the frontiers against "barbarians" such as the nomadic Jurchen tribes north of the Danube and the Franco-Saxons of Western Europe.
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In 610 when Heraclius came from Carthage to take the throne of the Byzantine empire, Sergius became the patriarch of the Constantinople church. The empire had been overrun by Slavs and Avars in the Balkans and by Persians in Asia Minor. Heraclius was so discouraged that he planned to move his capital to Carthage; but Sergius energetically opposed this plan and aroused the people. According to the laudatory poet George of Pisidia, Heraclius proclaimed that power must shine more in love than in terror. In 611 the Persians had been pushed out of Caesarea; but they invaded Syria, taking Antioch in 613 and Damascus, and the next year they captured Jerusalem after a 20-day siege. They pillaged the city, destroyed churches, and took the relic of the cross back to Ctesiphon.
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Three Byzantine successor states were left - the Empire of Nicaea, the Empire of Trebizond, and the Despotate of Epirus. The first, controlled by the Palaeologan dynasty, managed to reclaim Constantinople in 1261 and defeat Epirus, reviving the empire but giving too much attention to Europe when the Asian provinces were the primary concern. For a while the empire survived simply because the Muslims were too divided to attack, but eventually the Ottomans overran all but a handful of port cities.
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Mehmed and his successors continued to consider themselves proper heirs to the Byzantine Empire until the demise of the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century. By the end of the 15th century, the Ottoman Empire had established its firm rule over Asia Minor and parts of the Balkan peninsula.
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