On 5 November 812 Mesembria fell. It was now clear to Michael that he must march once more against his adversary; and this time he must win. All that winter he spent gathering his troops, from every corner of the Empire; and in May 813 he set out. The following month, on the field of Versinicia near Adrianople, the armies came face to face; and on 22 June John Aplakes, commander of the Macedonians on the left wing, led his men into the attack. The Bulgars fell back in confusion, and for a moment it looked as if the battle were over almost before it had begun. But then an astonishing thing happened: the Anatolian troops on the right, commanded by an Armenian named Leo, suddenly turned tail and fled from the field. At first, we are told, Krum stood incredulous; then he and his men fell on the luckless Macedonians and slaughtered them wholesale.

A Short History of Byzantium (Based on the Great Three-Volume Work) by John Julius Norwich, page 126.


http://books.google.com/books?id=xDINAA ... &ct=result

The above link is from the book History of Greece by George Finlay and he states that "John Aplakes, General of the Macedonian and Thracian forces" and that "they consisted chiefly of hardy Sclavonians".

Could it be that John Aplakes was actually a Macedonian himself? Macedonians fighting Bulgars??? Evidently John Aplakes would have had to speak Macedonian to his army.
Is this an unsung Macedonian hero? I will have to say yes.

Great discovery. You have found real treasure of our history. Who knows how many are there waiting for us to discover them. I'm sure we will be astonished in the future by the informations that are waiting for us.

excellent point. just look at what's happening with our archaeological findings. there's treasure everywhere you dig.

great find TM.

Is there any further information on John Aplakes?
Perhaps more unsung Macedonian heroes could come out through knowledge of John Aplakes?
This would be fantastic.

The Macedonians (that is the ancestors of the Macedonians today) were well and truly part of the Byzantine cultural and military matrix - it is interesting though that he associates the "Macedonian Army" with "Sclavonians".

Really. And what is a Byzantine?

I guess Finlay was drunk when he wrote that So you are a descendant from these people you mention above these,,,,"greek" speaking orthodox. So what you are saying is that it's possible that you , a "greek" speaker, could be a hellenized Albanian, Vlach, Macedonian, Bulgarian, Serbian, etc. Is that what you are telling me?

But how did Aplakes communicate to his men who were Macedonian? In "greek"Is that possible? Possibly. Anything is possible in life. But these are hardy sclavonians from Macedonia and Thrace.

So these guys spoke Macedonian. Ok I grasp that.

Didn't we just post on Nicephorus' thread about 2 minutes ago? What about Jordans thread? I would like to see a source that John Aplakes was ethnic "greek" not just "greek speaking". There is a difference.

So they lived in Macedonia and are called Macedonians. Geographical you say. I wonder why the term Hellenes was never used amongst the Byzantine Greek speakers? I mean you said they were descended from the ancient Hellenes. Hellenes came to mean pagan as we all know. But why didn't they just associate Hellene with Orthodoxy? They did live on the same land once inhabited by Pericles and Themistocles. So where's the continuity like Papparigopolous and Zambelios proved?

So he was greek speaking. Alot of people in the Byzantine empire spoke greek. They also spoke Latin and Slavic. So where are we now? Leo had his Anatolian troops to the right and Aplakes had his Macedonian troops on the left according to Norwich. Do we agree on this?

John Aplakes General of MACEDONIA, NOT THEMA MAKDONIA AS YOU SAY. His troops were composed of THRACIAN AND MACEDONIAN TROOPS.

So let's assume he isn't ethnically Macedonian for a second. What is he? I mean maybe he isn't. But maybe he is.

So then we should assume there is no evidence that he was an Anatolian.

I'm sorry but I am still finding it hard to believe that these Byzantine "greek" speakers are from the same stock as teh ancient Hellenes. This is, again, Papparigopolous and Zambelios' propaganda used to show "continuity" of a term hellenism created by a German in the 19th century.

I'll tell you what,,,let's talk here about this. general-discussions/modern-greeks-what-are-you-t12673.html