Byzantine Battles: Battle of Cotyaeum

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Battle of Cotyaeum (Cotiaeum)	year: 492
Defeat of the Isaurian rebels by the Imperial army	★ ★ ★ ★ ★

enemy: Isaurian Rebels	location: City of Cotyaeum (ancient Greek name: Kotyaion) in the territory of Mysia, modern Kütahya in western Asia Minor	accuracy: ●●●●●
battle type: Pitched Battle	war: Military Revolts	modern country: Turkey

	▼ The Byzantines(emperor: Anastasius I)	▼ The Enemies
Commander:	Ioannes the Scythian & Ioannes the Hunchback	Linginines
Forces:	Unknown	Unknown
Losses:

Background story:

Emperor Leo I had promoted Isaurians to important posts in the civil and military administration as a counterbalance to the power of the hitherto all-powerful officials of Germanic or Alan origin (like Aspar).
The Isaurians however were despised as semi-barbarians by the people of Constantinople, who in 473 rose in an anti-Isaurian revolt in the Hippodrome and in 475 overthrew the newly-crowned Isaurian emperor Zeno killing all the Isaurians in the city. But Zeno returned to the throne and, during his reign, his fellow Isaurians prospered. In 491, Zeno died and was succeeded by Anastasius I. The populace still hated Isaurians and Anastasius had a good excuse to exile the relatives of Zeno and several other Isaurians in high positions.
The Isaurians who had a strong presence in the army revolted in 492. Emperor Anastasius sent an army against them under the command of his trusted generals the magister militum per Orientem Ioannes the Scythian and the magister militum praesentalis per Orientem Ioannes Kyrtos (the Hunchback), also known as Flavius Ioannes Gibbus or John Gibbo. Both were probably of Gothic origin.

The Battle:

Byzantine officer

In battle at Cotyaeum, in west central Turkey, the Imperial army under Ioannes the Scythian and Ioannes the Hunchback secured a decisive victory and the Isaurian leader Linginines was killed. However, pockets of rebellion in Isauria persisted until 497.
From 494 to 497 the Isaurians closed themselves in their fortresses in the Isaurian mountains, where they were being supplied through the port of Antioch. In 497 John the Scythian killed Longinus of Cardala and his deputy, Athenodorus, whose heads were exposed on a spear in Tarsus, thus effectively ending the war.

Noteworthy:

According to Procopius, Ioannes Kyrtos intended to kill Justin for a disciplinary offense. But at night in his sleep a superhuman creature appeared and asked him to spare Justin's life. Kyrtos ignored it, but the dream was repeated more intensely for the next two nights, when the general was persuaded to release Justin, who 20 years later became emperor out of nowhere.

Aftermath:

This battle was the first and most severe conflict of the 6-year Isaurian War (492-497).
The war today looks like a lesser event in the long history of Byzantium. However for the contemporaries was big. The poet Christodorus commemorated the war in a now-lost poem in six books, entitled Isaurica. Also, after the final victory the two generals became consuls.