The Battle of Milazzo was a naval battle fought in 888 between the

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

and

Aghlabid The Aghlabids ( ar, الأغالبة) were an Arab dynasty of emirs from the Najdi tribe of Banu Tamim, who ruled Ifriqiya and parts of Southern Italy, Sicily, and possibly Sardinia, nominally on behalf of the Abbasid Caliph, for about a ...

fleets off northeastern

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

. The battle was a major Aghlabid victory. It is sometimes known as the Second Battle of Milazzo, counting the

Battle of Stelai The Battle of Stelai was a naval battle fought in 880 between the Byzantine and Aghlabid fleets off the southern Italian peninsula. The battle was a major Byzantine victory. Its location is disputed, hence it is also known as the First Battle o ...

as the First Battle of Milazzo.

Battle

In 888, the

Aghlabids The Aghlabids ( ar, الأغالبة) were an Arab dynasty of emirs from the Najdi tribe of Banu Tamim, who ruled Ifriqiya and parts of Southern Italy, Sicily, and possibly Sardinia, nominally on behalf of the Abbasid Caliph, for about a c ...

mounted a new expedition aimed at

Calabria, with ships from

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

as well as Ifriqiya. Off

Milazzo Milazzo ( Sicilian: ''Milazzu''; la, Mylae; ) is a town (''comune'') in the Metropolitan City of Messina, Sicily, southern Italy; it is the largest commune in the Metropolitan City after Messina and Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto. The town has a p ...

, the fleet met a Byzantine squadron of the Imperial Fleet of

Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya ( Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis ( ...

. The ensuing battle is not mentioned by any Byzantine source, but only by

Ibn Idhari Abū al-ʽAbbās Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʽIḏārī al-Marrākushī ( ar, أبو العباس أحمد ابن عذاري المراكشي) was a Moroccan historian of the late-13th/early-14th century, and author of the famous ''Al-Bayan al-M ...

's '' al-Bayan al-Mughrib'' as well as the '' Cambridge Chronicle''. Both agree that it was a crushing Aghlabid victory—their first in open sea combat: reportedly 5,000 Byzantines drowned, and 7,000 in total (or 7,000 more, depending on the translation from the Arabic) were killed.

Aftermath

In the aftermath of this debacle, the Byzantines abandoned many strongholds they had held in the

Val Demone Val Demone or Val di Demona (English: 'Valley of Demona') is a historical and geographical region encompassing the north-eastern third of Sicily. Historically, it was one of the three valli of Sicily. Val Demone was the last part of the island to ...

, and the remainder, left without hope of Byzantine aid, concluded a truce with the Aghlabid governor of Sicily. Even the garrison and populace of

Rhegion Reggio di Calabria ( scn, label= Southern Calabrian, Riggiu; el, label=Calabrian Greek, Ρήγι, Rìji), usually referred to as Reggio Calabria, or simply Reggio by its inhabitants, is the largest city in Calabria. It has an estimated popula ...

are said to have temporarily abandoned their city for fear of Aghlabid attacks.

References

Sources

* * {{coord missing, Mediterranean 888 880s in the Byzantine Empire

Milazzo

Byzantine Sicily