«Тахиййат»: Сборник статей в честь Н. Н. Дьякова

m 62 n Dimitrios G. Letsios Byzantine Foreign, Defence And Demographic Policy During the Establishment of the Umayyad Caliphate: The Case of the Mardaites * T he historical research dealing with events of the seventh and eighth centuries is confronted with the obscurity and paucity of the source material; it is for this reason that this period is labelled as “dark age” 1 . However especially the voluminous analysis of the seventh century his- tory of Byzantium by A. Stratos 2 , as well as a number of recent scholarly works, have certainly improved our knowledge and modified our picture of this period 3 . More precisely and in connection to defence and demo- graphic policy attention has been drawn in special articles and studies and in collective publications devoted to the foreign policy and the external relations of the Byzantine Empire or to social issues, which are interlinked with demography and military strategy during this period 4 . It should be *This is a slightly altered version of the paper read at the Conference “Byzantium and the Arab World” organized by Aristotle University, Thessaloniki, in 2011 (published in Proceed- ings of the Conference “ Byzantium and the Arab World ” , Aristotle University, Thessaloniki, December 2011 ). 1 Kountoura-Galake (2001); Haldon (2001). 2 Stratos (1968–1980). 3. Cf. among others: Kennedy (1986); Hawting (1986); Haldon (1990); Haldon (1995); Lilie (1976); Lilie (1995); Lilie (2005); Brandes (1989); Donner (1981); Kaegi (1992); Ka- plony (1996); Cosentino (2007). 4 Charanis (1992); Shepard and Franklin (eds.) (1992); Smythe (ed.) (2000).