Battle of Sebastopolis

Early in his reign, Justinian II had the ambition to restore the lands of the former Roman Empire, as Emperor Justinian I had during his reign. To accomplish this goal, he aggressively sought combat by undoing measures that brought the peace and prosperity established by his father. Early on, he broke a peace with the Bulgarians and immediately attacked slavic tribes that had established near Thessaloniki. In 688/9, Justinian II forcibly transplanted Slavic populations from the Balkans and settled them in the Opsician Theme, which was depopulated from Arab attacks under Justinian's father reign. He granted them military land grants, and from them he recruited a special military corps, allegedly 30,000 strong, called "the chosen people" (). In about 690, Neboulos was placed as the corps' commander (). Justinian II was bound by a treaty with the Umayyad Caliphate that granted him tribute in gold coins. However, he devised a way to undermine it. He introduced new coins featuring his portrait on one side and Christ's on the other. The leader of the caliphate, Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, made similar coins but omitted Christ's image, making them slightly lighter. Justinian then refused the tribute, claiming that the coins were not equivalent. When Abd al-Malik offered to increase the amount to meet the agreed value, Justinian II declared the treaty broken and began preparations for war. ==Battle==

In 692/3, after the corps' training had been completed, they were employed en masse by Justinian II in a major campaign against the Umayyads under the of the Anatolics, Leontios. The actions of Neboulos ensured the defeat of the Byzantines. ==Aftermath==

Justinian II's defeat deprived him of a viable army to continue his military campaigns, and the rupture of the treaty with the caliphate enabled the Arabs to launch new raids against Byzantine territories. Sources report how, after the battle, Justinian II blamed Leontios for the defeat and imprisoned him. He took his revenge on the remaining Slavs. He disbanded the corps and killed or sold into slavery many of its men, as well as killed the families of the deserters at Leukete near the gulf of Nicomedia. Much of this extermination took place in 694/5; some scholars dispute this account. Neboulos and his men, on the other hand, were settled by the Umayyads in Syria, and were employed in subsequent Arab forays into Byzantine-held Asia Minor. Douglas Whalin contends that the story of Neboulos illustrates the challenges the Byzantine Empire faced in depending on foederati (foreign tribe allies bounded by a treaty) when they were not sufficiently Romanized. ==See also==