Isaurian War

The Isaurian War was a conflict that lasted from 492 to 497 and that was fought between the army of the Eastern Roman Empire and the rebels of Isauria. At the end of the war, Eastern Emperor Anastasius I regained the control of the Isauria region and the leaders of the revolt were killed.

During the reign of Theodosius II (r. 408–450) people from Isauria, a poor and mountainous province in Asia Minor, reached for the first time high office in the Eastern Roman Empire. Emperor Leo I (r. 457–474) deliberately promoted Isaurians to important posts in the civil and military administration to counterbalance the power of the hitherto all-powerful Germanic elements. 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 (r. 474–475 and 476–491), killing all the Isaurians in the city in the process.

Zeno returned to the throne in 476, however, this time until his death in 491. Under this emperor his fellow Isaurians prospered, and the opposition to them, although growing, remained latent. In 484, the Isaurian magister militum Illus rebelled against Zeno and fled to the East, where he supported the usurpation of Leontius. That, however, ended in 488 with the capture and execution of both rebel leaders.

In 491 the emperor Zeno died and was succeeded by the silentiarius Anastasius I, chosen by the Empress Ariadne. During the brief interregnum, the Constantinopolitan populace had made its views on the succession clear by cries in the Hippodrome demanding a "Roman emperor", thus rejecting the possible succession of Longinus, Zeno's brother. In the same year, anti-Isaurian riots broke out in the Hippodrome, and Anastasius exiled Longinus and several other Isaurians, including general Longinus of Cardala.

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