Battle of Balanjar (650s)

The Battle of Balanjar was a battle that took place during the First Khazar-Arab War between the armies of the Khazar Khaganate and the Caliphate, whose commanding general was Abd ar-Rahman ibn Rabiah.

Battle of Balanjar
Part of the Arab–Khazar Wars
Date AD 650 Location Outside Balanjar Result Khazar victory
Belligerents
Khazar Khaganate	The Islamic Caliphate
Commanders and leaders
Unknown (possibly Irbis)	Abd ar-Rahman ibn Rabiah
Strength
?	?
Casualties and losses
?	?

Ibn Rabiah, probably the brother of Salman ibn Rabiah, governor of Armenia, was charged with the task of conquering the Khazars and, to this purpose, invaded the northern Caucasus in the late 640s. In 652 (or according to some sources, 642) Abd ar-Rahman and his army met a Khazar force outside Balanjar and were annihilated. According to Arab historians such as al-Tabari, both sides in the battle used catapults against the other.

See also

• Battle of Balanjar (disambiguation)

References

• Kevin Alan Brook. The Jews of Khazaria. 2nd ed. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc, 2006.
• Douglas M. Dunlop. The History of the Jewish Khazars, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1954.
• Peter B. Golden. Khazar Studies: An Historio-Philological Inquiry into the Origins of the Khazars. Budapest: Akademia Kiado, 1980.
• Norman Golb and Omeljan Pritsak, Khazarian Hebrew Documents of the Tenth Century. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press, 1982.