Dateline: Khazia 28 August 997: A mid-summer razzia by an all mounted army from the Ghaznavid Emirate was stopped yesterday by the remnants of the declining Khazar Khanate in the steppes northeast of the Khazar Sea (mistakenly known by Europeans as the Caspian Sea). Previously, ambassadors from the Ghaznavid Emir requested free passage for an army through Khazar and Ghuzz territory with the intent of raiding Patzinak lands along the River Don and capturing the Byzantine Empire's remaining foothold on the northern shores of the Black Sea in the Crimean Peninsula.

The Khazar Khan refused this request and immediately mobilized the Khazar nobles and levies along with some Rus heavy infantry to supplement their standing regular army of Arsiyah horse mercenaries. The Khazar Beq (i.e., C-in-C) led this force out of the capital of Itil and around the northern end of the Khazar Sea, deploying directly across the Ghaznavid line of march, on the south side of the River Emba.

Anchoring his left with bolt shooters on a rocky promontory supported by a swarm of Ghazar light horse, the Beq placed his three close order infantry units in his center. The mounted regulars, consisting primarily of muslim mercenaries originally from the regions of Khorasan, took the more exposed position on the right. The Khazar nobles, two heavy cavalry units, were held in reserve, slightly to the right of center.

Storm Forward

The Ghaznavid horde stormed forward upon sight of the waiting Khazars, but not without a careful deployment in response to the latter's troop placements. Refusing the right flank with light horse that made rapid feinting movements while flinging a continuous barrage of arrows, a Ghaznavid left oblique approach - reminiscent of Alexander the Great saved to pin the Khazar center and execute the major push with their left flank consisting mainly of heavy cavalry supported by elephants.

Pivoting on their elephants, and rounding a knob of rough rocky ground, the Ghaznavid heavy horse successfully outflanked the Khazar right. None of the Khazar horse were spooked by the appearance of enemy elephant units, and the masses of Khazar bows chewed up many of the charging Ghaznavids. Then, with the Arsiyah light horse dancing out of the way, first the regular heavy horse, and then the Khazar reserves, sacrificed themselves in a successful bid to smash the main thrust of the opposing heavy cavalry, allowing time for their infantry center to change facing to the right, and regroup the light horse to protect their otherwise exposed flanks.

The battle ended there, with the most of the remaining Ghaznavid units in a somewhat weakened state due primarily to the continuous rain of Khazar arrows, with no little help from the Khazar bolt shooters, but with the still intact Khazar infantry line unable to mount an offensive against horse which could easily dance out of the way and exploit even the slightest exposed flank.

When asked why his rather limited number of heavy units were able to break up the flanking charge by the massive numbers of Ghaznavid heavies, the Beq replied, "We seem to have had more and better archers, which weakened many of the enemy units before they could get to us. Also, it seems my timing was right on when and where to throw in our reserves. Sometimes you get lucky.... On the other hand, these Ghazies have always been real twits.."

The Ghaznavid commander was later asked why he held back until the last his elite heavy cavalry regulars, which never got into action. He replied, "Well, if you have to know, the silly buggers got into the kumis last night and were totally smashed this morning. So, we stuffed some camp followers into their armor and shoved them out onto the field just for show, hoping they wouldn't fall off their mounts. Naturally, we couldn't put those poor bastards into battle.."

As night fell over the camps of these two exhausted armies, a messenger arrived with news of Khazar reinforcements approaching in the form of more Arsiyah heavy horse supported by a swarm of light horse from the Burta tribes. The next morning, the Ghaznavid camp was empty, and scouts reported them heading southwards toward their homeland.

Once again, as they have done so many times over the last two and a half centuries of conflict with the muslim world, the Khazars have prevented an Asiatic invader from flanking the Byzantine Empire by circumventing the Black Sea.

Author's note: Dennis Leuenthal and Oliver Silsby dusted off the Hong Kong Society of Wargamers' Belorum rules for ancient and dark ages wargaming to have this battle between their respective Asiatic hordes. Belorum is a rule system created by a group of HKSW members back in 1991-92. They were created before DBM appeared in Hong Kong, and, as in the case with DBM, were a response to a demand for rules that were easier to learn and play than the old WRG 7th Edition rules. Dennis notes that back in 1991, the HKSW membership had a total of 27 Biblical period chariot armies in action using these rules. After the arrival of DBM, interest in this period seemed to dwindle amongst the HKSW membership.